Maleficent the movie...

[Itchi_da_killa]

I took my girlfriend to go see this the other night. I was all like, "boring chick movie, then getting laid". However, it turned out that I was totally into it. I was even pondering the movie over breakfast. It was really that good for me.

I would like to know what other people thought.

 

[ShadowsofHope]

I've seen quite a lot of it already, working at the theater. It is pretty decent in a lot of parts and Angelina Jolie has a lot of fun with her character, but the "Queen of Darkness" is more a role taken by King Stefan in this movie. Maleficent is portrayed is as a wild spirit who really only becomes acts evil for the parts retaliating against the King and his army. Sleeping Beauty and a few other characters get a stern, eclectic but disturbed mother figure. It's a story that very much only takes really the name and the costume of the original Maleficent as inspiration for it's titular character.

 

[Little Woodsman]

I loved it.
Of course I love stories

Spoiler: HUGE spoilers for Maleficent

about redemption. To me, the entire arc from when she discovers where Aurora is being 'hidden' up to where she attempts to revoke the curse by her own power is the meat of the story--the true conflict is not between Maleficent and the King but the struggle of her own core nature to reassert itself after being wronged so horribly.

I've heard some critics say that they didn't like how "easily she became good again" but I found it perfectly acceptable for a couple of reasons. Firstly, as mentioned above I saw it more as her 'evil' phase was an aberration, and that her true, core nature was almost sickeningly good, so her own base personality and nature worked for it. The other part is.. I know first-hand what a game-changer the love of a child is.

Also, even though it's been done before I did like the twist on "true love's kiss".

I will say that there were some parts that I think could have been done better, and that the way Angelina Jolie overshadowed the rest of the cast with her over-the-top performance was a bit jarring.

Definitely getting it when it comes out on DVD.

 

[Itchi_da_killa]

This isn't the first time I have been surprised in this way. When I took my lady out to see "Snow White and the Huntsman", I was really surprised that I liked it too.
In theory I'm not really into this type of stuff, because I'm more of a SciFi geek... but these movies have been great.

 

[Johnny Novgorod]

I'm mostly surprised Angelina Jolie seems to have gotten over the box office poison label that's been haunting her career since around Tomb Raider. I'm inclined to think the grimdark fairy tale revival had something to do with it though.

 

[Itchi_da_killa]

I'm mostly surprised Angelina Jolie seems to have gotten over the box office poison label that's been haunting her career since around Tomb Raider. I'm inclined to think the grimdark fairy tale revival had something to do with it though.

Yeah she lost some of my interest during those years. I was crushing on her from the Cyborg, and Hacker days.

 

[Itchi_da_killa]

I haven't seen it, but it does look really, really good. Not really sure where you could have gotten the impression of "boring chick movie" from, because I got the distinct impression of "epic, live-action retelling of a classic Disney animation with the villain as the focus."

Well, Disney's Sleeping Beauty was a "girly" movie, and I had assumed that this was some sort of modern live action redo. However I was wrong, and I totally enjoyed it.

 

[krazykidd]

I liked it. It was predictable as hell, especially after disneys FROZEN, but hey iv'e seen worst. My main gripe was angelina jolie as Melificent. Now, it's not that she didnt play it well, she was great, except, i didn't see melificent at all, all i saw was Angelia jolie. I guess that comes from being a very well known and distinguishable actor/person. Had Malificent been played by anyone else there wouldn't have been a problem, but all i saw in this movie was Angelina.

 

[lee1287]

It was alright. Not the target audience, (23, Male) I Love Sharlto in everything, but this was meh, his accent was alright, except when he shouted. The fairies annoyed the hell outta me though.

 

[Lilani]

I haven't seen it, but it does look really, really good. Not really sure where you could have gotten the impression of "boring chick movie" from, because I got the distinct impression of "epic, live-action retelling of a classic Disney animation with the villain as the focus."

I've seen it, and that's how I feel about it as well. In order to explain its existence canonically, there's narration at the beginning that says the original story of Sleeping Beauty wasn't told correctly. However, in spite of that, I don't feel like it was trying to improve upon or disown the original. I don't think this was Disney trying to say "This is the new Sleeping Beauty now." Partially because I know they aren't going to stop selling Aurora dolls or dresses based on the original film, and partially because that just doesn't feel like the intention of the film to me. It's like an alternate universe, hell even the names of the three good fairies are different.

So, yeah. To me it felt like a retelling of an old story for a new generation, but not necessarily meant to improve upon the original. Just to tell the same story but in a different light.

 

[Scarim Coral]

I thought it felt like it was a modern reinterpret of the classic story-

Spoiler

Ok there was that subtle rape reference but I didn't saw until Bob mention it. The main point that made me felt being a modern version was the kiss. The prince kiss fail cos why he did fancy Aurora but he does not know her well which make sense in today society. Malefient kiss work due to the love she have to her from all the time she look after her.
Granted I felt her love was not genine cos of that fairy wish "she will be loved by all" which apply to Malefient. Lastly there of course is adding third demension to a one noted villain, trying to give her reason/ justify for her to be a villain. This is not a good or bad thing, I guess it depend if that villain was good already for being one demensional or not.

 

[Rolaoi]

I basically understood it as being a story about a one night stand with really rapey vibes which lead to a 16 year custody battle made a lot more interesting by the inclusion of really well designed dragons. The true love's kiss take was pretty satisfyingly handled. It was pretty straight forward in its telling, but I felt that made sense in the context that it was supposed to be a fairy tale. I was really more interested in the subtext which I mentioned earlier. I think it was supposed to be something for the adults to pick up on while the kids just saw a bunch of action scenes.

 

[Mahorfeus]

It was an alright movie. Most of the things I read about it (Jolie carrying the movie) turned out to be true. I enjoyed it, but the premise kind of struck me as being somewhat convoluted.

Spoiler

The best parts of the movie for me were when Maleficent was actually, well, "evil." That lasted for all of 10 minutes. The throne room scene was used to market the movie for a reason, after all.

But I suppose Maleficent needed a better reason to be evil than just being a scornful ***** like in the original. Being a fairy, screwing over the lives of a few petty mortals for a century or so is nothing to her.

 

[Geo Da Sponge]

I absolutely loved it when I went to see it.

Spoiler: Mild spoilers are here

I've seen a lot of people saying that the weak spot of the film after Maleficent does her big curse and gradually stops being evil. I actually really liked that part of the film though, partly because she's supposed to be acting evil, but having had revenge by laying this curse on the Kin's daughter she realises there's not much else to do, and ends up just relaxing and mellowing out while watching over Aurora.

It's more entertaing than it sounds, partly because it also contains some of the funniest moments in the film. The comedy side of it really hasn't been mentioned much, with people preferring to call it "grimdark" when it's not really much darker than the original fairytale, is it?

I'm having a hard time summarising my thoughts about the film, but I really disagree with people who say Maleficent is only interesting when she's evil.