Just my two cents about Maleficent.
I must say that I wasnt really looking forward to see this movie. As put in the trailers, the concept of giving the villain of the piece the spotlight seemed like an appealing way to revisit this tale (even though is not a new concept). However what the film delivered was far from the villain point of view.
It certainly didnt help that, being based on the original Sleeping Beauty Disney film, you set a couple of expectations regarding Maleficent and the world she inhabits. I thought that I was going to see beginnings of this evil character, her motivations and since the trailer gave the hints, the peculiar relationship with Princess Aurora. According to the original film as far as I remember, Maleficent was an evil being. So evil in fact that she sentences the newly born princess to death, giving her a time limit for her life and look for everyone surrounding her to suffer because of the inevitability of her demise. We get a version of that.
I think the problem here is that Maleficent is not actually that evil. In fact is quite the contrary. We get to see the oddly named Maleficent as a child fairy in the forest, living a happy life and being kind with the funny creatures that inhabit that place. The turn of events in which she becomes her traditional self is not as interesting as it seems. She becomes involved with a human, Stefan, and they become friends. Later, they become more than that. Ultimately, Stefan is consumed by greed and betrays Maleficent, playing with her feelings and cutting her wings to prove himself worthy of being king of the humans kingdom.
The scene in which she realizes she lost her wings is very powerful and heartbreaking. We come to the realization that her wings are more than a part of herself. Her wings gives her freedom and joy, they make her happy and complete. Now she is bound to walk the Earth with a cane.
I think the film could have handled that aspect a little better, because it seems unnecessary that Maleficent had to be betrayed by her former lover to finally coming full circle with her expected rise as a villain. It seems a little cliché, and forced a grudge between the King Stefan and Maleficent not present in the original story. Now the evil spell cast upon Aurora is not out of sheer evil and malice, but of revenge. Im think that the wings motif in the film is far more powerful than the spite for realizing that Stefan didnt really love her.
Heartbroken and wingless, Maleficent is consumed with hate and vengeance, and declares herself the Queen of the forest. She saves a crow named Diaval by turning him into a human. In return he swears to serve her. Maleficent constantly shape shift him from man to bird or other animals as she deems necessary.
When baby Aurora is born, we get a spin on the spell. It isnt the three fairies that save Aurora. In fact the fairies are shown as a trio of incompetent wrecks, even with their good intentions. It is Maleficent who makes the loophole in the spell. She will fall in a mortal sleep by pricking her finger on the spindle of a spinning wheel when she reaches 16 years old, only to be awaken by a kiss of true love.
We learn later that Maleficent believes there is no such thing, because when she was younger, Stefan said one time that a kiss he gave her was of true love, and he didnt love her. And as far as Maleficent is concerned Aurora will sleep forever.
Now, Stefan does not care for the welfare of his child. He is more upset by the humiliation that Maleficent made of him at the presentation of Aurora. He sends his daughter to the care of the three fairies, far away from the kingdom, whom he doesnt respect either, sent to destroy all spinning wheels of the kingdom and declares war on the forest. He believes once the time of the spell passes, Maleficent will come after him.
He comes across as a very coward, greedy and paranoid person. As the villain of the piece, he is not very compelling, and Aurora may be his daughter but he is not father of hers. More to the point, his wife doesnt object the decision of leaving her daughter to the care of the clumsy fairies, she doesnt do anything relevant in fact, and dies off-screen years later.
And the fairies, which I believe are the comic relief, are just insufferable. They add nothing to the story whereas in the original tale are essential. They are the ones that put the kiss of true love clause to Maleficent spell, and are the ones that aid Prince Phillip to defeat Maleficent in the end (but this story goes in another direction) They are not even the godmothers of Aurora anymore, she calls them aunts.
The spin is, the godmothers role goes to Maleficent, who for some reason looks out for her in the meantime the time of the spell goes by. I believe is just to ensure that Aurora reaches 16 to enact his revenge. But she grows fond of her, and aids her, later she takes care of Aurora. Realizing her attachment to the kid, Maleficent tries to undo her own spell to no avail.
The thing that bothers me is that, Maleficent fondness for Aurora is because of her own spell. On the presentation of Aurora she says that everyone who treats her will love her or something like that. If thats true, in a way, Maleficent love for Aurora is kind of artificial. Then again, later when she gets reunited with his father, he still doesnt love her, so maybe the film is inconsistent with this, or Im looking too much into it. Perhaps they need to be close to her for this to work out, I dont know.
The role of the fairies in the upbringing of Aurora is diminished to the ground, in order to give Maleficent a greater role. Maleficent, being declared by Aurora as her own godmother, is for all intents and purposes is Auroras mother.
So now we have a totally different story than rise to villainy, Im not sure thats a good thing either.
We get a clumsy Prince Philip, who encounters Aurora just one time and befriends her. Nothing more comes from this, and later in the film is proven that Prince Phillip has no place in the film other than serving a counterpoint to the films kiss of true love. When Aurora learns the truth about the evil of the world, she flees to the castle and then the spell is realized. Maleficent cant do anything about it, neither the fairies nor Prince Phillip (his kiss, at the request of the fairies, isnt one of true love). When all hope is lost, a heartbroken Maleficent places an innocent kiss on the forehead of Aurora, and she awakens her from her sleep.
