Maleficent Review

4 out of 5

Family, Fantasy

The Verdict

Thumbs Up: Highly Recommended

Families and Disney fans curious about a darker take on Sleeping Beauty. It’s rated PG, but some scenes may be intense for very young kids.

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Synopsis

Maleficent (Jolie) is a powerful fairy that takes out her frustration on the world around her. The only way she feels better is by taking it out on Aurora (Fanning), the king’s daughter, with a curse. Before you begin to judge her just remember one thing, no evil person starts off that way.

Spoiler Warning!!! Full Review Below

Full Review (Spoilers)

Producers: Joe Roth

The Good

Angelina Jolie was amazing as Maleficent. She portrayed a Maleficent showing her fierce and vengeful side when encountering Stefan after his betrayal. She also showed her loving, and kind side when dealing with Stefan before he cut off her wings.

Jolie’s facial expressions really stole the show. Her best scene was the one with everyone giving Aurora gifts.

Maleficent’s interactions with Aurora showed off the incredible acting from Jolie. She really gave their interactions layers. At first you could tell Maleficent didn’t like Aurora but you slowly see the change in her attitude as time passes.

The Bad

This movie spent too much time with Stefan. He eventually turned into the protagonist of the film but it didn’t feel right at all. The more screen time they gave to Stefan, the more it dragged down the movie. It would have been better if they just cut out half of his screen time.

The lack of magic in this movie was disappointing. You expect a movie about Maleficent would show more magic than a few levitation spells. The biggest spell they displayed in this movie was the big thorn wall and her controlling some of the thorn vines. It wasn’t that impressive to say the least.

The battle scenes in this movie really served no purpose at all. The two major battles in this movie gave off a very lackluster feeling to them. The battle between King Henry and Maleficent’s forest army was short and made you wonder why she didn’t use her magic to take out the army. The last battle between crazy King Stefan and Maleficent just makes you sigh from boredom. The best moment was Maleficent turning Diaval into a dragon as a somewhat nod to the Disney story.

Originally published on the Bring On The Reviews Blogspot blog on June 5, 2014.

Maleficent (2014) Cast and Details

Maleficent (2014) is directed by Robert Stromberg and stars Angelina Jolie, Sharlto Copley and Elle Fanning. It runs 97 minutes and is rated PG. You can look up the full cast and crew on IMDb. You might also like my The Suspect review.

DC's Hypothetical Corner

Let’s say I change one thing. Maybe that one thing will make this movie better or more watchable.

It would be a different movie if Maleficent didn’t make it out of the castle battle. Stefan really had incompetent soldiers if they couldn’t take her down when they caught her in the iron net. They need more iron tools to get the job done. Maybe if they hired Tony Stark for their tools, maybe they would have won.

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