For the homonym TV Series, see The Wizard.
The Wizard is a 1989 film starring Fred Savage and two other actors nobody really remembers (though one turned out to be a
future indie rock star
). It is about Jimmy, a young boy who suffers from a serious mental disorder reminiscent of
Hollywood Autism after a traumatic incident. After being put in an institution, one of his older brothers breaks him out. They decide to run away to California together, as Jimmy is for some reason fixated on the place.
Along the way, they meet with some other kids that eerily seem to
lack parental supervision. They also learn that Jimmy is a
godlike entity around video games. Meanwhile, the concerned mother of the runaway kids hires a sleazy private detective to track them down. This causes a rivalry between him and the father and older brother that are also trying to get to them.
But none of this is what the movie is well-known for. The film is a fairly blatant
Merchandise Driven affair, made to sell the Nintendo products and the Universal Studios tour. In fact,
much of the film's
initial appeal was that it had a sneak peek at Super Mario Brothers 3.
The film maintains a cult following within the video game culture based on its
Snark Bait potential. Deconstructing the film is a senior thesis of its own, but some of the major issues include the following:
- It's not a good sign when Roger Ebert, who is vocally not a fan of video games, is able to notice the inaccuracies.
- Most of the "arcade" machines are little more than NES games given a justification for access to the main characters. (Although it could be argued that they were Playchoice 10 units.)
- Lucas and his infamous line, "I love the Power Glove. It's so bad". Anybody who has ever used one of those will tell you that there is no way you can utilize it with that level of skill. Not to mention the original meaning being distorted by the fact that now, "bad" has reverted to meaning "of poor quality", which the Power Glove was.
- During the tournament, the withdrawn kid displays that he has psychic powers by just randomly coming across the Warp Zone Whistle in the world 1 fortress of Super Mario Bros. 3, one of the least intuitive shortcuts in any game. How is some kid supposed to figure out that you're supposed to fly over the top of the ceiling and then go into a door that you can't even see? And why would he even risk it, given that he's in a competition?
- Did we mention this was the first time the game has been seen by anybody?
- It can be inferred that he learned the trick from reading Nintendo Power or from the dude at the Nintendo Hotline. If you don't believe that interpretation, then the scenes featuring both of said things were pretty much just the movie stopping for a commercial break.
- What part of the first time the game has been seen by anybody did you not understand?
- Or, for that matter, why do all the kids — even the ones cheering the competitors on — know so much about this game if this was a surprise showcase.
Still, it's a fairly popular Sunday afternoon TV recycle amongst younger kids who aren't familiar with Nintendo's heyday. Or who don't know any better.
This film provides examples of:
