Bitch Media January 21, 2021 As the sum of all its parts, Maleficent is a downright fun film.
New York Post May 29, 2014 It’s often arresting to look at, but never has a strong sense of where it wants to go.
A few bumpy patches notwithstanding, the new feature is an exquisitely designed, emotionally absorbing work of dark enchantment.
TIME Magazine May 29, 2014 Except for Angelina Jolie, exemplary as the fairy badmother who laid a narcotic curse on an infant princess, this pricey live-action drama is...
There’s no denying this project’s peculiar, landscape-changing power.
This fairytale world is stunningly photographed by another Australian veteran Dean Semler, and the sets, costumes and design in general are of the...
Detroit News May 30, 2014 Children of all ages should be dazzled.
As for the screenplay, by Linda Woolverton, it treads carefully, and all too kindly, in the footsteps of "Wicked" …
Imaginatively, it places all the known elements of the story in different contexts, completely recasting this familiar fairy tale into a more...
This is Jolie’s film because of the Maleficent she makes. Everyone else, even Aurora, fades in her presence.
It fails to live up to its early promise, mostly because of an uneven tone and murky character development.
Like Sleeping Beauty lying in her coma, "Maleficent" is mesmerizing to behold, and hard to fully embrace.
Uncertain of tone, and bearing visible scarring from what one imagines were multiple rewrites, the film fails to probe the psychology of its subjec...
Imaginatively, it places all the known elements of the story in different contexts, completely recasting this familiar fairy tale into a more...
Toronto Star May 29, 2014 [Stromberg] is more about visuals than storytelling, and that lack of cohesion costs Maleficent where it counts.
I’m still not sure if the movie’s smack-down between patriarchy and matriarchy is the way to go, but at least nobody here is warbling a...
We may have all wanted to know the story behind those famed horns, but the mystery was far preferable to having Maleficent defanged and declawed in...
The Atlantic May 30, 2014 As a cameo, Jolie’s performance might have proven spectacular; but as a protagonist, she doesn’t give us enough to hold onto...
When you’ve got a talented visual effects artist at the helm, iconic source material, an all-star cast and a hefty studio-sized bud...
Boston Globe May 29, 2014 While this is Jolie’s show, obviously – and she’s terrifically arch – the surprising dearth of other compelling characters do...
Vanity Fair December 13, 2018 Maleficent makes two fatal mistakes, the first being a problem of narrative.
"Maleficent" misses the mark.
The real enchantment here is not the story but the star.
Long live the feminist revisionist backstory.
The director, Robert Stromberg, was production designer on Tim Burton’s Alice in Wonderland and Sam Raimi’s Oz the Great and Powerful...
Maleficent is awful. Can you be arrested for making simpering fantasy-whimsies in the name of Disney?
star-telegram.com December 13, 2018 Undoubtedly, Jolie’s performance will be touted as elegantly evil, but it’s Elle Fanning’s effervescence as Aurora that really ma...
The Dissolve May 29, 2014 In a story that explains too much about something that didn’t require explanation, [Jolie], at least, maintains a welcome air of my...
Maleficent doesn’t reinvent any wheels when it comes to the fairy-tale genre – but the fairy tale already comes with pretty hardy wheels...
It’s a technological marvel starring the world’s biggest celebrity: the full weight of Hollywood spectacle incarnate.
It’s fine to tell old tales anew, and it’s fine to mold them to some new purpose – say, a narrative of maternal repentance. But it...
A movie that doesn’t quite work as a fantasy or as a subversion of the same.
As for the screenplay, by Linda Woolverton, it treads carefully, and all too kindly, in the footsteps of "Wicked" …
Angelina Jolie is good in the film, and I do think kids will dig this movie.
Jolie’s commitment to the part is admirable: She gives this Maleficent a real emotional urgency. But the rest of the movie lets her down.
Irish Times December 13, 2018 Angelina Jolie is unimpeachably well cast as the hitherto evil – now merely misunderstood – sorceress who, outraged by patriarchal abuse...
[It lacks] the sort of nightmarish visions that made Walt Disney’s early animation features so powerful. This looks impressive, though, makin...
There’s an ultrasappy, unnecessary and modern spin on the classic happily ever after. You know, because so many people have complained for ce...
Whatever its flaws, "Maleficent" is a family-friendly Disney adventure that offers a relaunched and thoroughly delightful Angelina Jolie …
It hardly matters that Jolie’s accent rambles a bit between pungent Cockney and plummy Buckingham Palace.
The Guardian May 28, 2014 I’d forgotten what a fierce screen presence Jolie is: she is becoming the Sophia Loren of our age. Now I want to see her in a grown...
Robert Stromberg’s visually stunning if narratively predictable debut feature.
The aggressively unpleasant visuals certainly detract from the overall film, but Maleficent makes for a fascinating entry in an ongoing wave of pro...
The Playlist June 2, 2014 In "Maleficent" a lush fairy-tale world is created and the result is truly magical.
A film of resonant gestures and dream logic, in which ancient and contemporary predicaments jostle against each other …
All would be forgiven if the film had more magical feeling.
It’s a splendid-looking film. The effects are striking throughout, whether they are dramatic battle confrontations between humans and th...
Angelina Jolie is so wickedly enchanting in the magical, magnificent "Maleficent," you may not notice how transporting this female-driven blockbust...
'Maleficent' takes the venom out of its fierce titular figure, and rewrites her story to make her pathetic.
In the blood-red lipstick and midnight-black gown and cowl of her Sleeping Beauty antecedent, Jolie’s Maleficent is magnificent.
Maleficent feels classical in nature. The characters are boiled down to their essentials, the humor is timelessly broad, and Jolie’s at her b...
You feel a little absurd being moved by something as shoddily put together as this. But it likes these women – even the nincompoop pixies...
Jolie’s performance so overshadows the rest of the cast (and the rest of the movie) that you sometimes feel as if the other characters are, l...
Times (UK) December 13, 2018 Jolie’s skills and range as an actress are barely tapped into in this undemanding role.
The film is never quite as scary as might have been anticipated. At least, there are plenty of incidental pleasures along the way.
The direction by Robert Stromberg is an immediate mess. A long-time special-effects whiz making his filmmaking debut, he crowds every scene wi...
At least Disney was smart enough to cast Jolie. She has a genuinely heroic presence. If only the movie were equal to it.
Angelina Jolie’s interpretation of the title character, which transforms the animated icon into a complex, fully realized woman, provide...
'Maleficent' is an admittedly great-looking, sometimes creepy.
The Guardian June 1, 2014 It’s an icky affair: more Perry (Katy) than Perrault (Charles).
