Songs of Devotion,Songs of Rapture

Continued on Page 4

RICHARD TERMINE FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES

Early Shaker Spirituals FrancesMcDormand in this productionby the Wooster Group at thePerforming Garage.

Angelina Jolie makes a fabu-lous monster. As the title charac-ter in “Maleficent” — a diverting-ly different rethink of an awfullyold story — she breezes through

the movie, part su-perstar, part super-freak.

Her red mouthslashes across thescreen while herclothes billow like

storm clouds, her body framed byenormous shimmering wings andher head capped by a pair of ma-jestic horns. The wings allow herto soar, but the horns mainly giveher character a distinctly Freud-ian kink, some phallic enhance-ment to go with the fairy tale en-chantment. And, my, what bighorns they are.

She wears them like a crown inthis live-action postscript to thevisually stunning 1959 Disney an-imated musical “Sleeping Beau-ty.” This time, the focus isn’t onthe beautiful, blond Aurora, who

IFRIDAY, MAY 30, 2014 C1

N

Movies Performances

Sisters of SummerDumped

By Her Prince,So Watch Out

FRANK CONNOR/WALT DISNEY PICTURES

Maleficent Angelina Jolie stars inthis rethinking of “SleepingBeauty,” opening on Friday.

Continued on Page 13

MANOHLADARGIS

FILMREVIEW

There is hardly a shortage ofmovies about rock ’n’ roll, butthere are few as perfect — whichis to say as ragged, as silly, as

touching or as true —as “We Are the Best!,”Lukas Moodysson’ssweet and rambunc-tious new film. The set-ting is Stockholm in1982, hardly a legend-

ary place or moment in the an-nals of modern music, but that’skind of the point. Rock ’n’ rollglory is wherever you find it,and whatever you make of it.

Bobo (Mira Barkhammar)and Klara (Mira Grosin), two 13-year-old best friends, are belat-ed would-be punk rockers tiredof hearing that punk is dead, and

frustrated with just about every-thing else. The popular kids atschool sneer at their unconven-tional clothes. Boys are insultingor indifferent, other girls evenworse. Nobody at home — Klaralives with her parents and twosiblings; Bobo with her sad, di-vorced mother (Anna Rydgren)— understands them. The re-hearsal room at the local youthcenter is dominated by Iron Fist,a heavy-metal band whose

It RocksWhenGirls

Go Punk

Continued on Page 12

MAGNOLIA PICTURES

We Are the Best! with MiraBarkhammar, opens Friday inNew York and Los Angeles.A.O.

SCOTT FILM

REVIEW

Last year, in announcing the inauguralNY Phil Biennial — an 11-day festival of

contemporary music with 21performances of 13 programs— Alan Gilbert, the music di-rector of the New York Phil-harmonic, unabashedly invit-ed comparisons with similarevents in the visual arts. Not

just the Whitney Biennial in New York,which focuses on American artists, but also

the Venice Biennale, perhaps the world’smost prestigious showcase of internationalcontemporary art.

There should be something like them inmusic, Mr. Gilbert asserted. Every otheryear was the right frequency; New York

was the obvious city. And the Philharmonicwas the ideal institution to anchor it, to bethe principal curator, along with partneringinstitutions like the Museum of Modern Art,the Metropolitan Music of Art, the 92ndStreet Y and the Orchestra of St. Luke’s.

The NY Phil Biennial, which will presentworks by some 70 composers, ranging fromhigh school students to living masters,

RICHARD TERMINE

Poe’s Lost Lenore Lives in Song and Dance

Continued on Page 4

The Raven , at the Gerald W. Lynch Theater,with the singer Fredrika Brillembourg, onfloor, and the dancer Alessandra Ferri.

ANTHONYTOMMASINI

MUSICREVIEW

The gift of being simple hasnever been widely associatedwith the Wooster Group, whoseaustere and profoundly affecting“Early Shaker Spirituals”

opened on Thurs-day night at thePerforming Garagein SoHo. Through-out its almost 40,unceasingly fertileyears of existence,

this genre-bending troupe hastaken theatergoers throughtwisting labyrinths of produc-tions, in which reality and itsrepresentations are splinteredby technology and irony.

So to find the Wooster Grouppaying plain-spoken tribute tothe Shakers, a sect celebratedfor its religious ardor and un-adorned aesthetic, feels like asetup for a joke. Abstemious-ness is also a hallmark of theShaker religion, a celibate 18th-century offshoot of the Quakersand now nearly extinct. Suchrigor scarcely comes to mind inrelation to the Woosterites, who

BENBRANTLEY

THEATERREVIEW

6 FILM REVIEW

For Seth MacFarlane, anoater spoof. BY STEPHEN HOLDEN

14 TELEVISION REVIEW

A new Blackbeard in JohnMalkovich. BY NEIL GENZLINGER

14 THE TV WATCH

Is Snowden a catch? No oneasked. BY ALESSANDRA STANLEY

3 THEATER REVIEW

Ditties for an Ayn Randdystopia. BY ANDY WEBSTER

C M Y K Nxxx,2014-05-30,C,001,Bs-4C,E1

Songs of Devotion,Songs of Rapture

Continued on Page 4

RICHARD TERMINE FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES

Early Shaker Spirituals FrancesMcDormand in this productionby the Wooster Group at thePerforming Garage.

Angelina Jolie makes a fabu-lous monster. As the title charac-ter in “Maleficent” — a diverting-ly different rethink of an awfullyold story — she breezes through

the movie, part su-perstar, part super-freak.

Her red mouthslashes across thescreen while herclothes billow like

storm clouds, her body framed byenormous shimmering wings andher head capped by a pair of ma-jestic horns. The wings allow herto soar, but the horns mainly giveher character a distinctly Freud-ian kink, some phallic enhance-ment to go with the fairy tale en-chantment. And, my, what bighorns they are.

She wears them like a crown inthis live-action postscript to thevisually stunning 1959 Disney an-imated musical “Sleeping Beau-ty.” This time, the focus isn’t onthe beautiful, blond Aurora, who

IFRIDAY, MAY 30, 2014 C1

N

Movies Performances

Sisters of SummerDumped

By Her Prince,So Watch Out

FRANK CONNOR/WALT DISNEY PICTURES

Maleficent Angelina Jolie stars inthis rethinking of “SleepingBeauty,” opening on Friday.

Continued on Page 13

MANOHLADARGIS

FILMREVIEW

There is hardly a shortage ofmovies about rock ’n’ roll, butthere are few as perfect — whichis to say as ragged, as silly, as

touching or as true —as “We Are the Best!,”Lukas Moodysson’ssweet and rambunc-tious new film. The set-ting is Stockholm in1982, hardly a legend-

ary place or moment in the an-nals of modern music, but that’skind of the point. Rock ’n’ rollglory is wherever you find it,and whatever you make of it.

Bobo (Mira Barkhammar)and Klara (Mira Grosin), two 13-year-old best friends, are belat-ed would-be punk rockers tiredof hearing that punk is dead, and

frustrated with just about every-thing else. The popular kids atschool sneer at their unconven-tional clothes. Boys are insultingor indifferent, other girls evenworse. Nobody at home — Klaralives with her parents and twosiblings; Bobo with her sad, di-vorced mother (Anna Rydgren)— understands them. The re-hearsal room at the local youthcenter is dominated by Iron Fist,a heavy-metal band whose

It RocksWhenGirls

Go Punk

Continued on Page 12

MAGNOLIA PICTURES

We Are the Best! with MiraBarkhammar, opens Friday inNew York and Los Angeles.A.O.

