In the issue of The Baum Bugle celebrating the 35th anniversary of Return to Oz, Sarah Krotzer quotes my favorite interview with Walter Murch and ruminates on it:
If I may offer a counter-perspective to Krotzer, in its way, that message is still comforting. It's not a message to "suck it up and be resilient because your loved ones will leave you," it's achingly compassionate to children who have known pain in their lives. It tells them that their pain matters and should not be glossed over because it is unpalatable for adults to hear or talk about.
It's also compassionate to Aunt Em because Aunt Em isn't portrayed as evil (the way the doctor and the nurse are, because as Murch says in a line of the interview that Krotzer cuts, "...grown-ups sometimes have the best of intentions - and sometimes they don’t"), but flawed. She wants to help Dorothy, but puts her trust in the wrong people and in societal pressures that tell her it would be better if Dorothy conform.
It's a message that tells Dorothy (and children watching her) that she deserves to be loved and valued, and that if adults in her life hurt her, they are wrong to do so. She should have a voice.
