Maleficent is a retelling of the Sleeping Beauty fairy tale, taking inspiration more so from the Disney animated film from 1959. One thing they got right was the casting, as Angelina Jolie is the perfect person for the role of the titular Maleficent. Whereas Maleficent was portrayed as a villain, in this movie, she is the anti-hero. While Maleficent still curses Aurora to fall into a deep sleep on her 16th birthday, and Maleficent still kills a fair number of people, she is given a plausible background and reason, stemming from betrayal and hatred. Unfortunately, right from the opening scene, there is a heavy reliance on computer generated effects. What makes this a problem is that the effects aren't very good and frankly, it does not add much to the film itself. The other downside of the movie is that the plot is predictable and quite cheesy at times. You will probably cringe in your seat during the scene when Maleficent turns evil, or when she flies, or during the climax. It's also predictable not in the way of how the general story goes (it can't be faulted since it needs to follow the Sleeping Beauty storyline) but the moral of the story, it feels as if the writers ran out of ideas and just went with something that's been done a million times before. Overall, a disappointing movie with a bland plot and exaggerated acting and gestures.