SCOTT FILM

REVIEW

Last year, in announcing the inauguralNY Phil Biennial — an 11-day festival of

contemporary music with 21performances of 13 programs— Alan Gilbert, the music di-rector of the New York Phil-harmonic, unabashedly invit-ed comparisons with similarevents in the visual arts. Not

just the Whitney Biennial in New York,which focuses on American artists, but also

the Venice Biennale, perhaps the world’smost prestigious showcase of internationalcontemporary art.

There should be something like them inmusic, Mr. Gilbert asserted. Every otheryear was the right frequency; New York

was the obvious city. And the Philharmonicwas the ideal institution to anchor it, to bethe principal curator, along with partneringinstitutions like the Museum of Modern Art,the Metropolitan Music of Art, the 92ndStreet Y and the Orchestra of St. Luke’s.

The NY Phil Biennial, which will presentworks by some 70 composers, ranging fromhigh school students to living masters,

RICHARD TERMINE

Poe’s Lost Lenore Lives in Song and Dance

Continued on Page 4

The Raven , at the Gerald W. Lynch Theater,with the singer Fredrika Brillembourg, onfloor, and the dancer Alessandra Ferri.

ANTHONYTOMMASINI

MUSICREVIEW

The gift of being simple hasnever been widely associatedwith the Wooster Group, whoseaustere and profoundly affecting“Early Shaker Spirituals”

opened on Thurs-day night at thePerforming Garagein SoHo. Through-out its almost 40,unceasingly fertileyears of existence,

this genre-bending troupe hastaken theatergoers throughtwisting labyrinths of produc-tions, in which reality and itsrepresentations are splinteredby technology and irony.

So to find the Wooster Grouppaying plain-spoken tribute tothe Shakers, a sect celebratedfor its religious ardor and un-adorned aesthetic, feels like asetup for a joke. Abstemious-ness is also a hallmark of theShaker religion, a celibate 18th-century offshoot of the Quakersand now nearly extinct. Suchrigor scarcely comes to mind inrelation to the Woosterites, who

BENBRANTLEY

THEATERREVIEW

6 FILM REVIEW

For Seth MacFarlane, anoater spoof. BY STEPHEN HOLDEN

14 TELEVISION REVIEW

A new Blackbeard in JohnMalkovich. BY NEIL GENZLINGER

14 THE TV WATCH

Is Snowden a catch? No oneasked. BY ALESSANDRA STANLEY

3 THEATER REVIEW

Ditties for an Ayn Randdystopia. BY ANDY WEBSTER

C M Y K Nxxx,2014-05-30,C,001,Bs-4C,E1

Angelina JOlie makes a fabulous monster. as the title character in “Maleficent” — a divertingly differ-

ent rethink of an awfully old story — she breezes through the movie, part superstar, part superfreak.

Her red mouth slashes across the screen while her clothes billow like storm clouds,

her body framed by enormous shimmering wings and her head capped by a pair of majestic horns. The wings allow her to soar, but the horns mainly give her character a distinctly Freudian kink, some phallic en-

hancement to go with the fairy tale enchant-ment. and, my, what big horns they are.

She wears them like a crown in this live-action postscript to the visually stun-ning 1959 Disney animated musical “Sleep-ing Beauty.” This time, the focus isn’t on the beautiful, blond aurora, who falls into a deep, bewitched sleep after prick-ing her finger on a spindle, but rather on the sinister scene stealer who cursed her in a fit of pique and a puff of acid-green smoke. as it turns out, Maleficent (it rhymes with magnifi-cent) had her reasons and a back story to go with them. Soothingly introduced in voice-

Songs of Devotion,Songs of Rapture

Continued on Page 4

RICHARD TERMINE FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES

Early Shaker Spirituals FrancesMcDormand in this productionby the Wooster Group at thePerforming Garage.

Angelina Jolie makes a fabu-lous monster. As the title charac-ter in “Maleficent” — a diverting-ly different rethink of an awfullyold story — she breezes through

the movie, part su-perstar, part super-freak.

Her red mouthslashes across thescreen while herclothes billow like

storm clouds, her body framed byenormous shimmering wings andher head capped by a pair of ma-jestic horns. The wings allow herto soar, but the horns mainly giveher character a distinctly Freud-ian kink, some phallic enhance-ment to go with the fairy tale en-chantment. And, my, what bighorns they are.

She wears them like a crown inthis live-action postscript to thevisually stunning 1959 Disney an-imated musical “Sleeping Beau-ty.” This time, the focus isn’t onthe beautiful, blond Aurora, who

IFRIDAY, MAY 30, 2014 C1

N

Movies Performances

Sisters of SummerDumped

By Her Prince,So Watch Out

FRANK CONNOR/WALT DISNEY PICTURES

Maleficent Angelina Jolie stars inthis rethinking of “SleepingBeauty,” opening on Friday.

Continued on Page 13

MANOHLADARGIS

FILMREVIEW

There is hardly a shortage ofmovies about rock ’n’ roll, butthere are few as perfect — whichis to say as ragged, as silly, as

touching or as true —as “We Are the Best!,”Lukas Moodysson’ssweet and rambunc-tious new film. The set-ting is Stockholm in1982, hardly a legend-

ary place or moment in the an-nals of modern music, but that’skind of the point. Rock ’n’ rollglory is wherever you find it,and whatever you make of it.

Bobo (Mira Barkhammar)and Klara (Mira Grosin), two 13-year-old best friends, are belat-ed would-be punk rockers tiredof hearing that punk is dead, and

frustrated with just about every-thing else. The popular kids atschool sneer at their unconven-tional clothes. Boys are insultingor indifferent, other girls evenworse. Nobody at home — Klaralives with her parents and twosiblings; Bobo with her sad, di-vorced mother (Anna Rydgren)— understands them. The re-hearsal room at the local youthcenter is dominated by Iron Fist,a heavy-metal band whose

It RocksWhenGirls

Go Punk

Continued on Page 12

MAGNOLIA PICTURES

We Are the Best! with MiraBarkhammar, opens Friday inNew York and Los Angeles.A.O.

SCOTT FILM

REVIEW

Last year, in announcing the inauguralNY Phil Biennial — an 11-day festival of

contemporary music with 21performances of 13 programs— Alan Gilbert, the music di-rector of the New York Phil-harmonic, unabashedly invit-ed comparisons with similarevents in the visual arts. Not

just the Whitney Biennial in New York,which focuses on American artists, but also

the Venice Biennale, perhaps the world’smost prestigious showcase of internationalcontemporary art.

There should be something like them inmusic, Mr. Gilbert asserted. Every otheryear was the right frequency; New York

was the obvious city. And the Philharmonicwas the ideal institution to anchor it, to bethe principal curator, along with partneringinstitutions like the Museum of Modern Art,the Metropolitan Music of Art, the 92ndStreet Y and the Orchestra of St. Luke’s.

The NY Phil Biennial, which will presentworks by some 70 composers, ranging fromhigh school students to living masters,

RICHARD TERMINE

Poe’s Lost Lenore Lives in Song and Dance

Continued on Page 4

The Raven , at the Gerald W. Lynch Theater,with the singer Fredrika Brillembourg, onfloor, and the dancer Alessandra Ferri.

ANTHONYTOMMASINI

MUSICREVIEW

The gift of being simple hasnever been widely associatedwith the Wooster Group, whoseaustere and profoundly affecting“Early Shaker Spirituals”

opened on Thurs-day night at thePerforming Garagein SoHo. Through-out its almost 40,unceasingly fertileyears of existence,

this genre-bending troupe hastaken theatergoers throughtwisting labyrinths of produc-tions, in which reality and itsrepresentations are splinteredby technology and irony.

