I know my review of Maleficent is a week late, but for ... reasons, I was not able to see it until just last night. Firstly, I would like to thank my adorable friend Mykul for taking me to see this movie in the lovely city of Boston! Secondly, my gods, AMC Theaters are so full of themselves! How many little cartoons with animated AMC logos to tell you to turn off your cell phones or that the emergency exits are at the front of the theater or that the feature presentation is about to start do they need? I kept thinking to myself, "Is this the movie? Was Maleficent born a little red ball of squeakiness?"

Eventually we were treated to the trailers. The first trailer was for a movie called Earth to Echo, which is ... a little weird. The story is apparently about a bunch of teenage kids who make friends with this tiny alien robot named Echo. It's essentially WALL-E meets E. T. the Extra-Terrestrial! I kept saying to Mykul that it's probably a Disney movie, but it's actually from a company called Relativity, which is a company I've never heard of. The movie looks cute, but I think I'd wait until hearing other reviews of before deciding to see it in 3D.

The next trailer was for a movie called If I Stay. The plot was that Chloe Grace Moretz is a lonely cellist who doesn't think she's worthy of anything, but just when she meets the guy of her dreams, she gets in a car accident and is stuck in a coma and now she's roaming the streets as a coma ghost. (Oh, no! It's Ghost Dad all over again! HIDE ALL YOUR BILL COSBYS!) And she has to figure out a way to wake herself up before they pull the plug on her and the love of her life loses her forever. It reeks of Nicholas Sparks, but I think it has a little bit of appeal. I'll let you know if I decide to see it.

The last and most ridiculous trailer was for ... Okay, bear with me on this. ... It was for black Annie! ... Black Annie! ... Annie, the little red-haired orphan girl ... is black now. ... Didn't the blaxploitation era end with The Wiz? But, yeah. Annie's black now. And Cameron Diaz plays Mrs. Hannigan and I really don't think I like that. And Jamie Foxx plays Daddy Warbucks, except he's not Daddy Warbucks in this movie. He's Will Starks or something and he's a politician running for reelection and he's suddenly skyrocketing in the polls because he saved Annie from being run over by a car and now he's going to adopt her and she gives him the idea to run for president and--This movie is going to suck so hard.

But now the moment you've all been waiting for! Maleficent! ... It's actually pretty good. Which is the general consensus of the opinions of many critics. It's pretty good. I'm glad I saw it and would definitely see it again. The movie has a couple flaws, the script needed some tweaking, but overall, I enjoyed the hell out of it!

The story is that the world is torn between the human kingdoms and the fairy world of the Moors. Maleficent, the strongest of all the fairies, flies around the land with her majestic wings which are dazzling for all to behold. She meets the boy would become Princess Aurora's father King Stefan at a young age. The two become the best of friends. She lets him pet her beautiful wings and run his fingers through her long and luxurious hair and at her sixteenth birthday, he kisses her. Calling it true love's kiss. But young Stefan, who despite having a Germanic name, speaks with a Scottish accent, has ambitions to one day live in the King's castle. And one day, he lets his ambitions get the better of him and he leaves Maleficent.

When they've grown up, the war between the Moors and the human kingdom becomes more and more perilous. Maleficent and the Ent-like border guards defeat the King in a battle and utterly embarrass him. On his deathbed, the King tells his best men, including Stefan, that he must be avenged. Whoever kills Maleficent will marry the King's daughter and rule the kingdom when he dies. So Stefan meets up with Maleficent in the Moors, seemingly to warn her that the King is sending men to kill her. The two spend the night catching up, but Stefan drugs her so she falls asleep intent on killing her. He can't bring himself to do it, so instead he cuts off her treasured wings and presents them to the King as proof of her demise.

Maleficent awakens the next morning, utterly heartbroken at this act of betrayal. In too much pain to walk, she manifests her signature staff and uses it as a walking stick. She then saves the life of a raven named Diaval by turning him into a man just before a couple hunters kill him. In exchange, he pledges his life to her service and through him she learns that Stefan betrayed her so he could be king. Considering this to be the worst aspect of the betrayal, Maleficent becomes consumed by hatred and want for revenge that she surrounds the Moors in a wall of thorns and crowns herself Queen of the Moors.

Later, Diaval tells her that Stefan has had a child and her Christening will be a grand celebration. She then decides to crash the party. She dresses herself in a long black cloak and hides her hair with leather straps because ... bald people are intimidating? (Shrugs) And she goes to the Christening party where she finds that three of her fairies (Who are not called Flora, Fauna, and Merryweather in this movie) are there blessing the young princess with gifts. To exact her revenge on Stefan, she puts a curse on the child that when she's sixteen she'll prick her finger on a spinning wheel spindle and fall into an eternal sleep. Only when Stefan submits to her and begs for her forgiveness, does Maleficent say that the curse will be broken with true love's kiss. The same kiss that Stefan lied to Maleficent about on her sixteenth birthday. She then proclaims that no power or force on earth, other than true love's kiss, can break this curse.

Maleficent and Diaval spend the next sixteen years watching the good fairies do a rather piss poor job at raising Princess Aurora in the cottage in the woods. Maleficent even has to save her life a few times while watching from afar. It's actually kinda funny. When Aurora is still a baby, the fairies leave her basket by a window where Maleficent decides to stalk her. Aurora sees the horned fairy and smiles. Maleficent makes a scary face and hisses at her and Aurora giggles. Maleficent goes "I hate you," and walks away. A lot of people in the audience found that funny.

But in the sixteen years leading up to the fateful night of the curse, Maleficent becomes attached to Aurora and wonders if she acted too harshly in cursing her. But is there any hope of Aurora being able to escape the curse when Maleficent made it so the only thing that can break it is true love's kiss?

This movie was truly a genuine take on the story of Sleeping Beauty. I'll not lie, I expected different. I thought this was supposed to be, like, what happened behind the scenes with the Sleeping Beauty movie in 1959. Kinda like what they did with The Lion King 1½, only not nearly as awful and horrendous. But no, they change entire sections of the story. Like how fifteen-year-old Aurora mistakes Maleficent for her fairy godmother. Remember that from the original movie? Cause I don't! But even if you don't like this movie, Angelina Jolie just steals the entire show, because her performance as Maleficent is doubtlessly the best thing in the entire movie! And for the scenes that were basically live action reenactments of the original movie, I looked at Angelina Jolie and I saw fucking Maleficent! Also, I feel like this movie did the woman scorned aspect better than Oz the Great and Powerful did with the Wicked Witch of the West. In that movie, Oz has a one night stand with the pre-green witch and plays her like a pan flute. In Maleficent, Stefan and Maleficent grow up as friends and eventual lovers and Stefan betrays her for a throne. That's so much more emotionally stirring than what Oz the Great and Powerful gave us. And think about that for a second, because I gave Oz the Great and Powerful more slack than other critics!

So I would recommend this movie without thinking twice! It was worth every penny! ... Or at least it would have been worth every penny if Mykul didn't pay for my ticket. >.>

So it was actually worth every one of his pennies! For letter grades, Maleficent gets an A for effort! =^.^=

I'm Samhain the Dark, and with that I bid you farewell!