Watch The Patchwork Girl of Oz For Free

the audience applauded

Memorable, crazy movie

hyped garbage

Very interesting film. Was caught on the premise when seeing the trailer but unsure as to what the outcome would be for the showing. As it turns out, it was a very good film.

You really have to look at "The Patchwork Girl of Oz" in context, otherwise you'll just dismiss it as a dull and incomprehensible movie. But, back in 1914, it was a rather impressive tale--but one that even audiences back then probably struggled to understand unless they'd read the Frank Baum story. Heck, I tried watching it was was TOTALLY confused until I read a summary of the story on the internet! That's because the narrative is really scant--with almost no intertitle cards. Instead, it's shown as a series of tenuously connected vignettes which are described on the card and then acted out...as was the style up until about 1914 or a bit later. It comes off almost like a slide show that is acted out for the audience! This certainly is NOT all that entertaining and too often the characters just cavort about aimlessly or do acrobatics instead of acting--and it comes off pretty poorly. BUT, again, it was pretty much the style of the day. The ladies in the film and sets and 'magic' were pretty similar to the work done a decade earlier by the groundbreaking French film maker Georges Méliès. By 1914, these amazing effects and story telling really were a a bit passé--definitely on their way out--which might explain why the film was a critical flop--that, and the fact that the audience probably had no idea what was occurring on screen! Interesting from a historical perspective and having excellent production values for the time, but still very easy to skip unless you adore very early silent films.

The recent phenomenon of Harry Potter isn't so unusual. An early case it the amazing popularity of Oz.The books, the first ones, became popular, amazingly so. By some measures more popular than Potter. They are simple: children, a magical land — rather a land like ours in many ways but with magic and magical creatures.Then the movies started. Magic sells cinematically when the world is like the one we live in plus magic that matches what the camera can emulate. When the writer understands the overlap, he or she can write books that are cinematically rooted. Each feeds the other. Each feeds the juvenile imagination.You should watch this. Because with distance, you can see how shallow that imagination is. The effects of today's movies are better, but they are no less believable to us than these were in their day. Let that soak in and you'll get pretty depressed about the current Potter phenomenon (and probably increase your appreciation for the "Rings" works).Ted's Evaluation -- 2 of 3: Has some interesting elements.

The enjoyable story and characters in "The Patchwork Girl of Oz" makes it a fun movie to watch, and it is also pretty resourceful for its era. It does have a lot of rough edges and shows some signs of age, but its energy and creativity more than make up for those. As with all of the Oz features made by L. Frank Baum's own studio, it shows his influence in the way that the fantasy world of Oz is brought to life with enthusiasm.As with most of Baum's Oz stories, it has plenty of oddball characters and offbeat developments. A couple of odd casting choices add to the curious feel, with Pierre Couderc making Scraps look much like a male, and Violet Macmillan making Ojo seem more like a young girl. But they and the rest of the cast give their characters plenty of life, which really is more significant in a movie like this. As in the other Oz movies in the series, Fred Woodward also gets to perform a number of his costumed animal characters.The story is one of Baum's most creative ones, telling a complex story in which the agendas and motivations of many different characters come into conflict. This adaptation is imaginative in using a lot of different techniques to reproduce the look of the characters, the magical events, and the hectic activity.Much of it works rather well, and all of it represents a very good attempt for its time. Very few film-makers of the era ever tried to make a full-length picture out of such challenging fantasy material, and even if it has a fair number of rough edges, it remains a worthwhile and entertaining effort.

Anybody who has seen THE WIZARD OF OZ (and who hasn't) should check out this earlier silent story from the Land of Oz. Don't expect the same story though as the Scarecrow, Tin Man and Cowardly Lion only show up at the end of the movie. The Patchwork Girl resembles an acrobatic Bozo the Clown with dreadlocks and a hoopskirt. Other bizarre creatures that show up include the Woozy (a sort of cardboard-box/cat creature) and the scary but lonesome Zoop.