What's wrong with 'The Wiz'? A lot ... but it's still hard not to love

I've had several waves of encountering the campy 1978 musical The Wiz. The first was as a relatively young man with an enduring Michael Jackson obsession. I encountered the film as a pop culture curio -- the first and only big screen performance by the King of Pop.

Later, I came to know the film as it is widely viewed in critical circles, as a big budget flop that derailed black cinema for nearly a decade. This harsh indictment never seemed quite fair to me, but nevertheless the movie has that stigma.

The last time I watched it the film's flaws were all too apparent. It's overlong, a miscast Diana Ross gives a whiny performance and its overproduced sets and costumes really are excessive.

And yet, last night, I surrendered to its charms and realized I love this messy musical anyway.

Oddly enough, I did not include the movie among my list of favorite musicals, even though the songs from The Wiz are likely my favorite from any entry in the genre.

I also have a deep appreciation for its director, the late Sidney Lumet, who has nothing else remotely like it in his filmography. I actually wrote a piece about the film at the time of his death, looking at how the film has held up as a cult classic. It remains one of the best received articles I've ever written.

Michael Jackson dons elaborate make-up to become the Scarecrow

Why do people love The Wiz so much in spite of its inadequacies? Michael Jackson factor is huge. He made this film right before he became a fully-fledged adult superstar with Off the Wall. Those of us who are nostalgic for early-era Michael, before plastic surgery and his bizarre personal life truly sullied his reputation, the film is irresistible.

Not only is he terrific in it as the Scarecrow (I should have said earlier, for the uninitiated, but the film and the musical on which it's based are a pretty straightforward, albeit urbanized version of The Wizard of Oz) -- but he is also so earnest and fresh, even he doesn't know he's on the cusp of perhaps the greatest run of pop culture supremacy we've ever seen.

It was on this film that he met his key career collaborator Quincy Jones, who provides an infectious and funky score throughout the proceedings. The movie also, to Lumet's credit, takes advantage of the late-'70s New York City decor to really bring this whimsical narrative down to earth, and to keep it relatable.

That said, there is simply no getting past the camp -- and the presumption that many of the people involved with the production must have been on drugs at the time.

And it's a shame Diana Ross sort of squandered her film career. After such a promising start with Lady Sings the Blues she devolved into a camp diva in Mahogany and she is simply outclassed here by Jackson, Nipsey Russell as the Tin Man and Ted Ross as the cowardly lion. Still, she has a great presence and some extremely expressive eyes. I sort of wish Tarantino would tap her for one of his patented career resurrections.

But why has it endured -- especially among black audiences -- my guess is that with time and distance, the bad press it received has faded away and it now stands as a time capsule from a more decadent, but also more innocent, time where so-called black cinema was at a peak of sorts and seemed filled with so much promise.

The dirty secret is that the blaxploitation era of the '70s actually didn't produce all that many good films, and it wasn't until the late '80s that a number of black filmmakers were afforded the chance to tell stories for us, by us.  The Wiz, on the other hand, is just pure spectacle -- but what a fun show.