The Prophet Of Oz [2013]

[Cross-posted on the Bad Movie Night Facebook page.]

We spent the majority of the evening watching "Showgirls 2: Penny's From Heaven" and I will be writing about that next week, but we started our evening with this little 20 minutes feature: "The Prophet of Oz." Basically it's just "The Wizard of Oz" but low budget and with Jesus. Dorothy and her guinea pig Squeaky get transported to Oz where they meet an "angel from heaven" who tells them to go speak to the prophet of Oz but avoid Satan. Dorothy needs to find out if she is born again. The scarecrow has no faith. The tin man can't pray. The lion has no compassion and seems to be wearing someone else's skin as a mask. The prophet tells them Christians are full of malarkey. BUT WAIT. They are in an abandoned church basement, one of the few sets that isn't awkward green screen or the nearest available field, and there's a Bible lying around. Dorothy reads from the Bible to determine that they all had that stuff inside of themselves all along (although curiously it looks like she was reading from Revelations, which is less "faith and compassion' and more "end of days). The sets are a joke and the acting is so flat we assumed all the actors were the pastor's family and were shocked to see that wasn't the case. Really the most impressive thing about this film is the costumes but I think it's safe to assume they were rented from a place that provides costumes for local productions. Those places always have a "Wizard of Oz" set and probably had no idea what nefarious purpose they would be used for.

All in all, give it a watch. It's kind of amusing and short enough that if you are somehow unreasonably bothered by it, it won't last long.

Spoon Rating: 5