Wicked

I can't quite wrap my head around all the positive comments for this film, they go so far that it is almost suspicious.

Anyway, me and my partner looked at each other after 1 hour and nodded to each other that it was time to leave. The storyline was going nowhere and it was frankly dull. I was really disappointed after reading some of the reviews for it, I'm not sure what I was expecting, but it wasn't that. It was so predictable that I could sit there and mouth the next line before they even said it, the cinematography was pretty average too, for me there wasn't much to like about it. Perhaps kids would enjoy it more? Sorry but I won't be watching P2.

For starters, I have seen the original Broadway Play of Wicked and I really like it. I love Wizard of Oz growing up and I thought it was a good interesting take of the world and setting.

As a film, I was always curious to see how it would be adapted. While I do appreciate it's faithfulness to the source, there are some good aspects but also not so good. Throughout, the costume designs, the production and the sound designs are amazing. It helps to build the world of Oz and create it's vibe. Including the musical score and singing that offers a vibrate, energized and colorful vibe.

However, as a whole, the dull presentation and it's stretched out narrative really seems to fail for me to fully engage with it's power. Writing wise, the narrative is interesting but being stretched out and added with unnecessary characters and moments makes it dried up. Causing some of the characters to be boring and not fully engaging.

The dialogue is pretty bad and there are some poor noticeable uses of CGI that kills away the magical vibe and feel of Oz. Most of the performances are just fine but they never really wowed me in anything particular. Because as a whole, I feel it's a bit overhyped.

2 hours and 40 minutes and this is only Part 1?! Nowhere except for in the cinema did I see the film advertised as PART 1-not in the advertising, not in the cinema listing, and not on the marquee. I don't think I would have gone knowing there were more parts coming. And since Wicked was just as long as a musical and had a beginning, middle, and an end in that same amount of time, it means that they should tell the entire story in about 9 hours. Yes the creativity of the sets and the CGI of animals were amazing, and the leads were pretty good especially since they had big shoes to fill. Cynthia & Ariana held their own, and Ariana may have a second career as she was awesome on SNL as an actor. Jonathan Bailey was a standout for sure, and can obviously sing and dance and came across as completely swoon worthy. Bowen Yang gave the film some camp and humour. But I guess we have a couple of more films to give a solid rating. Is it a 1/10?-no, that's too harsh, maybe not your cup of tea or too long. Is it a 10/10?!-no you might be fanning out on Wicked The Musical, Ariana, or Cynthia a little too much and perhaps you need a restraining order. But somewhere in the middle seems appropriate, until we see the subsequent parts.

I genuinely wanted to love this film and was so disappointed with it in the end. I really enjoyed the West End play and so was keen to see this version. Boy did it drag. It was about 1 hour too long. The set was lovely, the characters were ok and some of the songs were upbeat enough to engage, but overall it just wasn't captivating enough. I didn't even like most of the musical score. At times it actually made me cringe and I wished for it to end. I know most people seem to love it, but I just couldn't. I tried, but I wanted to escape by the second hour. It was just far too long and not captivating enough to keep me interested.

The stage play is far more enjoyable; pacing of the storyline and characters you really care about more than in this film. This movie definitely did not need to be a two-parter if the stage play can offer all the storyline and less time. I hope that there is a better cut of this film released when the second half comes out with the whole storyline, not exceeding 2 1/2 hours. These characters in this film seem so superficial. I'm not sure how you can compare this to the stage play. I feel that everything feels so fake in this movie compared to the stage play there could've been better use of all this extended time with more storyline..