It’s one thing to be a bad movie and it’s quite another to be boring and heaven help the film that is both. For its target audience, which I assume to be young girls no older than ten or so, Maleficent may be an enchanting feature filled with fairies and a strong female anti-hero turned heroine. For everyone else, I say beware, this is a tiresome slog that had me checking my watch 30 minutes in and every ten minutes after as it felt it would never end. Every turn in the story is narrated by Janet McTeer as if reading from an outline of the film’s script, which is so spectacularly weak it features entire scenes so riveting some end with people sitting in chairs while the focus of others is to watch as a character laughs maniacally to themselves… while sitting in a chair.
In adapting the fairy tale most of us remember as Disney’s classic 1959 animated feature Sleeping Beauty, screenwriter Linda Woolverton (Alice in Wonderland) has taken a welcomed approach to the story. Gone is the idea of a male character that must come to save our damsel in distress. Instead this is a story of female empowerment and love that isn’t decided based on the guy that comes along and simply finds the sleeping beauty the most gorgeous “thing” he’s seen. It’s a respectable choice and about time Disney took that approach, it’s just too bad it had to be in the form of such a dull feature.
It’s no wonder director Robert Stromberg, making his feature directorial debut, has an extension background in visual effects because that’s all this film is concerned about. Opening the story within the fantastical moors in which Maleficent is seen at an early age, living her life as a fairy, flying around in her magical, mystical realm with all her other fantasy friends until one day a boy, Stefan, from the realm of humankind stumbles into their land. The two become friends and over the years become very close, but as they age, the desire for power corrupts Stefan’s heart.
Soon the king decides, for whatever reason, he wants to kill all the magical creatures and proclaims the person that kills Maleficent will serve as his successor. Using his relationship with Maleficent (Angelina Jolie), Stefan (Sharlto Copley) gets close to her and clips her wings, thus beginning a cycle of hate that culminates in Maleficent cursing Stefan’s first born daughter Aurora (Elle Fanning) to a deep sleep on her 16th birthday, a curse that can only be broken by true love’s kiss, something both Maleficent and Stefan believe doesn’t actually exist. Sorry queen.
The story then bounces through the next 16 years of Aurora’s life with the three fairies (Imelda Staunton, Juno Temple and Lesley Manville) caring for her in the forest while Maleficent and her crow-turned-man-servant (Sam Riley) keep watch. Meanwhile, Stefan goes crazy in the castle trying to kill his friend-turned-foe, etc. etc. etc.
For a film that runs 96 minutes it feels like three hours and for a film this driven by visual effects it’s astonishing just how many scenes it includes where people just sit around and turn into talking heads only to advance the plot. You can sense when Stromberg and Woolverton were attempting to capture both the magic and the humor of the original Disney film, particularly with the bumbling fairies caring for Aurora, most notably the cake baking scene, which is simplified down into merely the presentation of a lopsided baked good rather than a moment to actually get to know Aurora’s caretakers.
This gets to the heart of Maleficent‘s issues, it’s a film consisting of bullet points rather than scenes. The cake baking scene is a perfect example of a moment where the scene showing the fairies making the cake is excised only to show the finished product. I understand the movie is titled Maleficent, but if all we’re going to do is watch her sit and stew in her own anger what’s the point?
Jolie does just fine in the title role while Fanning is given nothing to do but wander around clueless while getting in mud fights with fairyland creatures. The worst of the lot is Copley who seems to struggle from one accent to the next, but I guess I can’t lay too much of the blame at his feet as he too was given nothing to do. In fact, outside of Jolie, everyone else is just stumbling around like robots and the only great scene Jolie is given is the iconic entrance of Maleficent on the day she curses Aurora. After that it’s either scenes of her reveling in the misery she’s created or agonizing over the misery she’s created. Too bad they don’t have psychiatrists for mystical creatures, though I’m sure her agony isn’t something a wall of thorns and the cursing of a newborn child can’t fix.
Perhaps some will think I’m being overly precious when it comes to the classic animated story, but I fail to believe any youngster that watches Maleficent will hold it in high regard when they grow older the same way audiences adore Disney’s classic animated movies. Yes, movies such as this might be made for a young audience that will find something to enjoy in the magical CG flittering around, but once that audience grows up will they honestly turn to something like this for warm childhood memories? Dear God I hope not.
