The Wizard of Oz (1982 film) facts for kids

Quick facts for kids The Wizard of Oz オズの魔法使い
Screenshot of The Wizard of Oz anime, featuring the four main characters
Directed by	Fumihiko Takayama
Produced by	John Danylkiw
Written by	Akira Miyazaki Yoshimitsu Banno
Starring	Aileen Quinn Lorne Greene
Music by	Joe Hisaishi Yuichiro Oda
Editing by	Nobuo Ogawa Johann Lowenberg
Studio	Topcraft
Distributed by	Alan Enterprises (North America) Toho/TV Tokyo (Japan)
Release date(s)	October 6, 1982 (North America) December 31, 1986 (Japan)
Running time	78 minutes
Country	Japan
Language	English
Money made	$612,300 (North America)

The Wizard of Oz (オズの魔法使い, Ozu no Mahōtsukai) is a 1982 anime feature film directed by Fumihiko Takayama, from a screenplay by Yoshimitsu Banno and Akira Miyazaki, which is based on the 1900 children's novel by L. Frank Baum, produced by Yoshimitsu Banno and Katsumi Ueno for Toho Co., Ltd. The film was originally shown at the Cannes Film Festival, but did not have a regular run in U.S. theatres.

In the 1980s, a re-edited version of the film was released in Czechoslovakia. The film was dubbed into the Slovak language except for the songs, which were performed by Japanese singers (from the original Japanese music version). Some other foreign dubs, such as the Italian and Greek versions, had this premise edit as well.

Cast

Relation to other works

The Novel

The film is known for staying particularly close to the novel, its primary elimination being the journey to Glinda, which is only now slightly less of a deus ex machina than in the MGM version. Also borrowed from that version are the red "magic shoes" rather than the silver shoes of Baum's text. Some familiarity with the later books is clear, as the houses are the same two-chimneyed domes found in the artwork of John R. Neill, who never illustrated the first Oz book. It is one of the rare films to depict the various forms the Wizard appears to each of the travelers, such as the Beautiful-Winged Lady (shown to be a puppet rather than the Wizard in a costume, as in the book), the Terrible Beast (looking like an ordinary rhinoceros) and the Ball of Fire.

Film and television anime

Although this movie is in no way related to the 1986 anime television series produced by Panmedia outside of having the same source material, the fact that the movie was released in Japan in the same year that the TV series was first broadcast (and that both this film and the TV series were released in English in the U.S. and Canada) sometimes leads to the two works being confused. But despite that however, some information say that this film was actually originally released in Japan in 1982 and in North America later on, in 1983 for television, considering that the Japanese dialogue was recorded first, but might have been either released on that same year, or delayed until 1986.

Music

The music was written by Jō Hisaishi and Yuichiro Oda. The Lyrics were written by Keisuke Yamakawa.

1. "Someone is waiting for me" (だれかが私を待っている, Dareka ga watashi wo matte iru) (Main theme) (Singer: Mitsuko Horie)
2. ?
3. "What is 1+1?" (1＋1は何？, Ichi tasu ichi wa nani) (Insert song) (Singers: Mitsuko Horie and Koorogi '73)

The English dubbed version featured new different lyrics by Sammy Cahn and Allen Byrns, all sung by Aileen Quinn.

1. "It's Strictly Up to You" (Main theme)
2. "I Dream of Home"
3. "A Wizard of a Day"

See also

In Spanish: El mago de Oz (película de 1982) para niños