Maleficent. Dir.
Robert Stromberg. Disney, released May 30, 2014, in theaters. 135
mins.
Reviewed by: Elan
Justice Pavlinich (justice7@mail.usf.edu)
Visually enchanting,
comically elegant, and mildly violent, Maleficent is a
feminist film that places women
harmoniously in nature, against the impotent hubris of the
patriarchy.
Maleficent is
Robert Stromberg’s directorial debut, and though it is written by
Linda Woolverton, Charles Perrault, who published “Le belle au bois dormant” as part of his 1697
Histoires ou
contes du temps
passé, is credited too. Of course, the Disney Animated Classic
Sleeping Beauty follows Perrault’s
tale, but it is this 1959 cartoon that provides the visual foundation
upon which much of Angelina
Jolie’s characterization of the dark fairy is based.
Indicating an
acquaintance with this textual history, the narrator begins the tale
with the compelling challenge
that she will “tell an old story anew and see how well you know
it.” Now,
audiences are aware
that Maleficent is a modern adaptation of a familiar story
from the villain’s point of view, and
though it lacks the majesty of a typical Disney fairy tale
introduction, right away the audience is
presented with the problem of textual authority. Who is in charge
here? Perrault? Sleeping
Beauty? Or the contemporary cinema that is presently staking its
claim to an
oral tradition that
challenges our cultural memory of the Sleeping Beauty fairy tale?
The cross-cultural
multitemporal setting is at once familiar and ambiguous, referring
the audience to a time long
ago that eludes any coherent spatiotemporal location. The tale
implies an
early medieval temporal
setting based on the contrast between the fairy realm and the
kingdom of humans, yet the
architecture and costume design suggests postconquest Britain, which
is evinced by the
Anglo-Norman influence on the castle and costumes out of medieval
romance that indicate a dominant
French presence in an English court.[1]
Young Maleficent,
played by Isobelle Molloy, first appears as a happy fairy in earth tones, at peace with
nature and a healer who promotes wellness in the Moors, a land which
is
inhabited by all
mythical creatures, in contrast to the architectural vista of the
unnamed kingdom of humans. Maleficent
meets Stefan, a boy who had been warned never to venture into the monstrous territory of
the Moors. During this encounter we learn that fairies cannot touch
iron without being burned,
and so Stefan tosses his iron ring so that he can be closer to
Maleficent. Their love, however,
cannot withstand Stefan’s ambition as he is drawn to power in the
kingdom of humans. His people
fear the Moors, and their ruler, King Henry, promises that the one
who slays Maleficent will
advance to the throne. Relying on his intimacy with the powerful
fairy, Stefan lures her into a
meeting, drugs her, cuts off her wings, and delivers them to King
Henry to signify that she has
been vanquished. Based on these deceits Stefan becomes king, and his firstborn is Aurora.
On the day of Aurora’s
christening the kingdom gathers to bestow gifts upon the child. Maleficent intrudes
upon the festivities dressed in black, and Angelina Jolie delivers
the iconic
curse with magnificent
wickedness, proclaiming amidst roiling green smoke that the princess will prick her finger
on the spindle of a spinning wheel and fall into a death-like sleep
before her sixteenth birthday, and
that she may only be revived by true love’s kiss. As a precaution,
King Stefan rids the kingdom
of all spinning wheels and sends Aurora to be raised in the
countryside by three inept fairies,
to return to her home only after her sixteenth birthday.
Over the course of
Aurora’s youth, it is the vigilant Maleficent who protects her from
the shadows, who are
determined to see her curse fulfilled. To the audience familiar with
medieval
romance, while
Maleficent appears to be monomaniacal, her curse serves as the seed
for her personal epiphany
concerning love’s triumph over hatred. Nearly sixteen years later,
Aurora, now played by Elle Fanning,
is made aware of her guardian, and a bond is cultivated between the
two.
Still, the curse takes
hold and Aurora is compelled to return to her kingdom. The curse conveys her through
hidden passages and a company of women who are washing white sheets
until she finds the
room of discarded and dismembered spinning wheels. She pricks her
finger, falls asleep, and the
quest for her true love is begun. The logical remedy is a kiss from
the dashing Prince Phillip,
who anticlimactically fails to awaken her. It is Maleficent, Aurora’s
fairy godmother, whose kiss
restores the princess.