So to find the Wooster Grouppaying plain-spoken tribute tothe Shakers, a sect celebratedfor its religious ardor and un-adorned aesthetic, feels like asetup for a joke. Abstemious-ness is also a hallmark of theShaker religion, a celibate 18th-century offshoot of the Quakersand now nearly extinct. Suchrigor scarcely comes to mind inrelation to the Woosterites, who

BENBRANTLEY

THEATERREVIEW

6 FILM REVIEW

For Seth MacFarlane, anoater spoof. BY STEPHEN HOLDEN

14 TELEVISION REVIEW

A new Blackbeard in JohnMalkovich. BY NEIL GENZLINGER

14 THE TV WATCH

Is Snowden a catch? No oneasked. BY ALESSANDRA STANLEY

3 THEATER REVIEW

Ditties for an Ayn Randdystopia. BY ANDY WEBSTER

C M Y K Nxxx,2014-05-30,C,001,Bs-4C,E1

Songs of Devotion,Songs of Rapture

Continued on Page 4

RICHARD TERMINE FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES

Early Shaker Spirituals FrancesMcDormand in this productionby the Wooster Group at thePerforming Garage.

Angelina Jolie makes a fabu-lous monster. As the title charac-ter in “Maleficent” — a diverting-ly different rethink of an awfullyold story — she breezes through

the movie, part su-perstar, part super-freak.

Her red mouthslashes across thescreen while herclothes billow like

storm clouds, her body framed byenormous shimmering wings andher head capped by a pair of ma-jestic horns. The wings allow herto soar, but the horns mainly giveher character a distinctly Freud-ian kink, some phallic enhance-ment to go with the fairy tale en-chantment. And, my, what bighorns they are.

She wears them like a crown inthis live-action postscript to thevisually stunning 1959 Disney an-imated musical “Sleeping Beau-ty.” This time, the focus isn’t onthe beautiful, blond Aurora, who

IFRIDAY, MAY 30, 2014 C1

N

Movies Performances

Sisters of SummerDumped

By Her Prince,So Watch Out

FRANK CONNOR/WALT DISNEY PICTURES

Maleficent Angelina Jolie stars inthis rethinking of “SleepingBeauty,” opening on Friday.

Continued on Page 13

MANOHLADARGIS

FILMREVIEW

There is hardly a shortage ofmovies about rock ’n’ roll, butthere are few as perfect — whichis to say as ragged, as silly, as

touching or as true —as “We Are the Best!,”Lukas Moodysson’ssweet and rambunc-tious new film. The set-ting is Stockholm in1982, hardly a legend-

ary place or moment in the an-nals of modern music, but that’skind of the point. Rock ’n’ rollglory is wherever you find it,and whatever you make of it.

Bobo (Mira Barkhammar)and Klara (Mira Grosin), two 13-year-old best friends, are belat-ed would-be punk rockers tiredof hearing that punk is dead, and

frustrated with just about every-thing else. The popular kids atschool sneer at their unconven-tional clothes. Boys are insultingor indifferent, other girls evenworse. Nobody at home — Klaralives with her parents and twosiblings; Bobo with her sad, di-vorced mother (Anna Rydgren)— understands them. The re-hearsal room at the local youthcenter is dominated by Iron Fist,a heavy-metal band whose

It RocksWhenGirls

Go Punk

Continued on Page 12

MAGNOLIA PICTURES

We Are the Best! with MiraBarkhammar, opens Friday inNew York and Los Angeles.A.O.

SCOTT FILM

REVIEW

Last year, in announcing the inauguralNY Phil Biennial — an 11-day festival of

contemporary music with 21performances of 13 programs— Alan Gilbert, the music di-rector of the New York Phil-harmonic, unabashedly invit-ed comparisons with similarevents in the visual arts. Not

just the Whitney Biennial in New York,which focuses on American artists, but also

the Venice Biennale, perhaps the world’smost prestigious showcase of internationalcontemporary art.

There should be something like them inmusic, Mr. Gilbert asserted. Every otheryear was the right frequency; New York

was the obvious city. And the Philharmonicwas the ideal institution to anchor it, to bethe principal curator, along with partneringinstitutions like the Museum of Modern Art,the Metropolitan Music of Art, the 92ndStreet Y and the Orchestra of St. Luke’s.

The NY Phil Biennial, which will presentworks by some 70 composers, ranging fromhigh school students to living masters,

RICHARD TERMINE

Poe’s Lost Lenore Lives in Song and Dance

Continued on Page 4

The Raven , at the Gerald W. Lynch Theater,with the singer Fredrika Brillembourg, onfloor, and the dancer Alessandra Ferri.

ANTHONYTOMMASINI

MUSICREVIEW

The gift of being simple hasnever been widely associatedwith the Wooster Group, whoseaustere and profoundly affecting“Early Shaker Spirituals”

opened on Thurs-day night at thePerforming Garagein SoHo. Through-out its almost 40,unceasingly fertileyears of existence,

this genre-bending troupe hastaken theatergoers throughtwisting labyrinths of produc-tions, in which reality and itsrepresentations are splinteredby technology and irony.

So to find the Wooster Grouppaying plain-spoken tribute tothe Shakers, a sect celebratedfor its religious ardor and un-adorned aesthetic, feels like asetup for a joke. Abstemious-ness is also a hallmark of theShaker religion, a celibate 18th-century offshoot of the Quakersand now nearly extinct. Suchrigor scarcely comes to mind inrelation to the Woosterites, who

BENBRANTLEY

THEATERREVIEW

6 FILM REVIEW

For Seth MacFarlane, anoater spoof. BY STEPHEN HOLDEN

14 TELEVISION REVIEW

A new Blackbeard in JohnMalkovich. BY NEIL GENZLINGER

14 THE TV WATCH

Is Snowden a catch? No oneasked. BY ALESSANDRA STANLEY

3 THEATER REVIEW

Ditties for an Ayn Randdystopia. BY ANDY WEBSTER

C M Y K Nxxx,2014-05-30,C,001,Bs-4C,E1

Songs of Devotion,Songs of Rapture

Continued on Page 4

RICHARD TERMINE FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES

Early Shaker Spirituals FrancesMcDormand in this productionby the Wooster Group at thePerforming Garage.

Angelina Jolie makes a fabu-lous monster. As the title charac-ter in “Maleficent” — a diverting-ly different rethink of an awfullyold story — she breezes through

the movie, part su-perstar, part super-freak.

Her red mouthslashes across thescreen while herclothes billow like

storm clouds, her body framed byenormous shimmering wings andher head capped by a pair of ma-jestic horns. The wings allow herto soar, but the horns mainly giveher character a distinctly Freud-ian kink, some phallic enhance-ment to go with the fairy tale en-chantment. And, my, what bighorns they are.

She wears them like a crown inthis live-action postscript to thevisually stunning 1959 Disney an-imated musical “Sleeping Beau-ty.” This time, the focus isn’t onthe beautiful, blond Aurora, who

IFRIDAY, MAY 30, 2014 C1

N

Movies Performances

Sisters of SummerDumped

By Her Prince,So Watch Out

FRANK CONNOR/WALT DISNEY PICTURES

Maleficent Angelina Jolie stars inthis rethinking of “SleepingBeauty,” opening on Friday.

Continued on Page 13

MANOHLADARGIS

FILMREVIEW

There is hardly a shortage ofmovies about rock ’n’ roll, butthere are few as perfect — whichis to say as ragged, as silly, as

touching or as true —as “We Are the Best!,”Lukas Moodysson’ssweet and rambunc-tious new film. The set-ting is Stockholm in1982, hardly a legend-

ary place or moment in the an-nals of modern music, but that’skind of the point. Rock ’n’ rollglory is wherever you find it,and whatever you make of it.

