Maleficent: Mistress Of Evil (2019)

The Queen of the Moors (Elle Fanning) accepts a marriage proposal from Prince Philip of Ulstead (Harris Dickinson) which will unite their two kingdoms and (hopefully) end years of hostility between the two lands. But her Godmother (Angelina Jolie) is against the marriage and the Prince's duplicitous mother (Michelle Pfeiffer) has plans of her own. A sequel to the hit 2014 film and directed by Joachim Ronning. I was partial to the 2014 movie mainly because of Jolie but I also liked its fresh take on the classic fairy tale SLEEPING BEAUTY. It should have ended there but if there's a dollar to squeezed or a franchise to be milked, Disney will do it! This one lack's the fresh perspective of the 2014 film and it covers similar terrain so that it has a deja vu quality about it. It's not without entertainment value but the film seems so cluttered (there's something to be said for simplicity) that it's a disappointment nonetheless. Jolie and Fanning are fine but Pfeiffer seems adrift as the evil Queen. But Fanning looks so eerily like a young Pfeiffer that they could believably play mother and daughter. With Chiwetel Ejiofor, Sam Riley, Imelda Staunton, Juno Temple and Lesley Manville.