Her father however,
King Stefan, has fallen prey to his own paranoia and sets a trap to murder the fairy once
and for all. While Maleficent struggles to save herself, Aurora
discovers
her godmother’s wings
locked away in another secret chamber. She frees the flapping
members, which seek out the body
to which they belong, and upon union Maleficent is restored to her
full power so that she can
defend herself. She does not vanquish King Stefan, however; rather it
is his megalomania that
leads him to his own death.
In the end, Maleficent
finds happiness and is returned to harmony in the Moors, and Aurora is named queen
of both realms. All creatures, human and mythical, are happy to
uphold
her as the rightful
ruler.
According to
Entertainment Weekly, Maleficent is a recycled story
with very little substance and an
ill-refined plot that conflicts too much with its predecessor,
Sleeping Beauty.[2]
This myopic assessment
does not consider Maleficent’s elegant simplicity. The
temporal aspects of the fairy tale have
been collapsed. Now, instead of an entire kingdom slumbering for
years, Maleficent
presents Aurora, alone, sleeping for hours. Minimal character
development and sparse dialogue indicate a
refined narrative that relies on visual expression and the
audience’s presuppositions. It is
this very elegance that bespeaks a quiet complexity; one that is
fully appreciated by
considering Maleficent within the textual history of the
Sleeping Beauty narrative and by recognition of
the visual argument that promotes feminine empowerment. The fairy
tale tradition has
maintained gender dichotomies through such narratives, like the
foundational Disney Animated Classic
Sleeping Beauty, that foster tropes and archetypes,
subconsciously enforcing notions of
feminine weakness and servitude or monstrous corruption that
requires rescue and order by
means of masculine power and control. Maleficent is not only
self-conscious of its relation to a
literary history of androcentric narratives; it extricates itself by
announcing its own textual authority
as a representation of feminine empowerment in contrast to the
impotence of masculine claims to
power.
The first glimpse of
this stunning cultural critique occurs in the teaser trailer for Maleficent. In
accordance with other Disney previews that immediately signify their
connection
to the iconic studio,
the teaser trailer opens on the Disney kingdom at twilight, but then
the shot suddenly veers off in
the exact opposite direction to show the peaks of a wild and untamed
other, the Moors.[3] Upon
first viewing it would seem that the preview is announcing that
audiences will be taken into the dark
mirror-realm that opposes the perfection of the Disney kingdom, but
in fact, as we learn the
politics of Maleficent’s diegesis, the Disney kingdom is
self-consciously equated with
patriarchy. The Disney kingdom is opposite Maleficent’s Moors,
precisely in the same place as King
Stefan’s castle, an industrialized realm of masculine authority
built on treachery, where women
serve to beget heirs or they work underground to keep the kingdom clean. Signifying the
Disney kingdom in place of Stefan’s castle in the preview suggests
a Disney film that defies
the Disney tradition. Maleficent, following on the heels of
Frozen (perhaps too closely),
also promotes a practical notion of true love; one that relinquishes
the old fairy tale tradition
that commodifies women and bolsters masculine authority. The
Maleficent teaser trailer makes
fascinating use of space, for if we, the audience, are accustomed to
the spectacle of the Disney
kingdom, it would suggest that the Disney kingdom as patriarchy is constructed in such a
way that it is constantly vigilant of its other, and that our point
of reference
is the feminist
kingdom, whence we gaze.
The teaser trailer also
plays on the audience’s androcentric expectations, in that Maleficent is
publicized as a wicked witch, rather than betrayed fairy. Audiences
are drawn to
the character because
she is portrayed as monstrous, yet Maleficent constructs a
visual argument that privileges women
rather than reducing them to sexualized or horrific spectacles. Once
again, the teaser trailer is
dark, with Maleficent shrouded in shadows as Aurora asks her to show
herself and to not be afraid.
Delivering a response that releases shivers, the mysterious figure
says to Aurora that upon seeing
her, “you’ll be afraid,” as she steps forward to reveal
Maleficent in the flesh to audiences for
the first time.[4] The promotional material for Maleficent
conveys what Barbara Creed defines
as the monstrous-feminine, in that it “emphasizes the importance
of gender in the
construction of her monstrosity.”[5] Not only does cultural memory
identify her as evil, but also
Maleficent is still being depicted as the archenemy in the Disney
videogame series Kingdom Hearts,
and ‘Maleficent’ derives from the Latin maleficus,
referring to an enchanter with the connotation of
evil. While it would be naïve to limit Angelina Jolie’s Hollywood persona to a sex symbol
alone, one cannot neglect her physical appearance and previous
roles, which contribute to the
cultural memory of her identity and the talents she brings to
the
Maleficent character.
