Maleficent: Mistress of Evil

Maleficent: Mistress of Evil (2019)

Starring Angelina Jolie, Elle Fanning, Michelle Pfeiffer, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Sam Riley, Ed Skrein, Harris Dickinson, Imelda Staunton, Juno Temple, and Lesley Manville

Directed by Joachin Rønning

Written by Linda Woolverton, Noah Harpster, and Micah Fitzerman-Blue

Click here for my Letterboxd review

The RyMickey Rating:  C-

Maleficent

Maleficent (2014)

Starring Angelina Jolie, Elle Fanning, Sharlto Copley, Imelda Staunton, Juno Temple, Leslie Manville, Sam Riley, and Brenton Thwaites

Directed by Robert Stromberg

Written by Linda Woolverton

Click here for my current Letterboxd review

Click here for the original RyMickey Rating

Current RyMickey Rating:  B

The One and Only Ivan

The One and Only Ivan (2020)

Starring Bryan Cranston, Ramón Rodríguez, and Ariana Greenblatt

And the vocal talents of Sam Rockwell, Angelina Jolie, Danny DeVito, and Helen Mirren

Directed by Thea Sharrock

Written by Mike White

Click here for my Letterboxd review

The RyMickey Rating:  B

Movie Review - By the Sea

By the Sea (2015)

Starring Brad Pitt, Angelina Jolie Pitt, Mélanie Laurent, Melvil Poupaud, Richard Bohringer, and Niels Arestrup

Directed by Angelina Jolie Pitt

Due to circumstances not involved with the film, I had to stop watching By the Sea at just about an hour and fifteen minutes into my first viewing.  Upon returning to the film a mere few hours later, I had to re-find where I had stopped.  For the life of me, I couldn't.  Why is that?  Because By the Sea is essentially two hours of the same scenes over and over and over again - a mopey couple sitting around a luxurious French seaside hotel (either together or alone) pontificating about why their relationship went south and what they can do to make it better, whether that be attempting to connect with one another sexually or watching another younger couple connect sexually through a peephole.  Stagnant in its drama and overly repetitive, By the Sea is an interesting departure from Angelina Jolie's previous directorial feature Unbroken, but it's unsuccessful in its attempt to mimic some classic 1970s relationship dramas.

Jolie and her real-life husband Brad Pitt are Vanessa and Roland, a couple married for fourteen years who find themselves in obviously troubled relationship times.  Roland is a writer who is finding himself blocked so he decides to take a journey to a quaint, tiny French seaside town.  Upon arrival, Vanessa is distant, detached, emotionless and, quite frankly, a bit of a dramatic ice queen.  Inferences are made to something having happened in their past that has led to the emotional chasm that affects them now and while Roland hopes that this trip will help them reconnect, he finds himself met with reticence from Vanessa.  While Roland works in a local bar, Vanessa mopes around the hotel room where she discovers a circular peephole that peeks into the adjacent room where she watches the lives unfold of recently married and honeymooning couple Lea and François (Mélanie Laurent and Melvil Poupaud) whose lust for life stand in sharp contrast to her obvious depression.

I was along for the slow ride of By the Sea for nearly its first hour.  Sure, it had a meandering pace, but I was particularly interested and surprisingly invested in Brad Pitt's writer character and his struggle to get his wife out of her emotional funk.  However, as the film's second half came into focus, By the Sea felt like a film that didn't know where it was going, instead circling around the same scenes and themes over and over again.  Jolie (who also wrote the film) has crafted a movie that looks beautiful and sumptuous, but fails to create a substantive story to match the visuals.  Rather than feel well-rounded, her character Vanessa is excruciatingly one-note in her emotions.  Even when she begins to blossom after spying on the honeymooners, Vanessa's motives never seem reasonably explored.  And, quite frankly, the less said about that aforementioned something that caused Vanessa's deep depression, the better.

I'm oddly pleased that I gave By the Sea a chance because I'm still mildly intrigued by the notion of Angelina Jolie as a director (as I mentioned, the film looks gorgeous and the first hour was uniquely lensed), but she's missing something as a writer.  It's in the screenplay that By the Sea flounders and unfortunately it flounders too much to even think about recommending.