Bobo (Mira Barkhammar)and Klara (Mira Grosin), two 13-year-old best friends, are belat-ed would-be punk rockers tiredof hearing that punk is dead, and

frustrated with just about every-thing else. The popular kids atschool sneer at their unconven-tional clothes. Boys are insultingor indifferent, other girls evenworse. Nobody at home — Klaralives with her parents and twosiblings; Bobo with her sad, di-vorced mother (Anna Rydgren)— understands them. The re-hearsal room at the local youthcenter is dominated by Iron Fist,a heavy-metal band whose

It RocksWhenGirls

Go Punk

Continued on Page 12

MAGNOLIA PICTURES

We Are the Best! with MiraBarkhammar, opens Friday inNew York and Los Angeles.A.O.

SCOTT FILM

REVIEW

Last year, in announcing the inauguralNY Phil Biennial — an 11-day festival of

contemporary music with 21performances of 13 programs— Alan Gilbert, the music di-rector of the New York Phil-harmonic, unabashedly invit-ed comparisons with similarevents in the visual arts. Not

just the Whitney Biennial in New York,which focuses on American artists, but also

the Venice Biennale, perhaps the world’smost prestigious showcase of internationalcontemporary art.

There should be something like them inmusic, Mr. Gilbert asserted. Every otheryear was the right frequency; New York

was the obvious city. And the Philharmonicwas the ideal institution to anchor it, to bethe principal curator, along with partneringinstitutions like the Museum of Modern Art,the Metropolitan Music of Art, the 92ndStreet Y and the Orchestra of St. Luke’s.

The NY Phil Biennial, which will presentworks by some 70 composers, ranging fromhigh school students to living masters,

RICHARD TERMINE

Poe’s Lost Lenore Lives in Song and Dance

Continued on Page 4

The Raven , at the Gerald W. Lynch Theater,with the singer Fredrika Brillembourg, onfloor, and the dancer Alessandra Ferri.

ANTHONYTOMMASINI

MUSICREVIEW

The gift of being simple hasnever been widely associatedwith the Wooster Group, whoseaustere and profoundly affecting“Early Shaker Spirituals”

opened on Thurs-day night at thePerforming Garagein SoHo. Through-out its almost 40,unceasingly fertileyears of existence,

this genre-bending troupe hastaken theatergoers throughtwisting labyrinths of produc-tions, in which reality and itsrepresentations are splinteredby technology and irony.

So to find the Wooster Grouppaying plain-spoken tribute tothe Shakers, a sect celebratedfor its religious ardor and un-adorned aesthetic, feels like asetup for a joke. Abstemious-ness is also a hallmark of theShaker religion, a celibate 18th-century offshoot of the Quakersand now nearly extinct. Suchrigor scarcely comes to mind inrelation to the Woosterites, who

BENBRANTLEY

THEATERREVIEW

6 FILM REVIEW

For Seth MacFarlane, anoater spoof. BY STEPHEN HOLDEN

14 TELEVISION REVIEW

A new Blackbeard in JohnMalkovich. BY NEIL GENZLINGER

14 THE TV WATCH

Is Snowden a catch? No oneasked. BY ALESSANDRA STANLEY

3 THEATER REVIEW

Ditties for an Ayn Randdystopia. BY ANDY WEBSTER

C M Y K Nxxx,2014-05-30,C,001,Bs-4C,E1

Songs of Devotion,Songs of Rapture

Continued on Page 4

RICHARD TERMINE FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES

Early Shaker Spirituals FrancesMcDormand in this productionby the Wooster Group at thePerforming Garage.

Angelina Jolie makes a fabu-lous monster. As the title charac-ter in “Maleficent” — a diverting-ly different rethink of an awfullyold story — she breezes through

the movie, part su-perstar, part super-freak.

Her red mouthslashes across thescreen while herclothes billow like

storm clouds, her body framed byenormous shimmering wings andher head capped by a pair of ma-jestic horns. The wings allow herto soar, but the horns mainly giveher character a distinctly Freud-ian kink, some phallic enhance-ment to go with the fairy tale en-chantment. And, my, what bighorns they are.

She wears them like a crown inthis live-action postscript to thevisually stunning 1959 Disney an-imated musical “Sleeping Beau-ty.” This time, the focus isn’t onthe beautiful, blond Aurora, who

IFRIDAY, MAY 30, 2014 C1

N

Movies Performances

Sisters of SummerDumped

By Her Prince,So Watch Out

FRANK CONNOR/WALT DISNEY PICTURES

Maleficent Angelina Jolie stars inthis rethinking of “SleepingBeauty,” opening on Friday.

Continued on Page 13

MANOHLADARGIS

FILMREVIEW

There is hardly a shortage ofmovies about rock ’n’ roll, butthere are few as perfect — whichis to say as ragged, as silly, as

touching or as true —as “We Are the Best!,”Lukas Moodysson’ssweet and rambunc-tious new film. The set-ting is Stockholm in1982, hardly a legend-

ary place or moment in the an-nals of modern music, but that’skind of the point. Rock ’n’ rollglory is wherever you find it,and whatever you make of it.

Bobo (Mira Barkhammar)and Klara (Mira Grosin), two 13-year-old best friends, are belat-ed would-be punk rockers tiredof hearing that punk is dead, and

frustrated with just about every-thing else. The popular kids atschool sneer at their unconven-tional clothes. Boys are insultingor indifferent, other girls evenworse. Nobody at home — Klaralives with her parents and twosiblings; Bobo with her sad, di-vorced mother (Anna Rydgren)— understands them. The re-hearsal room at the local youthcenter is dominated by Iron Fist,a heavy-metal band whose

It RocksWhenGirls

Go Punk

Continued on Page 12

MAGNOLIA PICTURES

We Are the Best! with MiraBarkhammar, opens Friday inNew York and Los Angeles.A.O.

SCOTT FILM

REVIEW

Last year, in announcing the inauguralNY Phil Biennial — an 11-day festival of

contemporary music with 21performances of 13 programs— Alan Gilbert, the music di-rector of the New York Phil-harmonic, unabashedly invit-ed comparisons with similarevents in the visual arts. Not

just the Whitney Biennial in New York,which focuses on American artists, but also

the Venice Biennale, perhaps the world’smost prestigious showcase of internationalcontemporary art.

There should be something like them inmusic, Mr. Gilbert asserted. Every otheryear was the right frequency; New York

was the obvious city. And the Philharmonicwas the ideal institution to anchor it, to bethe principal curator, along with partneringinstitutions like the Museum of Modern Art,the Metropolitan Music of Art, the 92ndStreet Y and the Orchestra of St. Luke’s.

The NY Phil Biennial, which will presentworks by some 70 composers, ranging fromhigh school students to living masters,

RICHARD TERMINE

Poe’s Lost Lenore Lives in Song and Dance

Continued on Page 4

The Raven , at the Gerald W. Lynch Theater,with the singer Fredrika Brillembourg, onfloor, and the dancer Alessandra Ferri.

ANTHONYTOMMASINI

MUSICREVIEW

The gift of being simple hasnever been widely associatedwith the Wooster Group, whoseaustere and profoundly affecting“Early Shaker Spirituals”

opened on Thurs-day night at thePerforming Garagein SoHo. Through-out its almost 40,unceasingly fertileyears of existence,

this genre-bending troupe hastaken theatergoers throughtwisting labyrinths of produc-tions, in which reality and itsrepresentations are splinteredby technology and irony.

