“Folk lore, legends, myths and fairy tales have followed childhood through the ages, for every healthy youngster has a wholesome and instinctive love for stories fantastic, marvelous and manifestly unreal. The winged fairies of Grimm and Andersen have brought more happiness to childish hearts than all other human creations. Yet the old-time fairy tale, having served for generations, may now be classed as ‘historical’ in the children’s library, for the time has come for a series of newer ‘wonder tales’ in which the stereotyped genie, dwarf and fairy are eliminated, together with all the horrible and blood-curdling incidents devised by their authors to point a fearsome moral to each tale. Modern education includes morality; therefore the modern child seeks only entertainment in its wonder tales and gladly dispenses with all disagreeable incident.”—26 Mar 1910 Moving Picture World
       The 9 Apr 1910 Moving Picture World ran the following review: “The reproduction of a story of this character in motion pictures is an achievement of sufficient importance to attract more than the usual degree of interest. That it has been successfully accomplished needs scarcely to be said. The reputation of this house for producing striking and unusual films is too well established to require further description. It is an excellent film, well acted and clearly photographed.”
       According to the 26 Mar 1910 Film Index, “The opening of the story is in Kansas, the child is Dorothy, and in a cyclone. What a happy conceit to think of Kansas and a cyclone. She is whirled away to the country of the Munchkin and the Land of Oz. Arriving here, [L. Frank] Baum never lessens the interest of his tale. The scarecrow is splendidly comic and novel, so is the Tin Man, and cowardly lion is a fitting climax to a fine group of humorous ideas. Their journey with Dorothy to the Land of Oz has a meaning and a reason back of it that doubly enhances the interest. I maintain that the opening chapters of Oz, judged from the standpoint of ingenious and reasonable construction, equals anything that Grimm or Andersen ever wrote. Who is there to declare that this story is not the most satisfying of its kind that was ever produced in photographic pantomime? The scenes of the tale and the makeup and costuming of the characters have been faithfully copied from the drawings of that peculiar Genius [W.W.] Denslow, who may be dismissed with the statement that in the sketching of grotesque and fanciful characters America has yet to produce his equal.”
       This is the first film version of The Wizard of Oz, and appears to have been inspired by the 1902 Broadway musical based on L. Frank Baum’s novel, because the character of Imogene, the cow, which was not in the original book, had replaced Toto in the play in order that the production would not have to rely on a trained dog.
       A column in the 8 Jan 1910 Moving Picture World announced that the Selig Polyscope Company had placed Frank Baum, “the ‘Wizard of Oz’ man,” under contract as a producer.
       The 22 Jan 1910 Moving Picture World announced that Selig was issuing “beautiful four-colored lithographed posters by the Russel-Morgan Company in order that the exhibitor may make a special feature” of the film.
       See also Selig Polyscope’s sequels, Dorothy and the Scarecrow in Oz, The Land of Oz, and John Dough and the Cherub (all 1910).
       The George Eastman House restored thirteen minutes of The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, not including the closing credits, and it widely available.