Disney have announced that
Sam Raimi's Wizard of Oz prequel
Oz: The Great and Powerful that is casting up to film this July in Michigan will hit screens on March 8th, 2013 - refreshingly a near two year shoot-to-release-date window compared to the heart attacks modern day helmers are having struggling to turn around their tentpoles in 14 months or less (Matt Vaughn had less than a year to complete X-Men: First Class and was still working on it as recently as two weeks ago). Having seen
Tim Burton's similar concept for
Alice in Wonderland's re-imagining earn over $1 billion on the same date last year, clearly Disney are hoping lightning will strike again for another colourful fairytale/fantasy. Raimi's Spider-Man star
James Franco stars as the title character, a charlatan circus magician who has been necking it with a customer's wife when a violent storm sends his hot air balloon to the land of Oz where the kooky characters believe him to be a powerful Wizard and the man who can finally bump off the two wicked witches (
Mila Kunis' Thodora and
Rachel Weisz's Evanora). Talks are well under-way for
Michelle Williams to play Glinda, The Good Witch. Interestingly even though March 2013 is still nearly two years away they aren't solo on that date as
Neil Blomkamp's original sci-film movie
Elysium at Sony with
Matt Damon, Sharlto Copley and
Jodie Foster is due out on the same date. But with that being R-rated and Oz going for the PG-13 crowd, I doubt Sony will be overly concerned but if you hear about a release shift soon then you know why.