So to find the Wooster Grouppaying plain-spoken tribute tothe Shakers, a sect celebratedfor its religious ardor and un-adorned aesthetic, feels like asetup for a joke. Abstemious-ness is also a hallmark of theShaker religion, a celibate 18th-century offshoot of the Quakersand now nearly extinct. Suchrigor scarcely comes to mind inrelation to the Woosterites, who

BENBRANTLEY

THEATERREVIEW

6 FILM REVIEW

For Seth MacFarlane, anoater spoof. BY STEPHEN HOLDEN

14 TELEVISION REVIEW

A new Blackbeard in JohnMalkovich. BY NEIL GENZLINGER

14 THE TV WATCH

Is Snowden a catch? No oneasked. BY ALESSANDRA STANLEY

3 THEATER REVIEW

Ditties for an Ayn Randdystopia. BY ANDY WEBSTER

C M Y K Nxxx,2014-05-30,C,001,Bs-4C,E1

Songs of Devotion,Songs of Rapture

Continued on Page 4

RICHARD TERMINE FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES

Early Shaker Spirituals FrancesMcDormand in this productionby the Wooster Group at thePerforming Garage.

Angelina Jolie makes a fabu-lous monster. As the title charac-ter in “Maleficent” — a diverting-ly different rethink of an awfullyold story — she breezes through

the movie, part su-perstar, part super-freak.

Her red mouthslashes across thescreen while herclothes billow like

storm clouds, her body framed byenormous shimmering wings andher head capped by a pair of ma-jestic horns. The wings allow herto soar, but the horns mainly giveher character a distinctly Freud-ian kink, some phallic enhance-ment to go with the fairy tale en-chantment. And, my, what bighorns they are.

She wears them like a crown inthis live-action postscript to thevisually stunning 1959 Disney an-imated musical “Sleeping Beau-ty.” This time, the focus isn’t onthe beautiful, blond Aurora, who

IFRIDAY, MAY 30, 2014 C1

N

Movies Performances

Sisters of SummerDumped

By Her Prince,So Watch Out

FRANK CONNOR/WALT DISNEY PICTURES

Maleficent Angelina Jolie stars inthis rethinking of “SleepingBeauty,” opening on Friday.

Continued on Page 13

MANOHLADARGIS

FILMREVIEW

There is hardly a shortage ofmovies about rock ’n’ roll, butthere are few as perfect — whichis to say as ragged, as silly, as

touching or as true —as “We Are the Best!,”Lukas Moodysson’ssweet and rambunc-tious new film. The set-ting is Stockholm in1982, hardly a legend-

ary place or moment in the an-nals of modern music, but that’skind of the point. Rock ’n’ rollglory is wherever you find it,and whatever you make of it.

Bobo (Mira Barkhammar)and Klara (Mira Grosin), two 13-year-old best friends, are belat-ed would-be punk rockers tiredof hearing that punk is dead, and

frustrated with just about every-thing else. The popular kids atschool sneer at their unconven-tional clothes. Boys are insultingor indifferent, other girls evenworse. Nobody at home — Klaralives with her parents and twosiblings; Bobo with her sad, di-vorced mother (Anna Rydgren)— understands them. The re-hearsal room at the local youthcenter is dominated by Iron Fist,a heavy-metal band whose

It RocksWhenGirls

Go Punk

Continued on Page 12

MAGNOLIA PICTURES

We Are the Best! with MiraBarkhammar, opens Friday inNew York and Los Angeles.A.O.

SCOTT FILM

REVIEW

Last year, in announcing the inauguralNY Phil Biennial — an 11-day festival of

contemporary music with 21performances of 13 programs— Alan Gilbert, the music di-rector of the New York Phil-harmonic, unabashedly invit-ed comparisons with similarevents in the visual arts. Not

just the Whitney Biennial in New York,which focuses on American artists, but also

the Venice Biennale, perhaps the world’smost prestigious showcase of internationalcontemporary art.

There should be something like them inmusic, Mr. Gilbert asserted. Every otheryear was the right frequency; New York

was the obvious city. And the Philharmonicwas the ideal institution to anchor it, to bethe principal curator, along with partneringinstitutions like the Museum of Modern Art,the Metropolitan Music of Art, the 92ndStreet Y and the Orchestra of St. Luke’s.

The NY Phil Biennial, which will presentworks by some 70 composers, ranging fromhigh school students to living masters,

RICHARD TERMINE

Poe’s Lost Lenore Lives in Song and Dance

Continued on Page 4

The Raven , at the Gerald W. Lynch Theater,with the singer Fredrika Brillembourg, onfloor, and the dancer Alessandra Ferri.

ANTHONYTOMMASINI

MUSICREVIEW

The gift of being simple hasnever been widely associatedwith the Wooster Group, whoseaustere and profoundly affecting“Early Shaker Spirituals”

opened on Thurs-day night at thePerforming Garagein SoHo. Through-out its almost 40,unceasingly fertileyears of existence,

this genre-bending troupe hastaken theatergoers throughtwisting labyrinths of produc-tions, in which reality and itsrepresentations are splinteredby technology and irony.

So to find the Wooster Grouppaying plain-spoken tribute tothe Shakers, a sect celebratedfor its religious ardor and un-adorned aesthetic, feels like asetup for a joke. Abstemious-ness is also a hallmark of theShaker religion, a celibate 18th-century offshoot of the Quakersand now nearly extinct. Suchrigor scarcely comes to mind inrelation to the Woosterites, who

BENBRANTLEY

THEATERREVIEW

6 FILM REVIEW

For Seth MacFarlane, anoater spoof. BY STEPHEN HOLDEN

14 TELEVISION REVIEW

A new Blackbeard in JohnMalkovich. BY NEIL GENZLINGER

14 THE TV WATCH

Is Snowden a catch? No oneasked. BY ALESSANDRA STANLEY

3 THEATER REVIEW

Ditties for an Ayn Randdystopia. BY ANDY WEBSTER

C M Y K Nxxx,2014-05-30,C,001,Bs-4C,E1

Songs of Devotion,Songs of Rapture

Continued on Page 4

RICHARD TERMINE FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES

Early Shaker Spirituals FrancesMcDormand in this productionby the Wooster Group at thePerforming Garage.

Angelina Jolie makes a fabu-lous monster. As the title charac-ter in “Maleficent” — a diverting-ly different rethink of an awfullyold story — she breezes through

the movie, part su-perstar, part super-freak.

Her red mouthslashes across thescreen while herclothes billow like

storm clouds, her body framed byenormous shimmering wings andher head capped by a pair of ma-jestic horns. The wings allow herto soar, but the horns mainly giveher character a distinctly Freud-ian kink, some phallic enhance-ment to go with the fairy tale en-chantment. And, my, what bighorns they are.

She wears them like a crown inthis live-action postscript to thevisually stunning 1959 Disney an-imated musical “Sleeping Beau-ty.” This time, the focus isn’t onthe beautiful, blond Aurora, who

IFRIDAY, MAY 30, 2014 C1

N

Movies Performances

Sisters of SummerDumped

By Her Prince,So Watch Out

FRANK CONNOR/WALT DISNEY PICTURES

Maleficent Angelina Jolie stars inthis rethinking of “SleepingBeauty,” opening on Friday.

Continued on Page 13

MANOHLADARGIS

FILMREVIEW

There is hardly a shortage ofmovies about rock ’n’ roll, butthere are few as perfect — whichis to say as ragged, as silly, as

touching or as true —as “We Are the Best!,”Lukas Moodysson’ssweet and rambunc-tious new film. The set-ting is Stockholm in1982, hardly a legend-

ary place or moment in the an-nals of modern music, but that’skind of the point. Rock ’n’ rollglory is wherever you find it,and whatever you make of it.