Jolie’s sexuality coupled with the dark nature of the previews,
which boast blatant adjectives such
as ‘wicked,’ insinuate a monstrous-feminine persona.
Conversely, Maleficent
defies notions of monstrosity through a series of reversals that culminate in her
sentimental epiphany and the union of the feminine Moors and the
masculine
kingdom under the
harmonious rule of the beloved Aurora. In spite of the marketing
techniques, the film undermines
Maleficent’s monstrosity, using it instead for comical effect; her
character development defies the
horror genre the promotions promise to audiences, while maintaining
the lessons advanced by
feminist scholars like Creed:
The representation
of the monstrous-feminine in patriarchal signifying practices
has a number of
consequences for psychoanalytically based theories of sexual
difference. On the
one hand, those images which define woman as monstrous in
relation to her
reproductive functions work to reinforce the phallocentric notion
that female
sexuality is abject. On the other hand, the notion of the monstrous-
feminine
challenges the view that femininity, by definition, constitutes
passivity.
Furthermore, the
phantasy of the castrating mother undermines Freud’s theories
that woman
terrifies because she is castrated and that it is the father who
alone
represents the
agent of castration within the family.[6]
Stefan, the embodiment
of patriarchal values, is both fearful of castration and the
castrator (of both Maleficent and
himself). Female sexuality is represented as abject through the
various
dichotomies that are
built upon a substratum of sexual difference, and yet the image of
feminine sexuality permeates the
film, not as monstrous, but a sensual source of strength. Maleficent
is anything but passive;
her role throughout the film exposes the impotence of the patriarchy
by asserting her own
authority over male characters, and her ultimate victory reclaims the
women, such as Aurora’s
mother and the washerwomen, who are silenced under baseless
masculine power.
Femininity is conveyed
through a series of images that assert not only autonomy, but also authority, in spite of
the phallocentric regime. Maleficent’s lips constantly contrast
with the color
scheme of the film’s
mise-en-scène; even the opening sequences of her childhood
the earth tones of the Moors, her
costume, and complexion clash in order to emphasize her lips. Her
femininity commands attention. In
fact, much of Maleficent’s appearance is vaguely vaginal, including
her bright blood-red lips
that seem to rupture the otherwise color-coordinated visual aspects,
as well as the large and
looming wings that are stolen from her by an untrue lover, and the
horns that adorn her head,
featuring tripartite curvatures that are reminiscent of labia.
Maleficent’s appearance vividly
portrays the feminine cross described by Luce Irigaray:
Two sets of lips
that, moreover, cross over each other like the arms of the cross,
the prototype of
the crossroads between. The mouth lips and the genital lips do
not point in the
same direction. In some way they point in the direction opposite
from the one you
would expect, with the “lower” ones forming the vertical.[7]
There is no explicit
reference to her sexuality—this is, after all, a Disney film—but
her femininity is boldly
emblazoned, dominating every mise-en-scène, to emphasize the
power of her
femininity in
opposition to the patriarchal forces that seek to squelch her
autonomy. In fact, some critics have recognized
that the scene in which Stefan drugs Maleficent, cuts off her wings,
and leaves her alone in the
dark, suggests rape.[8] Her wings, commodified and cloistered by the patriarchy, are
rendered tokens of Stefan’s masculinity. They are perverted to
signify his patriarchal authority;
an authority that exists only by relating itself to, and by the
subjugation of an other.
Ultimately, the
impotence of the patriarchy is revealed, and (unsettlingly) every masculine character is
made subject to feminine forces. First, King Henry believes the land
of
the Moors to be a place
of evil, and so he sends his troops to conquer it and to slay its
protector, Maleficent. King Henry
dies a pitiful death in his luxurious bed soon after his attempt at conquest. King Stefan
is deprived of enjoying the company of his own daughter, Aurora, and even his wife, whom he
neglects on her deathbed. Finally, after having been defeated by Maleficent and left to
live out his life and maintain his throne, in a fit of anger
he attempts once more to destroy her and
accidentally hurls himself from a tower of the castle. Fittingly,
the patriarch dies due the
dangerous heights of the patriarchal structure, and the wide-angle
shot of his armor-clad corpse
with canted legs against the flagstones, looking small and
vulnerable, visually conveys the
emptiness of masculine avarice.