The RyMickey Rating:  C-

Movie Review - Unbroken

Unbroken (2014)

Starring Jack O'Connell, Domhnall Gleeson, Miyavi, and Finn Whitrock

Directed by Angelina Jolie

The courage and sheer will to survive of Mr. Louis Zamperini is incredible and, considering how thematically inspirational it is, I'm surprised his fascinating story hadn't been brought to the screen prior to director Angelina Jolie's Unbroken was released in 2014.  Here's a guy who went from being a misfit child to an Olympic runner to a soldier whose plane was shot down near Japan after which he spent 45 days floating on the ocean with two of his fellow heroes...only to be captured by the Japanese and taken to a prison camp where he found himself the target of a vicious general.  You can't write something like that and make it seem believable if it didn't really happen...but since it did really happen, you can only be in awe of the willpower of Zamperini.  Unfortunately, Jolie's movie doesn't quite find itself firing on all cylinders, wasting most of its gas in the film's admittedly very good first half and petering out in the end.

Jolie crafts a perfectly adequate film in Unbroken and it's obvious that she has the utmost respect for Zamperini (played in the film by Jack O'Connell), but despite the crisp look of the piece, the film feels oddly empty.  For all of this guy's struggles, I never found myself emotionally invested in the character in the way that I wanted to be.  Jolie is absolutely at her best in the scenes after the plane crash in the riveting time at sea on two small yellow rafts with Zamperini and his two fellow soldiers Phil and Mac (Domhnall Gleeson and Finn Whitrock).  When her focus shifts to the Japanese war camp headed by the sadistic Watanabe (played by Miyavi) in the film's final hour, the emotional struggle to survive so present in the film's first half fades away when it should've become perhaps even more relevant.  Unable to carry this important emotional aspect through the entire piece is a bit of a disappointment.

With great technical aspects all around -- cinematography, score, costumes -- and solid acting, the potential for Unbroken seems disappointingly untapped.  This is the first film I've seen directed by Jolie and I appreciate her eye behind the lens.  Considering the obvious admiration she holds for Mr. Zamperini, it's a shame the film didn't resonate as emotionally impactful as it should have.

The RyMickey Rating:  C+

Movie Review - Maleficent

Maleficent (2014)

Starring Angelina Jolie, Elle Fanning, Sharlto Copley, Imelda Staunton, Juno Temple, Lesley Manville, Sam Riley, and Brenton Thwaites

Directed by Robert Stromberg

Perhaps it's faint praise to tout Maleficent as being better than Disney's recent live action interpretations of Alice in Wonderland and Oz: The Great and Powerful considering that the former was horrendous and the latter was nothing to write home about.  Still, if Disney's going to insist on reinterpreting family classics, they're gradually starting to learn from their previous disappointments.

Moreso than their previous attempts, Maleficent draws greatly from Disney's animated classic Sleeping Beauty (yes, the Disney Discussion will be returning in September after a very long hiatus), twisting that story to its own whims.  In the animated film, Maleficent was pure evil, but here this formerly friendly fairy only turns fiendish when a neighboring kingdom's ruler tries to take over her home.  Years later, still hellbent on revenge thanks to an additional subplot involving stolen fairy wings (naturally), Maleficent (Angelina Jolie) hears that King Stefan and his wife are expecting a baby.  When the young Aurora is born, Maleficent appears at the festivities and curses the girl to prick her finger on a spinning wheel and fall into an unending sleep upon her sixteenth birthday only to be awakened by true love's kiss.  Sound familiar?  The remainder of the tale follows the storyline of Sleeping Beauty quite closely -- three fairies Knotgrass, Flittle, and Thistletwit (Imelda Staunton, Lesley Manville, and Juno Temple) -- raise the growing Aurora (played by Elle Fanning as a teen) in the woods away from all civilization in hopes that this will keep her safe.

However, unlike the previous Sleeping Beauty, Maleficent keeps a careful eye on Aurora and begins to feel sorry for what she's done to the girl who played no part in harming her.  This gentle, kind, magnanimous Maleficent is the change -- and it's not necessarily a change for the better.  For starters, Angelina Jolie is fantastic when she plays the title character for all her deliciously over-the-top scenery-chewing evilness.  Let's face it -- Maleficent is a quintessentially evil character and Jolie really embodies that aspect of the role.  However, when the film forces her character to downplay the nastiness and embrace niceness, things begin to falter a bit and become much less interesting.  Jolie certainly still is a presence, but it's not quite the presence we really long for her to be here.  Fortunately, as Jolie's Maleficent turns disappointingly kind, we're also able to see the innocence of Elle Fanning's Aurora which she displays perfectly to a tee.  You can almost see why Maleficent decides to befriend Aurora -- almost -- until you realize that this bastardization of a true cinematic villain is kind of boring to watch.