Bobo (Mira Barkhammar)and Klara (Mira Grosin), two 13-year-old best friends, are belat-ed would-be punk rockers tiredof hearing that punk is dead, and

frustrated with just about every-thing else. The popular kids atschool sneer at their unconven-tional clothes. Boys are insultingor indifferent, other girls evenworse. Nobody at home — Klaralives with her parents and twosiblings; Bobo with her sad, di-vorced mother (Anna Rydgren)— understands them. The re-hearsal room at the local youthcenter is dominated by Iron Fist,a heavy-metal band whose

It RocksWhenGirls

Go Punk

Continued on Page 12

MAGNOLIA PICTURES

We Are the Best! with MiraBarkhammar, opens Friday inNew York and Los Angeles.A.O.

SCOTT FILM

REVIEW

Last year, in announcing the inauguralNY Phil Biennial — an 11-day festival of

contemporary music with 21performances of 13 programs— Alan Gilbert, the music di-rector of the New York Phil-harmonic, unabashedly invit-ed comparisons with similarevents in the visual arts. Not

just the Whitney Biennial in New York,which focuses on American artists, but also

the Venice Biennale, perhaps the world’smost prestigious showcase of internationalcontemporary art.

There should be something like them inmusic, Mr. Gilbert asserted. Every otheryear was the right frequency; New York

was the obvious city. And the Philharmonicwas the ideal institution to anchor it, to bethe principal curator, along with partneringinstitutions like the Museum of Modern Art,the Metropolitan Music of Art, the 92ndStreet Y and the Orchestra of St. Luke’s.

The NY Phil Biennial, which will presentworks by some 70 composers, ranging fromhigh school students to living masters,

RICHARD TERMINE

Poe’s Lost Lenore Lives in Song and Dance

Continued on Page 4

The Raven , at the Gerald W. Lynch Theater,with the singer Fredrika Brillembourg, onfloor, and the dancer Alessandra Ferri.

ANTHONYTOMMASINI

MUSICREVIEW

The gift of being simple hasnever been widely associatedwith the Wooster Group, whoseaustere and profoundly affecting“Early Shaker Spirituals”

opened on Thurs-day night at thePerforming Garagein SoHo. Through-out its almost 40,unceasingly fertileyears of existence,

this genre-bending troupe hastaken theatergoers throughtwisting labyrinths of produc-tions, in which reality and itsrepresentations are splinteredby technology and irony.

So to find the Wooster Grouppaying plain-spoken tribute tothe Shakers, a sect celebratedfor its religious ardor and un-adorned aesthetic, feels like asetup for a joke. Abstemious-ness is also a hallmark of theShaker religion, a celibate 18th-century offshoot of the Quakersand now nearly extinct. Suchrigor scarcely comes to mind inrelation to the Woosterites, who

BENBRANTLEY

THEATERREVIEW

6 FILM REVIEW

For Seth MacFarlane, anoater spoof. BY STEPHEN HOLDEN

14 TELEVISION REVIEW

A new Blackbeard in JohnMalkovich. BY NEIL GENZLINGER

14 THE TV WATCH

Is Snowden a catch? No oneasked. BY ALESSANDRA STANLEY

3 THEATER REVIEW

Ditties for an Ayn Randdystopia. BY ANDY WEBSTER

C M Y K Nxxx,2014-05-30,C,001,Bs-4C,E1

Songs of Devotion,Songs of Rapture

Continued on Page 4

RICHARD TERMINE FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES

Early Shaker Spirituals FrancesMcDormand in this productionby the Wooster Group at thePerforming Garage.

Angelina Jolie makes a fabu-lous monster. As the title charac-ter in “Maleficent” — a diverting-ly different rethink of an awfullyold story — she breezes through

the movie, part su-perstar, part super-freak.

Her red mouthslashes across thescreen while herclothes billow like

storm clouds, her body framed byenormous shimmering wings andher head capped by a pair of ma-jestic horns. The wings allow herto soar, but the horns mainly giveher character a distinctly Freud-ian kink, some phallic enhance-ment to go with the fairy tale en-chantment. And, my, what bighorns they are.

She wears them like a crown inthis live-action postscript to thevisually stunning 1959 Disney an-imated musical “Sleeping Beau-ty.” This time, the focus isn’t onthe beautiful, blond Aurora, who

IFRIDAY, MAY 30, 2014 C1

N

Movies Performances

Sisters of SummerDumped

By Her Prince,So Watch Out

FRANK CONNOR/WALT DISNEY PICTURES

Maleficent Angelina Jolie stars inthis rethinking of “SleepingBeauty,” opening on Friday.

Continued on Page 13

MANOHLADARGIS

FILMREVIEW

There is hardly a shortage ofmovies about rock ’n’ roll, butthere are few as perfect — whichis to say as ragged, as silly, as

touching or as true —as “We Are the Best!,”Lukas Moodysson’ssweet and rambunc-tious new film. The set-ting is Stockholm in1982, hardly a legend-

ary place or moment in the an-nals of modern music, but that’skind of the point. Rock ’n’ rollglory is wherever you find it,and whatever you make of it.

Bobo (Mira Barkhammar)and Klara (Mira Grosin), two 13-year-old best friends, are belat-ed would-be punk rockers tiredof hearing that punk is dead, and

frustrated with just about every-thing else. The popular kids atschool sneer at their unconven-tional clothes. Boys are insultingor indifferent, other girls evenworse. Nobody at home — Klaralives with her parents and twosiblings; Bobo with her sad, di-vorced mother (Anna Rydgren)— understands them. The re-hearsal room at the local youthcenter is dominated by Iron Fist,a heavy-metal band whose

It RocksWhenGirls

Go Punk

Continued on Page 12

MAGNOLIA PICTURES

We Are the Best! with MiraBarkhammar, opens Friday inNew York and Los Angeles.A.O.

SCOTT FILM

REVIEW

Last year, in announcing the inauguralNY Phil Biennial — an 11-day festival of

contemporary music with 21performances of 13 programs— Alan Gilbert, the music di-rector of the New York Phil-harmonic, unabashedly invit-ed comparisons with similarevents in the visual arts. Not

just the Whitney Biennial in New York,which focuses on American artists, but also

the Venice Biennale, perhaps the world’smost prestigious showcase of internationalcontemporary art.

There should be something like them inmusic, Mr. Gilbert asserted. Every otheryear was the right frequency; New York

was the obvious city. And the Philharmonicwas the ideal institution to anchor it, to bethe principal curator, along with partneringinstitutions like the Museum of Modern Art,the Metropolitan Music of Art, the 92ndStreet Y and the Orchestra of St. Luke’s.

The NY Phil Biennial, which will presentworks by some 70 composers, ranging fromhigh school students to living masters,

RICHARD TERMINE

Poe’s Lost Lenore Lives in Song and Dance

Continued on Page 4

The Raven , at the Gerald W. Lynch Theater,with the singer Fredrika Brillembourg, onfloor, and the dancer Alessandra Ferri.

ANTHONYTOMMASINI

MUSICREVIEW

The gift of being simple hasnever been widely associatedwith the Wooster Group, whoseaustere and profoundly affecting“Early Shaker Spirituals”

opened on Thurs-day night at thePerforming Garagein SoHo. Through-out its almost 40,unceasingly fertileyears of existence,

this genre-bending troupe hastaken theatergoers throughtwisting labyrinths of produc-tions, in which reality and itsrepresentations are splinteredby technology and irony.

So to find the Wooster Grouppaying plain-spoken tribute tothe Shakers, a sect celebratedfor its religious ardor and un-adorned aesthetic, feels like asetup for a joke. Abstemious-ness is also a hallmark of theShaker religion, a celibate 18th-century offshoot of the Quakersand now nearly extinct. Suchrigor scarcely comes to mind inrelation to the Woosterites, who

BENBRANTLEY

THEATERREVIEW

6 FILM REVIEW

For Seth MacFarlane, anoater spoof. BY STEPHEN HOLDEN

14 TELEVISION REVIEW

A new Blackbeard in JohnMalkovich. BY NEIL GENZLINGER

14 THE TV WATCH

Is Snowden a catch? No oneasked. BY ALESSANDRA STANLEY

3 THEATER REVIEW

Ditties for an Ayn Randdystopia. BY ANDY WEBSTER

C M Y K Nxxx,2014-05-30,C,001,Bs-4C,E1

Songs of Devotion,Songs of Rapture

Continued on Page 4

RICHARD TERMINE FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES

Early Shaker Spirituals FrancesMcDormand in this productionby the Wooster Group at thePerforming Garage.