While King Henry and
Stefan are motivated by greed, other masculine characters, who are not morally
corrupt, are nevertheless rendered submissive to feminine power,
namely Diaval
and Prince Phillip.
Diaval was once a raven, trapped by peasants and pitied by
Maleficent; he was transformed into a
man, and thus a servant to the mistress to whom he owes his life. Although he acts as
advisor to Maleficent, he lacks control over his own body, because
she alters his appearance to suit
her needs, even violating his will by transforming him into a wolf in
order to terrify soldiers.
And Prince Phillip, the courtly lover, is also proven impotent by the
narrative. Ultimately, his kiss
fails to awaken the sleeping beauty, constituting the film’s
reexamination of true love’s kiss. But
the image of Prince Phillip under Maleficent’s sway, is suggestive
of his own lack of power, and
perhaps a hint at his true sexuality. Consider that, in order to
manipulate people, Maleficent
renders them unconscious and lifts them into the air by means of
magic; so Aurora, levitated by
Maleficent, rolls backwards gently, and floats supine as if
slumbering. Prince Phillip,
however, assumes a less dignified posture upon levitating. Instead of
appearing to be at peace, his face
is cast downward and his hind is slightly more elevated than his
back, suggesting a masculine
posture of submission. He is entirely unconscious as Maleficent
traverses the thorny iron
barricade that keeps them from accessing Aurora, and it is the three
fairies, Flittle
(Lesley Manville),
Knotgrass (Imelda Staunton), and Thistletwit (Juno Temple), who
deliver him to the cursed princess.
Women in Maleficent defy danger; feminine forces
facilitate masculine powers.
In the end, Aurora is
crowned the queen who unites the natural and mythical realm with the kingdom of humans
under one rule. But this is not the story “we” know. In spite of
the
triumph of feminine
authority, contemporary audiences are currently living within the
patriarchy and we are aware of the
controversial effects that humans have on the environment. The magic
of the Moors that appears
to be synonymous with nature and feminine energy, ultimately, have
not triumphed. Regardless
of whether Queen Aurora and Maleficent lived happily ever after, we know that eventually
these powers have succumbed to the patriarchy. The irreconcilable conclusion of
Maleficent to its Sleeping Beauty predecessor raises
our consciousness of the textual history of this
particular fairy tale. Maleficent does not need to conform to
the androcentric narrative
upon which it is based, because the tension between Maleficent
and the literary and cultural
tradition whence it is derived incites the audience to wonder how
patriarchal authority ever came to
dominate the narrative. Of course, the newest generation of Disney audiences may not
recognize themes of rape and contentions of the gender binary, but
the Disney fairy tales are
evolving to promote autonomy and practical notions of love, because a
good fairy tale ought to grow up
with its audience.
Elan Justice Pavlinich
University of South
Florida
___________________________
[1] Ardis Butterfield,
“National Histories” Cultural Reformations: Medieval and
Renaissance in
Literary History.
Ed. Brian Cummings and James Simpson (New York: Oxford UP, 2010),
pp. 33-55.
[2] Keith Staskiewicz,
"Maleficent," Entertainment Weekly, June 12,
2014, accessed July 7, 2014,
[3] "Maleficent
Teaser Trailer," Maleficent: Official Website, accessed
July 7, 2014, http://movies.disney.com/maleficent/video.
[4] Ibid.
[5] Barbara Creed, The
Monstrous-Feminine: Film, Feminism, Psychoanalysis (New York: Routledge, 1993), p.
3.
[6] Ibid., p.
151.
[7] Luce Irigaray, An
Ethics of Sexual Difference. Trans. Carolyn Burke and Gillian C.
Gill. (Ithaca, NY: Cornell
UP, 1993) p. 18.
[8] Hayley Krischer,
"The Maleficent Rape Scene That We Need to Talk About,”
The Huffington Post, June 6,
2014, accessed July 7, 2014,
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/hayley-krischer/the-maleficent-rape-scene_b_5445974.html.
