Tuesday, June 3, 2014

Maleficent Movie Experience at Trinoma


Directed by Robert Stromberg (production designer of "Alice in Wonderland", "Avatar", "Oz the Great and Powerful"), produced by Don Hahn ("Beauty and the Beast", "The Lion King", "The Hunchback of Notre Dame") and Joe Roth ("Alice in Wonderland", "Oz the Great and Powerful", "Snow White and the Huntsman"), and written by Paul Dini (both Batman and Superman: The Animated Series, Tiny Toons Adventures, Batman Beyond) and Linda Woolverton ("Alice in Wonderland", "Beauty and the Beast", "The Lion King"), this big-budget live action remake of Walt Disney's classic Sleeping Beauty explains how and why Maleficent turned so evil that led her to curse the infant Princess Aurora. This is the story of how a once-good fairy became the "Mistress of All Evil". - IMDB
So, last May 30, I was blessed enough to attend an early screening of Maleficent at TriNoma and I have to tell you right off the bat that I loved the movie entirely. I’ve been anxiously awaiting the release of this movie ever since we first heard that Angelina Jolie would be starring as the titular character way back last year. But before I tell you all about the movie, I would love to share my wonderful cinema experience at Trinoma Cinema.


It was the first time I watched a movie with my daughter, Danielle,and she was so ecstatic as I was when she knew it was Maleficent that we were watching.   It has been a while since I last had a Trinoma cinema experience, it was such a pleasure being granted the experience and to top it off, it was a blocked screening even, from nonetheless than Trinoma.  What I like most about the experience was how they give utmost priority on safety and compliance to the MTRCB regulations.  Like any high end cinemas, Trinoma's is clean and very comfortable, with the staff very courteous and amicable.  The cinemas are near my favorite restaurants as well on the fourth level so it's easy to get a meal after a movie.

Now let's get on to the movie, Maleficent.

The first thing that I need to make explicitly clear is that this movie is not totally a remake of the original Disney animated film Sleeping Beauty.   Growing up watching the original animated version, Maleficent is seen as how viewers perceive the likes of wicked step-mothers, witches and Disney antagonists.  The twist lies in Maleficent re-telling the story of Sleeping Beauty from her point of view, but this time she is the featured heroine.

Maleficent gives us a very clever version of the Sleeping Beauty story with mu ch endearment, a movie full of heart, thus, staunch fans of Maleficent as a purely evil villain may not respond well to this movie.
Angelina Jolie was made to play Maleficent and, truly, the thought that this movie was made for her may cross your mind.  All the same,  the original elements of the Sleeping Beauty story were still there — the curse, Aurora‘s fairy godmother upbringing in the woods, Prince Philip, true love’s kiss — but the elements are all adjusted slightly from Maleficent‘s perspective (another big change is that Aurora‘s name is never changed to Briar Rose, she remains Aurora the whole time).

The scenes where Maleficent interacts with Angelina‘s daughter Vivienne as young Aurora are so freaking cute, I can’t even tell you. There is much more heart in this movie than I anticipated. I expected to like the movie a lot but it really did exceed my expectations. While I can understand how staunch purists might not like this movie, I was charmed and wholly entertained by the retelling of the Sleeping Beauty story that we’ve known all these years.

Ahhh… what else to say? What a villain Maleficent is! But like all of us she started off with good in her heart and that was the story behind her story, why she became so evil.

I thought this was done wonderfully. The story behind everything of course had me cringing and hoping for a better way but people will be people and because of that Maleficent is left hurting and alone in this cruel world.

The movie was quite dramatic and of course very dark. I love this idea behind allowing the curtain to open on the past and showing villains for who they really are. And this movie did not fail to do that and more. Angelina Jolie was fantastic as were the other actors and I was mesmerized the entire time.

The trailer fortunately only shows a few parts of the movie so it is not one of those where you see the entirety of the film in just a few clips. There was so much more to be told, to be shown, and for the audience to understand. And in the beginning of the movie the narrator tells us that this story is different than others that we’ve heard through the ages so it allows the viewer to keep that in mind as the story progresses and I must say I did like that but especially because the ending was so different.

I can say that although this isn’t a movie that will make you think for years to come, it is a movie that did what movies are supposed to do, which is to take its audience to another world entirely. To introduce us to a story and show another version, to take us away from life as we know it and to allow us a few moments into this fantastical world. I know I want to live in the fairy world, it is gorgeous!!

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