Maleficent: Mistress of Misunderstood

ALERT! SPOILERS AHEAD!

For those of you who are not familiar with the mistress, Maleficent is a character born in an enchanted forest surrounded by fairies and other creatures. When her parents were killed by humans, she became an orphan, thus, making her queen of the Moors.

Now, as part one of the story goes, she befriends a pheasant boy and the two hit it off really good; so good that they fell in love…or so she thought. The boy, Stefan, overhears King Henry saying if anyone kills Maleficent would become the next king and marry his daughter. I’m guessing that was enough to make him want to cause harm to the love of his life. He couldn’t bring himself to kill her, however, he took her wings instead. When she woke up the next morning, she was frantic and became another personality…an evil one. She even got a raven as a sidekick. As time passed, Stefan became king and had a daughter named Aurora. When Maleficent got wind of this, she became furious. How furious? Well, she basically crashed the christening of the little child and cursed her. On her 16th birthday, she will prick herself on a spinning wheel and fall into a deep sleep and only a true love’s kiss could awaken her. Harsh.

The king was enraged and sent the girl to live with her ‘aunties’, the pixies, to keep her safe. Meanwhile, he’s trying to devise a plan to kill his former lover. Over time, Maleficent starts to care for the girl and on her 15th birthday, they finally meet. That cold heart of the mistress was beginning to get warm, and she tries to undo the curse…no such luck. On Aurora’s 16th birthday, the curse is carried out and she pricks her finger. She’s in a deep sleep. The little prince she met couldn’t help her out. Nor could anyone else…but Maleficent. She kisses the girl on the forehead and to our surprise, the princess awakens! An all out battle begins with Stefan, his men, and Maleficent. In the end, Stefan falls to his death and Aurora goes to live in the Moors with her new ‘fairy godmother’.

The end.

In part two of the story, the news is that Maleficent is a villain despite the fact that number one, she’s not, and number two, she practically saved Aurora. Moving on, Prince Phillip proposes to Aurora. Maleficent disproves of this altogether. They are invited to meet King John and Queen Ingrith and over dinner some words were exchanged between fairy godmother and the in-laws. King John suddenly falls into a deep sleep…a curse is on him. Aurora thought it was Maleficent’s doing but at this point, who knows. She flies away through the window. While in the air, she’s shot down by Gerda with an iron bullet (her weakness) and falls into the waters. But what do we see? Another winged creature of her kind swoop her up and whisk her away. She is taken to the home of fairies and after listening to Conall, the peaceful one, she realizes that she is the last of the dark fae…some dark phoenix type fairies. Borra, another fairy, wants to end the humans once and for all. He’s a bit fed up with them.

Meanwhile, back at the castle, Aurora isn’t liking the royal life treatment and soon learns that Ingrith is the real villain. She dislikes the Moor folk, blames them for her brother’s death, and cursed her own husband. By her doing, Gerda poisons all the fairies and creatures trapped in the chapel. Borra has brought all his friends to the castle for war, but the nasty queen had her men shoot poison at them which caused most to die instantly. The queen and Maleficent have a standoff with Aurora trying to defuse the tension. The queen wasn’t having it and shoots a poison arrow which catches Maleficent in the back. Aurora is hysterical and cries frantically. The tears drop on the ashes and the mistress is not the dark fae. The queen runs away, but Borra and friends catches up to her. In the end, all is at peace again and the Moor folk and castle inhabitants agree to coexist…oh, and Aurora and Phillip tie the knot.

The end.

Now, my title explanation.

Maleficent was an orphan. Her parents were killed by humans. She meets a boy…boy breaks her heart…and steals her wings…something very personal to her. Yes she had a chip on her shoulder after that,  but wouldn’t you? People tried to come in her home (the Moor) and try to destroy it so she fought back. Typical reasoning for standing your ground. She curses the man’s daughter, yet, learned the meaning of true love by actually caring. She was shot in the back…twice! The one’s she called family was being poisoned by the REAL villain while feeling that her ‘daughter’ was being taken away from her.

