Director: Robert Stromberg
Before I give my full review, I'd like to give my rating first: 3.6/5
Quick Review: Angelina Jolie's performance was grand and she was definitely the perfect choice for the role of Maleficent. However, the overall film wasn't as equally great as her performance; she was too good for the film. The CGI wasn't anything special. I did enjoy the first act of the story and the idea on why she became a villain and I was on her side the whole way. The second act was bland yet gave its reasoning for the conclusion of the final act which was nice to see, but I wasn't satisfied with it.
At first, I did give it a 3.8, but after letting it sink in and I watched Disney's Sleeping Beauty again, and once coming to a few realizations, the more disappointed I was in Disney's Maleficent. I do understand, that this is supposed to be a completely different story from Disney's Sleeping Beauty, I get it! I do! But, I just wasn't satisfied with it and down below are my FULL reasons why:
(WARNING: SPOIL ALERTS)
The CGI (Computer Genterated Imagery)
In the trailer, watching it both on YouTube and in the theater, I thought everything looked marvelous and it was beautiful! After sitting in the theater, viewing the full length movie, the CGI made me cringe a little.
The Good: The creation of the giant tree-people and monsters of 'Moors', a forest kingdom with supernatural creatures, the giant thorns arising from the grown, and Maleficent's wings. Also, another creation that stood out is when Maleficent transforms Diaval's into other animals. For example, he's originally a crow but when she turned him into a wolf or a horse, they still had crow-like features which turned out pretty good.
The Bad: The Good Fairies of 'Moors': Flittle, Knotgrass, and Thistlewit.
The fairies look good from afar or with quick glance, but seeing the actresses faces in CGI as fairies made me frown upon it. They look like they came from Shrek. ABC's Once Upon A Time does a better job at creating fairies at a small size, heck, why didn't they create them like they did Tinkerbell in 2003's Peter Pan:
Character Development
Maleficent (Angelina Jolie) - She was developed quite nicely, especially from the beginning of the plot. I wanted to cry with her when the man she loved stole her wings, thus making her the villain that we know from Disney's Sleeping Beauty. As her character is further developed, it turns out that she's not all that villainous as she seems when we get to the end of the second act as it shows her watching over Princess Aurora and eventually caring about the child, wanting to protect her. And suddenly, she's not the villain anymore. Even though I would still want her to be the villain, it was a nice little twist at the end, despite me being unsatisfied with it. (Will explain more in the Plot Development paragraph).
Stefan (Sharlto Copley) - Stefan was developed fairly well from loving Maleficent from the bottom to his heart to betraying her for greed and the chance to be king. Stefan was the true villain and I wanted him dead so bad, although his death in the movie wasn't how I wanted it to be. His death was...age appropriate just like any other Disney villain death.
The Good Fairies: Flittle (Lesley Manville), Knotgrass (Imelda Staunton), and Thistlewit (Juno Temple) - First of all, I dislike the names that they gave them; they aren't memorable names, unless the reasoning for it was because they have different personalities than Flora, Fauna, and Maryweather from Disney's Sleeping Beauty. Lastly, I'm going to be absolutely blunt and say that these fairies were really idiotic and a bit annoying; they weren't all that funny. Those three fairies could have been the death of Aurora if it wasn't for Maleficent watching over it. The three tried feeding baby Aurora baby carrots and then they weren't watching her and she could have fallen off of a cliff. Really?? (Yeah, yeah, I get it, Maleficent was supposed to be there in order to support the plot, blah blah..) But still...
Diaval (Sam Riley) - This is the Maleficent's crow. She saved him from being beaten by a farmer who had captured him for being in his crops. She turned him into human and since then, Diaval becomes dedicated to her, doing anything that she asks him to do. He does what he is told, but has his moments when he questions her actions by words of complaint or by a single look. This character, was really interesting to me and I thought that Disney had something here to where he was going to play a bigger part, but, of course not. I wish his character was developed more; I would love to see more of him to the point where I wouldn't mind seeing his own movie.
Aurora (Elle Fanning) - Aurora was never an interesting character to me in Disney's Sleeping Beauty, and Elle Fanning as Aurora made me less interested. I didn't really care for her playing the role, but the character itself had no spark other than making Maleficent realize that there is true love. The most adorable scene about Aurora growing up was when Angelina's real life daughter played her.
Prince Phillip (Brenton Thwaites) - The way the plot was developed, Prince Philip shouldn't even had been in the film at all. He was a useless character.
Plot Development
In the first act, it was truly dark and menacing as they showed the romance between Maleficent and Stefan, but suddenly he betrayed his love for her by stealing her wings in order to become king. The moment Maleficent had cried for the loss of her wings, I started to tear up because her cry was so haunting. And for that moment when she became a villain, I was on her side. I wanted her to do bad things. I was ready to see this villain in action.
In the second act, when the three good fairies took in baby Aurora, this is where things got very bland for me. Maleficent knew where she was "hidden" all ready, and even though she would call little Aurora "Beasty" and make scary faces at the child, she ended up looking after her much better than the Three Stooges of the fairies. Most of the second act was practically bonding time between Maleficent and Aurora; I honestly wanted to hit "fast-forward". This is when I started to dislike Flittle, Knotgrass, and Thistlewit as well.
Finally, in the third act, this is where I had liked the idea, but the satisfaction for it wasn't there. Long story short (BIG SPOILER AHEAD)......
Aurora doesn't awaken by Prince Phillip's kiss. Sure, he was in the movie, he met Aurora for the first time and the two looked like they were dumb in love, but his "true love's" kiss didn't break the spell. It was Maleficent's. She bonded a friendship with Aurora and felt bad about the curse and apologized for it and promised to protect her no matter what. She kissed her forehead and Aurora's wide awake! Okay, so, apparently, they decided to go the same route as Disney's Frozen. Big whoop! Don't get me wrong, when the moment happened sighed with happiness and event went "Awwww!!", and once again, it gives that positive message to young girls that "True Love" doesn't only mean falling in love with someone romantically. It could mean friendship as well. But, seriously, I didn't see it coming until she actually bent down and gave her the kiss.
This was my prediction: Diaval, the crow, was falling in love with Aurora. Honestly, every time the camera showed him looking at her, it looked like he had true feelings for the girl. In my opinion, I would have written in that way. It would have been a different twist; maybe even better, and I would have kept Maleficent as the villain.
My Disappointments:
- I was hoping to have some fun with the three fairies as I did when watching Flora, Fauna, and Maryweather, bake the cake and make a dress for Aurora's birthday. Did it happen? Nope. I was hoping to see a recreation of this scene:
- And my major disappointment was when Maleficent wasn't the one to transform into a dragon. It was her sidekick, crow, Diaval. I love Diaval, I do! But, I think the movie would have been much better if they would have stuck with Maleficent transforming into the dragon.
All I have to say is...nice try Stromberg, but...it could have been better. You had a lot of potential here, but this movie wasn't as great as the wonderful Angelina Jolie.
Now here's my question: When going to Disneyland/Disney World, is the character Maleficent supposed to be from Disney's Sleeping Beauty? Or Disney's Maleficent? What if a guest says something in relation to the live-action film. How do they respond? Hmmm....
Anyways, what did you all think about this film? Did it live up to your expectations or did it fail you?
