>>39952768
Long story short it was all about the Depression and the devaluing of the money system.
>Oz = Ounce, a unit of measurement
>Scarecrow = Agriculture, brainless
>Tin Man = Industry, heartless
>Lion = Military, cowardly
>Wicked Witch of the East = Moneyed interests on the East Coast
>The Wizard of Oz lives in the Emerald City
>Emerald = Green = Money
>Yellow bricks = gold bars, street paved in gold
>The Wizard of Oz is a fraud
>Silver shoes = silver is powerful
>Witch wants the silver slippers for herself
>During this time, private ownership of precious metals was considered illegal
They changed the silver shoes to ruby because the movie was one of the first color films and they wanted to take advantage of the new technology.

There's a similar imagery used in the movie The Shining. In the book, the bar is referred to as the Silver Room. And when Kubrick first filmed the shot, the room was indeed silver. For reasons that he never really explained, he decided that he wanted the room to be gold instead. So they remade the entire room with gold paneling and had to reshoot the entire scene, and instead the bar is now "The Gold Room." Some people think this also was intended as a symbolic story about the US banking system.

Back | Go to board

Board:

/x/

Thread:

Wizard of Oz Symbols