Maleficent: Mistress of Evil Is At Its Best When It's Weird and Original

Another live-action Disney remake, cool! We haven't gotten any of those this year. Despite being like the umpteenth slice of chocolate cake eaten at an all-you-can-eat dessert buffet, Maleficent: Mistress of Evil actually stands out as narrowly the best of these movies we've gotten in 2019. Though still just average as a movie itself, it's got more energy to it than Dumbo or The Lion King and both its production design and costume design stand out as genuinely enjoyable. It's a pity the script is a mess by, among a number of critical faults, failing to deliver on elements general family audiences would want to see if they're shelling out cold hard cash to see a Maleficent movie.

The First Trailer For The New Jungle Book Movie Has Arrived!

The Jungle Book is one of my favorite films of all-time, full stop. It's a magnificent showcase for the incredible hand-drawn animation Disney was capable of in its heyday (every one of the minor mannerisms of Shere Kahn are amazing and even subtle moment like Kaa shrugging shows an immensely inventive spirit), as well as some insanely lovable characters like Baloo and Bagheera. The best part? This isn't all bad on childhood nostalgia; rewatching it last year, I discovered that not only did the motion picture hold up, but there were more subtle elements of it that stood out to me as an adult viewer that only enhanced my enormous appreciation for this 1967 film.

Tim Burton Is Directing A Live-Action Dumbo Movie. I Swear, This Isn't An Onion Headline

Disney's recent surge of converting their classic animated films to live-action/CGI features has only been done twice (I'd say count Oz The Great And Powerful, but it's not technically an extension of a Disney movie), but those two films were Alice In Wonderland and Maleficent, which both made big bucks at the box office. Hell, Alice managed to gross over billion dollars, paving the way for a sequel to that 2010 film (which arrives in 2016), as well as a cavalcade of updates to classic Disney movies.

The Ten Worst Movies Of 2014

Well, the first article I write for Land Of The Nerds in 2015 should have some kind of significance, right? So, I've come to the decision of take a look at the ten worst movies I saw in 2014! Let's not waste any time, and get right to it!

Trailer For Live-Action Cinderella Takes Classic Tale And...Doesn't Update It

Aside from a little teaser trailer that didn't show any footage from this past summer, Kenneth Branagh's take on Cinderella for Disney has been really quiet. That changes now, as a new trailer popped up this morning, just in time to be shown on The Hunger Games: Mockingjay Part One this weekend. Check out the new trailer below.

Box Office Analysis: 2014 Has Been Rough For Family Movies

A lot of things have gone over spectacularly in 2014 cinema, but weirdly, family movies have been having one of their worst years in recent memory. It's not that any of them are tanking in a "Lone Ranger" style, it's just that they're certainly underwhelming mightily compared to years past. The main problem is the huge amount of lazy sequels made this year.

Editorial: Warner Bros. And Disney Are Engaged In A Cinematic Civil War

 Recently, movie studios have made a release date for an upcoming movie far more than just a typical date. Oh no, it's as essential as any other part of the film, with studios grabbing release dates far, far in advance in order to give their film the best possible advantage financially. Studios have always been eager to pick the best release dates possible, but recently, two studios have been using it as a way to compete with each other on a massive scale.

Summer Movie Memories: How Did One Of The Worst Movies Of the Summer Became A Smash Hit?

Up until Labor Day, I'll be looking at seven different summer movies from Summer 2014 and analyzing what really made them stand out this summer, for reasons both good and bad. Obviously, SPOILERS for Maleficent lie ahead. 

Box Office Predictions: Transformers Will Reign Over McCarthy, Aliens and Demons

In Box Office Predictions, I take a look at the forthcoming weekend and see how new releases and holdovers will fare.

We've got quite a meager bunch of movies for this particular 4th of July weekend. But even meager offerings deserve some predictions (even if I'm cheating a bit this time around since all the new releases have been out for a day already), so let's get to it!

Box Office Predictions: Make Your Choice...Dragons or Drugs?

Jonah Hills agent must be feeling very content now, as his client prepares to feature heavily in both of this weeks new releases that are likely each gonna top $50 million. The main question on everyones mind right now is which one will come out triumphant?

Box Office Predictions: Can Tom Cruise Conquer The Stars?

