Maleficent: Mistress of Evil, attempted to draw out the tale of Sleeping Beauty’s prized villain to the absolute limit. Unfortunately, what started out in the first film, Maleficent, as a well crafted origin story of a not-so-villainous fairy, quickly degraded into something almost unrecognizable in Maleficent: Mistress of Evil.
That’s not say Disney did nothing right. As with all Disney films, the special effects were on point. Multiple species of fairies were lovingly rendered with CGI and captured in almost every scene. Maleficent’s iconic green flames made several appearances. And let’s not forget the action sequences! Who doesn’t love a long drawn out battle between a battalion of winged fairies and an army of inept castle guards? All that aside, action and fantastical CGI effects can’t hope to save a film if the script of that film is less than adequate.
And the script of Maleficent: Mistress of Evil was just awful. The dialogue throughout the film was plagued with cliched lines, each one like a slap in the face, sinking me lower and lower into my seat. To be honest, I became embarrassed for the actors as they spewed out lines such as: “It’s a new day.”, “I’ve loved you since the moment I met you…“, and “You do not know me.”
Of course, there were some small gems of dialogue as well, but those moments were too few and far between the underwhelming quality of the script as a whole.
Now, perhaps I could have ignored the bad script and just enjoyed the rich and complex plot of the story. After all, I’m a big fan of Disney. However, the plot wasn’t rich, neither was it complex. In fact, it was completely and utterly predictable. ( WARNING: SPOILERS ) Philip’s mother suddenly has a change of heart when it comes to her precious son marrying Aurora? She must be the villain. Diaval, (Maleficent’s right hand man/crow), randomly mentions that he’d make a great bear? Well, know we know what Maleficent is going to turn him into during the heat of battle.
It isn’t that these events are necessarily bad, but in order to keep an audience enthralled by a film, there needs to be a sense of not knowing what is going to happen next. You’ve felt it before, that uneasy feeling in your stomach as you clutch the arms of your chair, completely at the mercy of the screen in front of you. That is a good film, a film that combines a well developed plot with an original script in order to show you something that you never knew could exist.
Unfortunately for Disney, Maleficent: Mistress of Evil is not one of those films, at least for me.
ouccchhh… Guess I can take that one off my list