Maleficent: Mistress of Evil

Over the weekend, Andrea and I ventured forth from the Fortress of Ineptitude to go see Maleficent: Mistress of Evil. This is the first movie Andrea and I have seen together just the two of us since Randie went off to college.  We also saw Maleficent: Mistress of Evil without benefit of reading any reviews; we thought it looked cool and that was sufficient cause. Also we saw Maleficent: Mistress of Evil without ever seeing the first Maleficent movie from 2014. Still, Andrea and I are Disney savvy people with a working knowledge of Sleeping Beauty so it wasn’t too hard to pick up on the ins and outs of this world.

For a movie with “Mistress of Evil” in the title, Maleficent does very little “Evil Mistressing”.  Oh yeah, she dresses in sinister black, has sharp cheek bones that would cut diamond, has wicked looking horns growing out of her head and her magic power sparks and burns around her with that sickening green hue we associate with demonic powers. And she’s portrayed by Angelina Jolie. So a lot of strikes against her in the whole “Mistress of Evil” department. 

But mostly, Maleficent is more a “Mistress of Poor Social Skills” than of actual evil. 

There’s someone else vying for the title of “Mistress of Evil”. 

Five years after the events of the previous movie, Aurora reigns as Queen of the Moors where all manner of magic folk and critter dwell. Maleficent serves as protector of the Moors.

Meanwhile, Maleficent continues to be regarded as the villain by the neighboring kingdom of Ulstead, home to Prince Phillip who is in love with Aurora and asks her to marry him. She says yes and this is when the trouble starts.  Or rather trouble starts when Phillip’s parents, King John and Queen Ingrith, invite Aurora and Maleficent to celebrate this engagement. 

John’s an affable sort who prefers peaceful co-existence to war. Ingrith is a bit more tightly wound.  All through dinner, Ingrid keeps snidely provoking Maleficent until Maleficent lose her tenuous grip on her considerable temper. In an outburst of her mystic powers, it appears that John has been cursed to a death like slumber, much like the one that befell Aurora in the original fairy tale. 

 But it’s not Maleficent who has cursed the good king. John’s own wife, Ingrith, has done the terrible deed herself.  Indeed, we discover Ingrith has been playing a long and sinister game for Ulstead to conquer and take the Moors while killing every single one of the magic folk and critters that dwell there. 

It is Ingrith who’s laying down the serious claim to the title of “Mistress of Evil”. 

This becomes a seriously intense movie as it barrels towards its resolution as Ingrith exposes the depths of her hatred and the lengths she is willing to go to give action to that hatred.

I would say that Maleficent: Mistress of Evil is serviceable towards telling its story even if I don't think it provokes the sense of wonder and awe one might expect from the experience.

The movie truly shines whenever Angelina Jolie is on screen, trying to have Maleficent learn how to smile in a way that is pleasant and not scary beyond all reason.