And then comes the obligatory battle between the knights of the king and Maleficent. She doesnt get to transform into a huge dragon, and in this story, Maleficent being transformed has no place either because that would mean that she could give herself new wings at her will. Instead, it is her crow that is transformed into the dragon. Aurora finds Maleficent wings which (we learn at last minute), have some sort of conscience and want to be reunited with their owner. Maleficent is fused again with her wings, gains the upper hand in battle and confronts King Stefan, she spares his life and at the end dies because of his own hand.
Aurora is declared the queen and goes to live on the forest, Maleficent relinquishes her throne and regains the role of guardian of the forest. And the story ends with the narrator revealing that she is in fact Aurora, and that she has been given the moniker of Sleeping Beauty even if she only was a sleep a couple of hours.
I believed (for some reason), we were going to get the story of Maleficent from her point of view. Her fall as a villain and her ultimately demise. The story is completely different and I can accept that, even then, that story presents problems by itself.
Why require the cliché that the villain turns to evil because an unrequited love and betrayal?. As I said before, the motif of the wings is far more powerful. Think of this: The Kingdom of humans wants the treasures of the forest, so the King makes a façade of truce between his people his neighbors, but in the end they are betrayed, Maleficent loses her wings and also the trust for any other human. Perhaps with some tweaking this could have worked. Without the romantic subplot, the notion of true love being false to Maleficent is lost too, so the fairies could had a more competent role in diminishing Maleficent curse as in the original tale. Then you could have Maleficent stalking young Aurora and eventually growing fond of her, without any magic aid. That way, the film keeps flowing and you keep the plot twist of the kiss.
More so, Maleficent isnt truly evil more than just very flawed and hurt. Not in itself a bad thing, but the film was sold as such, so there were some expectations. She doesnt do anything outright evil. Even when becoming the Queen of the forest, we dont get to see any mistreating from her to the creatures. Just an ominous dark tone that symbolized nothing, at least as those creatures were concerned. The spell for Aurora is diminished too by Maleficent, she is sent by her to sleep forever, not to die.
Ultimately, she is made to be seen sympathetic, perhaps necessary since she is the star of the piece. Would have been better to see her downfall without redemption, ala Breaking Bad? Not for the target audience. But perhaps we could have gotten something a little more poignant. What if Maleficent assumed his evil role in order to lure Prince Phillip into rescuing her, and realizing that she had to die in order for Aurora to be free? Im thinking too much of this.
The true villain of the piece, King Stefan, is not very compelling. Perhaps is the actors fault, but there is nothing truly scary from him. And being that Maleficent is now on the protagonist place, the villain being a real threat was a necessity. We know that Maleficent can defeat him whenever she wants, the only defense is Maleficents weakness: iron. He didnt care for his daughter as much as his own welfare, what if he used her to gain the upper hand? He comes as a bland character, with no gravitas and no sense of real danger.
The only supporting character worthwhile is Diaval, Maleficent crow. Serving as some sort of Jiminy Cricket was a relief for a film that lacked interesting characters. He brought warmth and soul that was required in order to help in Maleficent growth.
Aurora itself characterized in a very simple way, but the air of innocence that she displayed was sweet. But there was no major drama for her, it would have been nice to see some character development from her instead of a one note characterization.
The thematic elements of the film are in place. But some are not developed in a satisfactory way. Here comes again the motif of the wings. I think that it was never clearly stated that Maleficent could regain her wings, also perhaps she didnt know either. But the scene where she loses them is so heartbreaking that made me believe that she lost them for good. Wings that represented her happiness are long gone, and she descends to a dark path.
Enter Aurora. She becomes the thing that fulfills that happiness in Maleficent. In the end they made literal that Aurora gives Maleficent back her wings. But what if Aurora was, in a metaphorical level, Maleficent wings. She didnt need the wings anymore, and the film could have used another excuse to gain the upper hand in the final battle. What if the turn of events made Maleficent accept that perhaps she wouldnt fly ever again, but be happy tutoring Aurora as her godmother. It would have been a bittersweet poignant note to end a film of a redeemed villain. Regaining her wings literally and triumphantly was unnecessary, and a little contrived.
Also, we get voiceless kingdoms of humans and magical creatures. Even worse, in the end the human kingdom is forgotten. While the barrier has been taken down, we dont see any people on Auroras coronation ceremony, the inclusion of Prince Phillip notwithstanding (he wasnt even from that human kingdom). At the beginning we are told that these two kingdoms are separated, if not by a physical barrier a cultural of sorts. And we are told the resolution, but we dont actually see it. The greedy human kingdom is not redeemed, and the magical immaculate forest place is never put to a test, not event to give the humans the lesson of humbling they need.
Angelina Jolie steals the show with Maleficent, it is her talent that drives the film and with a good reason. In comparison, most of the characters fall flat.
At the end we get a regular film with potential for much improvement. I just hope this doesnt become a trend. Cruella de Vil had a puppy pet that she loved with her life