In Box Office Predictions, I take a look at the forthcoming weekend and see how new releases and holdovers will fare.

As late as 10 years ago, a summertime Tom Cruise tentpole could be guaranteed to be one of the biggest films of not just the season, but also the year. Since those days, he's been extremely more hit and miss, with his only $100 million features coming from Mission Impossible and a (hilarious I might add) cameo in a Ben Stiller film. Edge of Tomorrow has been dogged by both the press and audience members ever since it's first trailer came out, but extremely positive reviews seem to be turning the tide for the movie. I doubt it can all of a sudden churn even an Oblivion sized opening, but I'll be daring and say this thing just barely cracks $30 million.

Maleficent Reivew

The Only Explanation For This Movies Badness is Magic...Or Poor Filmmaking

Even she looks shocked at how bad this film is!

The best villains in cinema have an aura of mystery to them. Would The Joker be that imposing in The Dark Knight if we knew all of his backstory? How about Richie DiMaso in American Hustle? And if Boba Fett was revealed to be Bill Phillips, an accountant from Oregon, would he still remain so thrilling? (Ok, maybe that last one could work if Noah Baumbach directed. Frances Hoth we could call it) Maleficent makes the crucial mistake thinking that the only thing missing from that impeccable villain is a "tragic" backstory, that really just amounts to Twilight-esque romance and inconsistent characters.

Their main trouble is that the titular characters only appearance in any other media prior to this was the 1959 masterpiece Sleeping Beauty, as well as some Kingdom Hearts media. Unlike the characters seen in Disney's past two fantasy films (Alice In Wonderland and Oz The Great And Powerful), there aren't dozens of different cinematic interpretations of this characters to go through. That's not a terrible scenario; if they were smart, they would forget all about the original Disney movie and do their own thing. Which they kind of do, and yet, kind of don't.

Ya see, the tale of Sleeping Beauty as shown in the 1959 film kind of sort of happened; Prince Phillip, the three fairies, a spinning wheel and that engrossing baddie still factor in here. But the villain this time around is Aurora's (Elle Fanning) father, King Stefan (Sharlto Copley). While it's great that Copley gets a major role like this (he more than deserves it!), he's a pale substitute for the original animated features antagonist. But replacing the original Maleficent with a dude that dresses up in Sauron's armor is the least of the films problems. No, the worst part of the entire film is in it's one instance of entirely remaking a scene from the original movie; the scene where Maleficent curses baby Aurora to enter into an eternal sleep.

The whole scene lacks the dramatic potency of the original, and while Jolie is at least allowed to spring to evil life here (the only time in the movie she's allowed to do so). Oh, and let's just say the way she exits the scene here is just anemic when compared to the original.  Now, when it comes to remakes, I tend to take the attitude of book-to-movie adaptations and allow these things to stand on their own. But when your copying your inspiration this much, and then fail this badly, it deserves to be noticed. Speaking of failing badly,  the character of Maleficent in her incarnation here, is perfectly pitiful. Gone is the Queen of All Evil who threw all the forces of Hell at Prince Phillip; she's pretty much a glorified babysitter here. See, that last plot point really sticks out to me, since just a year or two after cursing the child to die on her 16th birthday, she soon takes the kid under hew wing. Now look, I'm not a soulless monster, I'll even freely admit the first scene where Maleficent encounters Aurora is all kinds of adorable, but it doesn't make scenes for the character as we've come to know her thus far in this particular movie.

That high level of inconsistency that plagues the movie has a field day with the films action sequences, which are so close to being thrilling it's disgusting. In a terrible waste of cool looking fantasy creatures, an epic battle between man and the magical beasts Maleficent helps protect loses all of it's effectiveness since the battles are shot so incoherently. In an effort to make the fights as PG appropriate as possible, no stabbings, impaling or what have you can be shown. As you might imagine, this makes depicting an epic battle sequence extremely difficult and by the end of it all, it just becomes a dull mess.

At least the finale is staged a little more lucid, although all the good is melted away by one of the single most idiotic things I've seen depicted in a film of this financial caliber. It's befuddling how this particular moment, along with practically everything else from the inconsistent characters to the God-awful green screen to the 3D that makes sure you can't see anything that happens in the film, was thought to be acceptable in the slightest.