Apparently Wicked’s muted colors make it more like our desaturated reality

Wicked director Jon M. Chu explains that he wanted viewers to “feel the dirt” of Oz.

By Matt Schimkowitz  |  November 24, 2024 | 6:14pm
Photo by Giles Keyte (Universal Pictures)
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Apparently Wicked’s muted colors make it more like our desaturated reality

Wicked has clicked (or should we say Glicked—no, we shouldn’t) with moviegoers, defying gravity to an estimated $114 million domestically. That’s enough money to poo-poo any criticisms about the movie looking pretty drab, an issue shared by The A.V. Club. In his review, critic Jesse Hassenger found the film’s color grading ranked among its most significant problems. “Dim contrast, washed-out pinks and greens, and the kind of overall white-haze overcast look that renders images clear but utterly muted,” Hassenger writes. “Most of [Wicked] still looks like those Marvel movies they shoot in Georgia parking lots.” Hassenger wasn’t the only viewer disappointed by Wicked toning down The Wizard Of Oz’s Technicolor bravado. It was enough of a complaint that The Daily Globe And Mail told director Jon M. Chu that the movie was “a little desaturated.” Apparently, that’s the point because color doesn’t exist in reality.

Despite insisting that “there’s color all over it,” Chu maintains that he wanted to “immerse people into Oz” and “make it a real place.” A “fake place,” the colorful kind like Oz, would prevent the audience from believing the film’s relationships and stakes, a problem moviegoers have had with the 1939 original for nearly a century. Chu believes this allows viewers to experience Oz unlike ever before. “[Oz has] been a matte painting. It’s been a video game digital world. But for us, I want to feel the dirt. I want to feel its wear and tear. And that means it’s not plastic.” And “not plastic” means dulled, like reality, where there are no bright colors because it would trigger everyone’s latent, dormant psychosis.

“We have the environment,” Chu added to his defense. “The sun is the main source of light. You see the vast landscapes. You see the air. You see creatures exist here. These two characters that will go through two movies, their relationship with the land is important; their relationship with the nature of this land that the wizard imposed himself. The [color] contrast goes up over time because that is what Elphaba brings to this world.”

If we’re following correctly, the more Wicked movies Elphaba stars in, the more colorful they’ll become. Until then, mythical film critic Roy G. Biv awaits somewhere over the rainbow, his fingers ready to give Wicked 2 five stars on Letterboxd, where he hopes to rave, “This movie lives up to my name!”

 
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