By: Ashmar Mandou

Audiences are eagerly awaiting the release of Disney’s Oz The Great and The Powerful, but no one is more excited than Francisco DeJesus, digital effects supervisor on the film. “Oz The Great and The Powerful adds a fresh, new perspective to the most beloved story, The Wizard of Oz,” said DeJesus. “We researched the original stories of L. Frank Baum and found an interesting world of characters that we felt would be interesting to this prequel.”

Oz The Great and The Powerful story begins when a circus magician, played by James Franco, is strangely transported to Oz. There, he meets trio of witches, played by Mila Kunis, Michelle Williams, and Rachel Weisz, who are not convinced that he is the great magician everyone else believes he is. He is then chosen to protect the residents of Oz from the evil witch, ultimately, becoming the great Wizard of Oz. “I know audiences are going to enjoy watching it as much as we enjoyed working on it,” said DeJesus. “Although we had some challenges trying to create new characters, which is expected when working on digital effects, it’s always great to have talented actors who make this film come to life.” One of DeJesus’s favorite characters in the new film is China Girl, originally found in Baum’s tales of Oz. “In the original movie, The Wizard of Oz, you don’t see China Girl, even though she is written about in Baum’s other books, so we thought it would an interesting detail to bring her character to life in this film.”

DeJesus work can be found in other films, such as the first Spider-Man movie, Alice in Wonderland, G-Force, Monster House, and Men in Black 2, to name a few. Oz The Great and The Powerful is out in theaters on Friday, March 8th.