Angelina Jolie makes a fabu-lous monster. As the title charac-ter in “Maleficent” — a diverting-ly different rethink of an awfullyold story — she breezes through

the movie, part su-perstar, part super-freak.

Her red mouthslashes across thescreen while herclothes billow like

storm clouds, her body framed byenormous shimmering wings andher head capped by a pair of ma-jestic horns. The wings allow herto soar, but the horns mainly giveher character a distinctly Freud-ian kink, some phallic enhance-ment to go with the fairy tale en-chantment. And, my, what bighorns they are.

She wears them like a crown inthis live-action postscript to thevisually stunning 1959 Disney an-imated musical “Sleeping Beau-ty.” This time, the focus isn’t onthe beautiful, blond Aurora, who

IFRIDAY, MAY 30, 2014 C1

N

Movies Performances

Sisters of SummerDumped

By Her Prince,So Watch Out

FRANK CONNOR/WALT DISNEY PICTURES

Maleficent Angelina Jolie stars inthis rethinking of “SleepingBeauty,” opening on Friday.

Continued on Page 13

MANOHLADARGIS

FILMREVIEW

There is hardly a shortage ofmovies about rock ’n’ roll, butthere are few as perfect — whichis to say as ragged, as silly, as

touching or as true —as “We Are the Best!,”Lukas Moodysson’ssweet and rambunc-tious new film. The set-ting is Stockholm in1982, hardly a legend-

ary place or moment in the an-nals of modern music, but that’skind of the point. Rock ’n’ rollglory is wherever you find it,and whatever you make of it.

Bobo (Mira Barkhammar)and Klara (Mira Grosin), two 13-year-old best friends, are belat-ed would-be punk rockers tiredof hearing that punk is dead, and

frustrated with just about every-thing else. The popular kids atschool sneer at their unconven-tional clothes. Boys are insultingor indifferent, other girls evenworse. Nobody at home — Klaralives with her parents and twosiblings; Bobo with her sad, di-vorced mother (Anna Rydgren)— understands them. The re-hearsal room at the local youthcenter is dominated by Iron Fist,a heavy-metal band whose

It RocksWhenGirls

Go Punk

Continued on Page 12

MAGNOLIA PICTURES

We Are the Best! with MiraBarkhammar, opens Friday inNew York and Los Angeles.A.O.

SCOTT FILM

REVIEW

Last year, in announcing the inauguralNY Phil Biennial — an 11-day festival of

contemporary music with 21performances of 13 programs— Alan Gilbert, the music di-rector of the New York Phil-harmonic, unabashedly invit-ed comparisons with similarevents in the visual arts. Not

just the Whitney Biennial in New York,which focuses on American artists, but also

the Venice Biennale, perhaps the world’smost prestigious showcase of internationalcontemporary art.

There should be something like them inmusic, Mr. Gilbert asserted. Every otheryear was the right frequency; New York

was the obvious city. And the Philharmonicwas the ideal institution to anchor it, to bethe principal curator, along with partneringinstitutions like the Museum of Modern Art,the Metropolitan Music of Art, the 92ndStreet Y and the Orchestra of St. Luke’s.

The NY Phil Biennial, which will presentworks by some 70 composers, ranging fromhigh school students to living masters,

RICHARD TERMINE

Poe’s Lost Lenore Lives in Song and Dance

Continued on Page 4

The Raven , at the Gerald W. Lynch Theater,with the singer Fredrika Brillembourg, onfloor, and the dancer Alessandra Ferri.

ANTHONYTOMMASINI

MUSICREVIEW

The gift of being simple hasnever been widely associatedwith the Wooster Group, whoseaustere and profoundly affecting“Early Shaker Spirituals”

opened on Thurs-day night at thePerforming Garagein SoHo. Through-out its almost 40,unceasingly fertileyears of existence,

this genre-bending troupe hastaken theatergoers throughtwisting labyrinths of produc-tions, in which reality and itsrepresentations are splinteredby technology and irony.

So to find the Wooster Grouppaying plain-spoken tribute tothe Shakers, a sect celebratedfor its religious ardor and un-adorned aesthetic, feels like asetup for a joke. Abstemious-ness is also a hallmark of theShaker religion, a celibate 18th-century offshoot of the Quakersand now nearly extinct. Suchrigor scarcely comes to mind inrelation to the Woosterites, who

BENBRANTLEY

THEATERREVIEW

6 FILM REVIEW

For Seth MacFarlane, anoater spoof. BY STEPHEN HOLDEN

14 TELEVISION REVIEW

A new Blackbeard in JohnMalkovich. BY NEIL GENZLINGER

14 THE TV WATCH

Is Snowden a catch? No oneasked. BY ALESSANDRA STANLEY

3 THEATER REVIEW

Ditties for an Ayn Randdystopia. BY ANDY WEBSTER

C M Y K Nxxx,2014-05-30,C,001,Bs-4C,E1

Songs of Devotion,Songs of Rapture

Continued on Page 4

RICHARD TERMINE FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES

Early Shaker Spirituals FrancesMcDormand in this productionby the Wooster Group at thePerforming Garage.

Angelina Jolie makes a fabu-lous monster. As the title charac-ter in “Maleficent” — a diverting-ly different rethink of an awfullyold story — she breezes through

the movie, part su-perstar, part super-freak.

Her red mouthslashes across thescreen while herclothes billow like

storm clouds, her body framed byenormous shimmering wings andher head capped by a pair of ma-jestic horns. The wings allow herto soar, but the horns mainly giveher character a distinctly Freud-ian kink, some phallic enhance-ment to go with the fairy tale en-chantment. And, my, what bighorns they are.

She wears them like a crown inthis live-action postscript to thevisually stunning 1959 Disney an-imated musical “Sleeping Beau-ty.” This time, the focus isn’t onthe beautiful, blond Aurora, who

IFRIDAY, MAY 30, 2014 C1

N

Movies Performances

Sisters of SummerDumped

By Her Prince,So Watch Out

FRANK CONNOR/WALT DISNEY PICTURES

Maleficent Angelina Jolie stars inthis rethinking of “SleepingBeauty,” opening on Friday.

Continued on Page 13

MANOHLADARGIS

FILMREVIEW

There is hardly a shortage ofmovies about rock ’n’ roll, butthere are few as perfect — whichis to say as ragged, as silly, as

touching or as true —as “We Are the Best!,”Lukas Moodysson’ssweet and rambunc-tious new film. The set-ting is Stockholm in1982, hardly a legend-

ary place or moment in the an-nals of modern music, but that’skind of the point. Rock ’n’ rollglory is wherever you find it,and whatever you make of it.

Bobo (Mira Barkhammar)and Klara (Mira Grosin), two 13-year-old best friends, are belat-ed would-be punk rockers tiredof hearing that punk is dead, and

frustrated with just about every-thing else. The popular kids atschool sneer at their unconven-tional clothes. Boys are insultingor indifferent, other girls evenworse. Nobody at home — Klaralives with her parents and twosiblings; Bobo with her sad, di-vorced mother (Anna Rydgren)— understands them. The re-hearsal room at the local youthcenter is dominated by Iron Fist,a heavy-metal band whose

It RocksWhenGirls

Go Punk

Continued on Page 12

MAGNOLIA PICTURES

We Are the Best! with MiraBarkhammar, opens Friday inNew York and Los Angeles.A.O.

