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Maleficent | 2014 | PG | - 1.4.2
The orphan leader of a group of magical creatures (Angelina Jolie) suffered loss and betrayal that filled her with bitterness and desires for revenge. In retribution, she places an irrevocable curse upon the greedy human king's new baby (Elle Fanning). Also with Sharlto Copley, Sam Riley, Imelda Staunton, Juno Temple and Lesley Manville. Directed by Robert Stromberg. [1:37]
SEX/NUDITY 1 - On her 16th birthday a boy kisses a winged girl briefly and he says that he has given her true love's kiss. A teen boy kisses a teen girl as she sleeps. A pre-teen girl and pre-teen boy embrace briefly. A teen boy and a teen girl hold hands briefly in the woods. A boy and a winged girl hold hands. A man clothed in black kisses a teen girl's hand.
► Twice, we hear that there is no such thing as true love.
► Some very small male elves are shown shirtless with bare chests and backs. A few women in a castle wear low-cut gowns that reveal a small amount of cleavage. We hear that a king and a queen had a baby daughter and see a dozen women giggle about it. A crow transforms into a nude man, covered with grime (we see his bare back, arms, shoulders and chest).
VIOLENCE/GORE 4 - Moors and forests are filled with trees and rock formations that have eerie faces: Fairies inhabit the area and some are small glowing blue mermaids while others are short fat trolls with short elephant-like trunks; some are blue fish that fly in the air and others are large gray, scaly birds with two arms and three wings; others are small humanoid folk with several colorful, thin insect legs and still others are short old men with scalps like flat flowers; three tiny fairies are surrounded by blue butterflies or flower petals, even when they transform into women. Tall men made of roots and branches growl threateningly at visitors to the moors. A girl with horns and wings has large blue irises and as an adult they change from blue to gold and back to blue. In several scenes we hear howling from unknown creatures off-screen.
► Thousands of troops led by a human king advance on the moors, but a winged woman forbids them entry and the king calls out, "Bring me her head" and the woman calls out loudly, "Arise and stand with me now!" whereupon trees and bushes rise up and become humanoid warriors riding huge warthogs, carrying spears and lances; one woody root becomes a large dragon that snorts, snaps its jaws and fills the screen, the woman (flying) and tree-creatures meet the attack of thousands of horsemen and foot soldiers carrying spears and we see many men fall from their horses and tree creatures stab and stomp on soldiers who drew swords (no blood is seen); the king wounds the woman in the shoulder with his hand (the raw, reddened area instantly heals) and the woman knocks the king to the ground and chokes him, telling him to leave; the tree creatures kill several more men (no blood) causing the king and his men to retreat and the camera cuts to the king in bed at night, saying that he is dying and he tells several men at the foot of the bed that whoever vanquishes the winged woman will be the next king. A king and his men catapult firebombs into the moors at night, where fires burn thorny walls, but extinguish quickly; some of the thorny vines stand up and toss away approaching soldiers while other soldiers enter the moors, where a woman levitates them, tosses them around and slams them into tree trunks and the ground (we do not see injuries).
► In a castle a net made of iron links falls on a woman and we see blood on several links (no clear wound is seen); the woman changes a crow into a giant dragon that breathes fire onto armored soldiers surrounding her and a few men fall; other soldiers circle her with tall shields and pound them on the floor as the screen fills with flames and soldiers throw a dozen long chains around the dragon; a king in armor walks into the circle with a fat iron chain, beats the woman and flings her across the floor with it (no wound shows). A king attacks a woman and the two fall over the side of a balcony and the woman flies up and he falls to the ground, dead (no blood is shown).
► A human returns to the moors he visited as a youth and tricks a winged woman with a drugged beverage (please see the Substance Use category for more details), drugs her, cuts off her wings as a prize, and turns them in to the nearby castle to become successor to the elderly and dying human king, who lies in bed, coughing repeatedly; the formerly winged woman awakes in the morning in pain, gasping and groaning and discovering her loss, she screams loudly into the sky before pulling herself to her feet, picking up a twig, changing it into a long walking staff topped by a glowing orb and struggling to walk, she stops to sit because of the pain in her back. A teen boy drugs a winged girl, cuts off her wings as a prize, becomes king and marries another woman (please see the Violence/Gore category for more details). A teen girl enters a room filled with spinning wheels and pricks her finger on a spindle, falling immediately into a coma on the floor; a king shouts at three fairies, blaming them for the coma, and slapping one fairy out of his way (she shouts in pain and holds her arm).
► A set of large wings flutters and breaks out of a glass case as a dragon breaks free of his chains and a king chokes a woman, then releases her, but draws a sword as if to stab her; a close-up of her face shows a gasp of pain and a bright light behind her (we see that large wings have attached themselves to her back); the woman drags the king with a chain he wrapped around her leg and flies through a loudly shattering window to a high balcony, where they struggle after she punches him twice in the face, and then chokes him and releases him, saying, "It's over."
