There are movies each generation embraces, carries with them throughout their lives, and leaves behind for future generations to cherish. So it is with America’s two favorite homegrown fables, The Wizard of Oz and Star Wars. Unsurprisingly, these movies have more in common than might be apparent at first glance, in addition to deep American roots. They tell stories that both represent classic American ideals as well as universal truths about the human experience.
Published in 1900, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, the book that inspired the movie, came from the complicated imagination of L. Frank Baum. It was followed by 13 additional books, all full of characters ripe for storytelling, but the most popular film version, released in 1939, sticks mainly to the events of the first book. Dorothy is an orphan, and although not bodily neglected by her guardian aunt and uncle she clearly longs for more than the grey Kansas prairie. A chance tornado lifts her and her little dog, Toto, up and over the rainbow, into a magical land of Munchkins and witches good and evil. The good witch, Glinda, kisses her for luck and sends her to the Emerald City, where the almighty Wizard should be able to send her home. Along the way she collects a trio of companions who see her safely there.
In Star Wars, Luke Skywalker is also an orphan, also a dreamer who seeks adventure beyond his own aunt and uncle’s farm. While Dorothy pines for a land beyond the clouds, Luke has the twin suns of Tatooine. Luke’s own aunt and uncle discourage his longings, for reasons that become clear all too soon, but again, Fate intervenes. While cleaning a recently acquired droid of some age (modern farm chores), Luke discovers a message recorded by Princess Leia of the Rebel Alliance. R2-D2 disappears in search of the message’s intended recipient, Obi-Wan Kenobi. Luke goes out in search of R2, and is captured by the Sand People. Who comes to his rescue but “Old Ben” Kenobi. From that point on, Luke’s future is clear. Ben reveals Luke’s father’s past as a Jedi warrior, the path he hopes Luke will follow as well.
Both orphans, both longing for bigger things than the quiet life around them. Both discovering powers within they had no idea they possessed. Granted, the Ruby Slippers are an accidental gift, and one of questionable source, but they do enable Dorothy and her companions to complete their assigned task of defeating the Wicked Witch of the West, the only negative vibe of an otherwise idyllic land. Luke’s quest takes longer, requires hours of study of Jedi ways, but he is assisted by his father’s old lightsaber, a powerful talisman of the past and the sacred duty that has fallen onto Luke’s young shoulders.
With the “space race” of the 1960s and beyond, a fairy tale set in outer space is no surprise. However, at its heart, it’s a hero’s journey, to use the vernacular of Joseph Campbell. Luke is changed after all his adventures. He is profoundly different from the young farm boy we meet at the beginning of his tale. Is Dorothy changed at the end of her travels? The film implies that her journey wasn’t real, but merely the wild dreams of an injured child. She awakens to the same grey farmhouse, her aunt and uncle fussing over her, friendly farmhands surrounding her bed. Dorothy has taken a journey, yes, but instead of experiencing the here and now of this marvelous land, all she wishes for is to return to Kansas. Many have been puzzled by this notion, but remember, although portrayed by the rapidly maturing Judy Garland (breasts bound in an attempt to downplay her bosom), Dorothy is in fact a young girl. Despite her resourcefulness along the Yellow Brick Road, she is only exhibiting good old Kansas know-how. Any child raised on a farm at the turn of the century would be as capable. But Dorothy is a child, has already lost her birth parents, and longs for the comfort of her family and friends back home. At the end of her journey, although a heroine of a kind, she takes no credit for any actions back in Oz. She is home, the only reward she ever wanted.
American ideals of courage, truth, and noble acts are found in both of these tales. Good triumphs over evil, a constant theme of much of the children’s literature written from Baum’s time on. It’s only in recent decades that our stories have become more complex, more nuanced for children who can’t remember a world before cellphones, the Internet, or even Pac Man. They are plugged in early on, and the stories we tell today’s youth attempt to prepare them for these complexities. Both Luke and Dorothy, plucky as they are, would certainly have a shot at success today. But they were extraordinary beings in their own times and stories, and deserve the fandom both have been granted. One can imagine the two of them stargazing, not hand in hand but side by side, the same stars available to us all to dream on, to hear our longing for something new. The stars we all pine for in the darkest days of our lives, soon to be happily ever after.