Still, despite my qualms which I admit are rather important in the grand scheme of the film, I liked Maleficent.  Maybe it's because I went in with such low expectations, but Jolie's performance certainly is solid.  I only wish she was able to be as gloriously evil as her title character should've been allowed to be.

The RyMickey Rating:  C+

Movie Review - The Tourist

The Tourist (2010)

Starring Johnny Depp, Angelina Jolie, and Paul Bettany

Directed by Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck

While watching The Tourist, I kept thinking that it was very reminiscent of 1950s/60s romantic thrillers like the Cary Grant/Audrey Hepburn-starrer Charade.  That flick took place overseas in Paris, whereas this flick calls Venice, Italy, its home.  That earlier flick was sumptuous and rich-looking, as is The Tourist.  Charade had two big name stars, as does this one.  Unfortunately, Johnny Depp is no Cary Grant and Angelina Jolie is no Audrey Hepburn...and together the two superstars lack any ounce of chemistry which is fundamentally vital to making this suspensor work.  It certainly doesn't help either of the two actors that the director (whose incredibly long name is listed above) never found a nice rhythm for the flick and the plodding nature bogged down the rather silly plot.

I could have lived with the silly plot, however, if there were any sparks onscreen between the two leads.  However, Jolie and Depp shockingly lack any ounce of charisma in their scenes together.  When Jolie's Elise first meets Depp's American tourist Frank on a train heading to Venice, I was expecting a moment where their eyes meet and a sparkle glimmers.  Instead, the duo is simply bland.

Elise is a woman on the run who meets Frank when her criminal boyfriend, Alexander, whom she hasn't seen in many months asks her to board the aforementioned train and find a man to "pretend" to be him.  This will create a decoy for both the British cops and the British gangster who are both following Elise to get to Alexander, allowing him time to get things settled before he sees her again.  Seeing as how Jolie's Elise is essentially seducing Depp's Frank into following her around the city of Venice, there was very little sensuality exhibited from the sex symbol.  And Depp (who I guess could be deemed a sex symbol as well) doesn't reciprocate any sensuality either.  The two simply don't work together and, to be quite honest, that is quite surprising.

While Depp and Jolie certainly shoulder a good chunk of the blame for the film not working, the director (helming his first American film) is also at fault for not getting good performances out of his two leads.  Add to that the fact that von Donnersmarck doesn't seem to have a keen sense as to how to correctly pace a film or a notion of how to create any semblance of excitement in action sequences and you've got a thriller that lacks thrills.  That this film was nominated for Best Comedy/Musical at the last Golden Globes shows how much of a sham those awards really are -- The Tourist is neither a comedy or musical nor is it any good.

The RyMickey Rating:  D

Movie Review - Salt

Salt (2010)

Starring Angelina Jolie, Liev Schrieber, and Chiwetel Ejiofor

Directed by Philip Noyce

It's not a shocking statement to say that Angelina Jolie is considered one of the hottest women on the planet.  And while I don't think she should top the Maxim 100 list or anything, she's certainly attractive.  So if you have an incredibly attractive woman starring in a full-blown action pic, why wouldn't you play that up a bit?  Sure, it's probably sexist for me to say it, but one would think that we'd get to see some modicum of hotness emanating from Ms. Jolie in a fun summer movie. 

That's never the case in Salt.  Instead, we see Angelina in an awful blond wig and later dressed up like a man...neither get-up falls into the "hot" category.  I'm not faulting the flick for this, but I just found it odd.

Jolie is Evelyn Salt, a CIA agent who is accused by a Russian spy she is interrogating that she herself is a Russian spy infiltrating the American agency to discover government secrets.  Her fellow agents immediately want to question her, but Salt escapes and finds herself on the run.

Overall, I'm just really lukewarm on the flick.  The action sequences were actually well-shot by director Philip Noyce.  There were a few surprises that I didn't see coming.  But, in the end, the film didn't excite me in the slightest.  

And I think that the problem lies with Jolie herself...not in her lack of hotness, but in her lack of emoting.  There was never a moment in Salt where I felt the least bit concerned for the title character.  As a spy, one would assume that Salt was trained to hide her emotions, but in a movie, an emotional disconnect just doesn't allow for an audience to give a damn.  Jolie just appears to be moving right through the movie, accepting her big paycheck, but not really doing much beyond running really fast.

The RyMickey Rating:  C+