I sense no villain blood or evilness in her veins. No one ever really got to know her. Okay maybe in the animated versions she was a bit rough, but we are now in real life and she has evolved. And maybe I’m reading too much into this, but I like Maleficent. She really is a nice person (like she lives next door). The real mistress of evil was Michelle Pfeiffer’s character, Queen Ingrith. Hate ran all through her, yet, she hid it well.

I have no doubts that as the story goes on Maleficent will face other ‘villains’ and be deemed the title instead. But one thing is certain: As long as she fights the good fight, I’m in her corner.

 

 

FOLLOW THE YELLOW BRICK ROAD

Dorothy, with the instruction of the little munchkins, was told to follow the yellow brick road to the meet the wizard of Oz. He was to help her get home. Home to her was back in Kansas with her family and the home life she knew. It wouldn’t be that much of an easy task as she was faced with obstacles along the way, but also meeting new friends to aid her on her journey. In the real world, we should do the same…follow the yellow brick road.

It’s not so much as the real thing, but a metaphoric approach to the journey we face in life. There comes a time when we too must take a path and where it leads us will be the ending we may or may not want to face. Our imaginary yellow brick road is the one we choose to take and along the way, obstacles will be inevitable, but friends will be made as well. When Dorothy made it to Oz, he was not quite what she expected and she was disappointed, but she eventually found a way back home.

A couple of things the movie taught me was to face whatever obstacle that’s in front of me head on. The real fear is missing your chance to move forward because you doubt yourself. And if you’ve found the one friend that will stick by you, then you’ve already won. The other is to never give up! I say that to everyone who I think needs a pep talk a time or two. Your dreams are stagnate if there is no work involved.

The yellow brick road is waiting for you, and should you travel it remember to always keep going!

 

Quiet Please

Earlier this year, the movie  ‘A Quiet Place’ hit theaters. Let me first say that I am not a fan of horror flicks, but this one peeked my interest. So, opening weekend, me and a couple of friends of mine were one of the many patrons in the packed theater.

For those of you who’ve never seen it, here’s the plot without giving away too much:

A family must learn to live in complete silence or be torn to pieces by monsters…in a nutshell. Oh, and they’re blind. Annnddd, they have very sensitive ears. Very. Sensitive.

Okay, back to my post.

Now, the movie itself is one big quiet game so naturally you had to be quiet yourself in order to relate to the tenseness. I myself let out a few whispers and there was snickering and seat jumping amongst everyone. I mean, no one could be TOTALLY quiet…which got me to thinking.

Fast forwarding, I thought the movie was awesome and if you haven’t seen it, you should just for the fact that it was a different kind of horror movie. For instance, there was no screaming, running, the killer chasing you, or throat slashing. No, this one is on a new level.

Driving home I thought to myself, ‘What if that happened for real?’ And not like the monsters and all, but what if we were put in a situation where we HAD to live in complete silence to survive?

I challenged myself…

Arriving at my house, I parked the car and turned off the ignition…dead silence. My doorstep is just a few feet from the car. All I had to do was make it to the door without making any noise of any kind. Sounds easy doesn’t it? It’s not. They would have got me. Damn.

I thought the movie was orchestrated perfectly. These ‘things’ had been around for quite some time so this family had to learn to adjust to them. I think it was day 400 or so I can’t remember but that was at least a year and some months.

Even though this was a fictional film, it pointed out something to me. In the movie, the daughter is deaf, so she heard nothing…an inside inability of hers. The rest had to be ‘deaf’ as well…an outside inability. In the theater, we are so accustomed to ‘hearing’ sounds that it was hard to even be quiet throughout the whole movie. The thought of being quiet that long is unnerving to some…a universal inability. It all boils down to one question:

Is there a such thing as true silence?

 

In the end, I don’t think we have what it takes master such an incredible task, but it does suit the age old adage that

‘Silence is Golden’.