► A woman speaks a curse over an infant girl, declaring that the girl will prick her finger on the spindle needle of a spinning wheel, falling into a death like sleep. A woman erects a thick wall of huge woody vines with large thorns around the moors to keep humans out and as she walks by short stony walls, her anger throws the stones away behind her. In occasional fits of rage a woman, dressed in black and having black horns, shouts to the sky and sends green lightning up and back; in one scene, she attempts to revoke a curse she placed on a girl and we see gold and green lightning passing back and forth across a room and back into the woman's hands. A toddler runs off a cliff in a long shot and a witch blows gold mist toward her, causing strong plant branches in the side of the cliff to catch her and place her back up on land, unharmed.
► A king shouts and slams the point of his knife into a table; we hear that he has become dark and paranoid and we see him in a dim war room, plotting against a woman in the moors. A king sits alone in a dim room, talking to a pair of large wings held inside a glass case when a messenger enters and says the queen is dying, and the king says he is too busy to see her. A king hears a woman's screaming voice in his sleep and sits up in bed, stomps down a hallway, screams at a night guard who falls into a barrel of liquid, grabs the man and shouts for him to wake up all the troops, no matter how late at night it is.
► A crow struggles under a net as a man takes up a wooden club and is about to beat it to death; a woman saves the crow when she casts a misty golden cloud over the bird and changes it into a man. A woman changes a crow into a snarling giant wolf to drive away humans and into a horse to provide her with transportation, changing it back into a black-clothed man after each case (he has small feathers etched into his temples and collarbones when he is a man). A woman uses gold mists to entrance a teen girl in several scenes and a teen boy in one scene; she puts them to seep and levitates them off the ground, where they float behind her as she walks. A boy and a girl shake hands and his ring draws some blood as it cuts the hand of the girl slightly; the boy throws the ring away.
► A woman captures a teen boy, puts him to sleep on his horse with a gold mist, and leads him to a castle where the woman catches her shoulder on a large thorn, but escapes and clubs a soldier unconscious with her staff; the teen boy levitates and floats down a hallway, drops to the floor, awakens and three tiny fairies direct him to kiss a sleeping girl to break a spell; when his kiss fails to awaken the girl the fairies pick him up and throw him from the room; a woman cries at the side of the cushioned bed where the comatose girl lies and a man in the room becomes tearful as well. A woman with two black horns on her head raises her hands beside her face, makes her fingers into claws and hisses as she looks into a cottage window at a baby in a crib; the baby laughs, while the woman drops her hands and says mildly, "I hate you."
► Soldiers collect all the spinning wheels in a kingdom, place them in a castle chamber and set them on fire (flames fill the screen); among burning embers later, we see piles of charred wood and partial wheels.
► Three fairy women in a cottage argue often, lightly slapping one another in the face and pulling each other's hair a bit (one woman's face turns blue with fairy dust); in one scene, they toss flour all over one another as one of the women beats a ball of dough excessively with a rolling pin; in another scene, they argue and rain falls from the ceiling, making them shriek and the camera pans back to show a lightning and thunder storm happening inside the cottage, but not outside (no one is injured). A woman, a teen girl and fairies engage in an escalating mud fight in the woods and they laugh.
LANGUAGE 2 - Name-calling (silly, imbeciles, idiots, hovel, winged elf, beast, beastie, bleeding bloated goat, clumsy fool, dirty vicious filthy stinking wolves), stereotypical references to men, women, parents, greedy kings, the Scottish, witches, princesses, teenagers, fairies, peasants, the rich.
SUBSTANCE USE - A woman forms gold and green mists from her hands that put two people into a deep sleep, green mists move objects, change a crow into a man and a wolf and a horse, and a baby inhales green mists and makes a wide-eyed grimacing face as its eyes glow. A woman drinks from a flask and soon falls into a deep sleep, and a man falls into a barrel of what might be either water or beer in a hallway.
DISCUSSION TOPICS - The environment, relationships, love, betrayal, greed, power, magic, fantasy, belief, conflict, revenge, trust, reconciliation.
MESSAGE - True love is the love of a mother for her child.
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CAVEATS
Be aware that while we do our best to avoid spoilers it is impossible to disguise all details and some may reveal crucial plot elements.
We've gone through several editorial changes since we started covering films in 1992 and older reviews are not as complete & accurate as recent ones; we plan to revisit and correct older reviews as resources and time permits.
Our ratings and reviews are based on the theatrically-released versions of films; on video there are often Unrated, Special, Director's Cut or Extended versions, (usually accurately labelled but sometimes mislabeled) released that contain additional content, which we did not review.
The Front Room - 6.5.6
Beetlejuice Beetlejuice - 3.6.5
Reagan - 1.4.3
Afraid - 4.5.5
You Gotta Believe - 2.3.3
The Forge - 1.1.1
City of Dreams - 5.8.7
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