Maleficent

Parental Rating: PG

Contains: Violence    Adult Content    

Jill's Review

Opens May 30, 2014

Runs 98 minutes

This is the untold story of Sleeping Beauty. Angelina Jolie is Maleficent, the evil fairy who casts a sleeping spell on the young Princess Aurora (Vivienne Jolie-Pitt as a young girl and Elle Fanning as a teen). Maleficent starts out as a nice girl-fairy, living in the Moors, surrounded by other fairies, trolls, walking trees and other creatures. She meets a young man, Stefan (eventually played by Sharlto Copley as he gets older) from the far off Kingdom seen in the distance. The Kingdom and the Moors have been at odds with each other over the years.  However, Stefan continues to sneak over, befriend Maleficent and eventually, they fall for each other (or so Maleficent thinks).  Then, Stefan, in an attempt to gain the throne in the Kingdom, performs a horrible crime against Maleficent and she is stripped of her wings. At this point, she is out for revenge. She puts a curse on Stefan's daughter, Aurora which allows her to put Aurora to sleep at the snap of her finger and will send her into a coma when she turns 16. Maleficent observes Aurora from afar and eventually allows her to think that she is her fairy godmother. As Aurora's kindness and wide-eyed innocence begin to thaw Maleficent's heart, she comes to realize that the young princess could be the one to bring peace to the land.

This movie looks great. The creatures in the Moors are awesome and Maleficent's wings are magnificent. But the story is just average. It seemed a little dark for a PG rating, especially with the battle scenes. Angelina Jolie and Elle Fanning bring life to the film but it wasn't as good as I wanted it to be. It is still worth seeing but don't set your expectations too high. I don't feel like it will be a classic fairy tale for the ages.

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