Michael Jackson’s Movies

The Wiz

This Michael Jackson’s movie was directed by Sidney Lumet. The Wiz is actually a remake of one of Michael’s favorite movies, “The Wizard of Oz”. In this movie Michael Jackson played no other but the Scarecrow. Many said that he was the best choice for that role; although I can’t really see why.

Never the less, Diana Ross played the lead Role of Dorothy and Richard Pryor had the honors of playing The Wiz himself.

This was Michael Jackson’s first movie. Many said that he worked hard on this movie. But, this was no problem for him because he enjoyed the process of film making. Apparently he wanted his fist role in a movie to be a real success. And it was! Many critics said that Michael Jackson was great.

In “The Wiz” Dorothy is a shy young woman who works as a kindergarten teacher in Harlem. Unlike in the original version, this time Dorothy is brought by a snowstorm to the mysterious Land of Oz. In “The Wiz” movie Land of Oz is actually the city of New York; a huge city that can seem very hostile for a shy kindergarten teacher.

In her efforts to go back home, Dorothy ends up at many strange places to end up in the New York Public Library. 

The movie was released in 1978, and it was directed by Sidney Lumet.

Moonwalker

Moonwalker was released in 1988, and it was directed by Jerry Kramer and Colin Chilvers. This movie was released to coincide with Michael Jackson’s album,”Bad”. The movie was a huge success. It was sold in 800,000 copies in United States alone.

This movie is basically a story of the battle between good and evil. This was no surprise as Michael Jackson always publicly spoke about human rights issues. Equality of all people was his lifetime goal. For this reason, many saw him as the peacemaker.

As in many of Michael Jackson’s music videos, Moonwalker is full of expensive special effects. Also there are some really great songs in the movie as well as some tremendous dance scenes.

In this movie Michael Jackson played a good gangster who uses his authority as a criminal to protect the kids of some big city. 

Ghosts

This is a very short movie. It only lasts 38 minutes. The “Ghost” was released in 1997. This was the first and the last movie that Michael Jackson wrote. He had some help from his good friend Stephen King in writing this movie. Stan Winston directed the movie. Michael Jackson wanted Winston do direct this movie because he had quite an experience when it comes to special effects. Winston made a huge reputation by working on such films as “The Terminator”, “Aliens”, and “Jurassic Park”.

The “Ghosts” is basically a story of a small town bothered by a weird man (Michael Jackson) living in a haunted house. 

Interesting thing about this Michael Jackson’s movie is that all songs from the movie were taken from Michael Jackson’s „HIStory“ and „Blood on the Dance Floor“ albums.

Image via Wikipedia