Google, teaming up with Sphere Entertainment, Warner Bros. Discovery, and Magnopus, is giving the 1939 movie “The Wizard of Oz” a fresh twist for a big, immersive show at the Sphere, starting August 28, 2025. They’re using Google Cloud’s super-smart AI tools—like tricked-out Gemini models, Veo 2, and Imagen 3—to turn the old film into a wild, all-around experience for the Sphere’s giant 160,000-square-foot screen, which is super sharp at 16K x 16K.
Here’s how they’re doing it with some fancy tricks. First, Google’s AI takes the original 35mm Technicolor film—made from three scratchy negatives—and boosts it into really clear, high-quality pictures that look great on the Sphere’s huge screen without losing clarity. AI then uses ‘outpainting’ to stretch the movie scenes past their old edges, adding new backgrounds and people so it feels like you’re surrounded by the story. Lastly, “performance generation” lets them bring in characters for new parts—like showing Uncle Henry in spots where he wasn’t filmed before—all while keeping the movie feeling real and true to itself.
![Wizard of OZ: 85th Anniversary Theater Edition (4KUHD + BD + DIG/Steelbook) [4K UHD]](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/41WACX94utL._SL160_.jpg)
- Judy Garland, Frank Morgan, Ray Bolger (Actors)
- Victor Fleming (Director) - Mervyn LeRoy (Producer)
- Audience Rating: G (General Audience)
We’re starting with the original four-by-three image on a 35mm piece of celluloid — it’s actually three separate, grainy film negatives; that’s how they shot Technicolor. That obviously won’t work on a screen that is 160,000 square feet. So we’re working with Sphere Studios, Magnopus and visual effects artists around the world, alongside our AI models, to effectively bring the original characters and environments to life on a whole new canvas — creating an immersive entertainment experience that still respects the original in every way,” said Buzz Hays, the global lead for entertainment industry solutions at Google Cloud.