SCOTT FILM

REVIEW

Last year, in announcing the inauguralNY Phil Biennial — an 11-day festival of

contemporary music with 21performances of 13 programs— Alan Gilbert, the music di-rector of the New York Phil-harmonic, unabashedly invit-ed comparisons with similarevents in the visual arts. Not

just the Whitney Biennial in New York,which focuses on American artists, but also

the Venice Biennale, perhaps the world’smost prestigious showcase of internationalcontemporary art.

There should be something like them inmusic, Mr. Gilbert asserted. Every otheryear was the right frequency; New York

was the obvious city. And the Philharmonicwas the ideal institution to anchor it, to bethe principal curator, along with partneringinstitutions like the Museum of Modern Art,the Metropolitan Music of Art, the 92ndStreet Y and the Orchestra of St. Luke’s.

The NY Phil Biennial, which will presentworks by some 70 composers, ranging fromhigh school students to living masters,

RICHARD TERMINE

Poe’s Lost Lenore Lives in Song and Dance

Continued on Page 4

The Raven , at the Gerald W. Lynch Theater,with the singer Fredrika Brillembourg, onfloor, and the dancer Alessandra Ferri.

ANTHONYTOMMASINI

MUSICREVIEW

The gift of being simple hasnever been widely associatedwith the Wooster Group, whoseaustere and profoundly affecting“Early Shaker Spirituals”

opened on Thurs-day night at thePerforming Garagein SoHo. Through-out its almost 40,unceasingly fertileyears of existence,

this genre-bending troupe hastaken theatergoers throughtwisting labyrinths of produc-tions, in which reality and itsrepresentations are splinteredby technology and irony.

So to find the Wooster Grouppaying plain-spoken tribute tothe Shakers, a sect celebratedfor its religious ardor and un-adorned aesthetic, feels like asetup for a joke. Abstemious-ness is also a hallmark of theShaker religion, a celibate 18th-century offshoot of the Quakersand now nearly extinct. Suchrigor scarcely comes to mind inrelation to the Woosterites, who

BENBRANTLEY

THEATERREVIEW

6 FILM REVIEW

For Seth MacFarlane, anoater spoof. BY STEPHEN HOLDEN

14 TELEVISION REVIEW

A new Blackbeard in JohnMalkovich. BY NEIL GENZLINGER

14 THE TV WATCH

Is Snowden a catch? No oneasked. BY ALESSANDRA STANLEY

3 THEATER REVIEW

Ditties for an Ayn Randdystopia. BY ANDY WEBSTER

C M Y K Nxxx,2014-05-30,C,001,Bs-4C,E1

Songs of Devotion,Songs of Rapture

Continued on Page 4

RICHARD TERMINE FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES

Early Shaker Spirituals FrancesMcDormand in this productionby the Wooster Group at thePerforming Garage.

Angelina Jolie makes a fabu-lous monster. As the title charac-ter in “Maleficent” — a diverting-ly different rethink of an awfullyold story — she breezes through

the movie, part su-perstar, part super-freak.

Her red mouthslashes across thescreen while herclothes billow like

storm clouds, her body framed byenormous shimmering wings andher head capped by a pair of ma-jestic horns. The wings allow herto soar, but the horns mainly giveher character a distinctly Freud-ian kink, some phallic enhance-ment to go with the fairy tale en-chantment. And, my, what bighorns they are.

She wears them like a crown inthis live-action postscript to thevisually stunning 1959 Disney an-imated musical “Sleeping Beau-ty.” This time, the focus isn’t onthe beautiful, blond Aurora, who

IFRIDAY, MAY 30, 2014 C1

N

Movies Performances

Sisters of SummerDumped

By Her Prince,So Watch Out

FRANK CONNOR/WALT DISNEY PICTURES

Maleficent Angelina Jolie stars inthis rethinking of “SleepingBeauty,” opening on Friday.

Continued on Page 13

MANOHLADARGIS

FILMREVIEW

There is hardly a shortage ofmovies about rock ’n’ roll, butthere are few as perfect — whichis to say as ragged, as silly, as

touching or as true —as “We Are the Best!,”Lukas Moodysson’ssweet and rambunc-tious new film. The set-ting is Stockholm in1982, hardly a legend-

ary place or moment in the an-nals of modern music, but that’skind of the point. Rock ’n’ rollglory is wherever you find it,and whatever you make of it.

Bobo (Mira Barkhammar)and Klara (Mira Grosin), two 13-year-old best friends, are belat-ed would-be punk rockers tiredof hearing that punk is dead, and

frustrated with just about every-thing else. The popular kids atschool sneer at their unconven-tional clothes. Boys are insultingor indifferent, other girls evenworse. Nobody at home — Klaralives with her parents and twosiblings; Bobo with her sad, di-vorced mother (Anna Rydgren)— understands them. The re-hearsal room at the local youthcenter is dominated by Iron Fist,a heavy-metal band whose

It RocksWhenGirls

Go Punk

Continued on Page 12

MAGNOLIA PICTURES

We Are the Best! with MiraBarkhammar, opens Friday inNew York and Los Angeles.A.O.

SCOTT FILM

REVIEW

Last year, in announcing the inauguralNY Phil Biennial — an 11-day festival of

contemporary music with 21performances of 13 programs— Alan Gilbert, the music di-rector of the New York Phil-harmonic, unabashedly invit-ed comparisons with similarevents in the visual arts. Not

just the Whitney Biennial in New York,which focuses on American artists, but also

the Venice Biennale, perhaps the world’smost prestigious showcase of internationalcontemporary art.

There should be something like them inmusic, Mr. Gilbert asserted. Every otheryear was the right frequency; New York

was the obvious city. And the Philharmonicwas the ideal institution to anchor it, to bethe principal curator, along with partneringinstitutions like the Museum of Modern Art,the Metropolitan Music of Art, the 92ndStreet Y and the Orchestra of St. Luke’s.

The NY Phil Biennial, which will presentworks by some 70 composers, ranging fromhigh school students to living masters,

RICHARD TERMINE

Poe’s Lost Lenore Lives in Song and Dance

Continued on Page 4

The Raven , at the Gerald W. Lynch Theater,with the singer Fredrika Brillembourg, onfloor, and the dancer Alessandra Ferri.

ANTHONYTOMMASINI

MUSICREVIEW

The gift of being simple hasnever been widely associatedwith the Wooster Group, whoseaustere and profoundly affecting“Early Shaker Spirituals”

opened on Thurs-day night at thePerforming Garagein SoHo. Through-out its almost 40,unceasingly fertileyears of existence,

this genre-bending troupe hastaken theatergoers throughtwisting labyrinths of produc-tions, in which reality and itsrepresentations are splinteredby technology and irony.

So to find the Wooster Grouppaying plain-spoken tribute tothe Shakers, a sect celebratedfor its religious ardor and un-adorned aesthetic, feels like asetup for a joke. Abstemious-ness is also a hallmark of theShaker religion, a celibate 18th-century offshoot of the Quakersand now nearly extinct. Suchrigor scarcely comes to mind inrelation to the Woosterites, who

BENBRANTLEY

THEATERREVIEW

6 FILM REVIEW

For Seth MacFarlane, anoater spoof. BY STEPHEN HOLDEN

14 TELEVISION REVIEW

A new Blackbeard in JohnMalkovich. BY NEIL GENZLINGER

14 THE TV WATCH

Is Snowden a catch? No oneasked. BY ALESSANDRA STANLEY

3 THEATER REVIEW

Ditties for an Ayn Randdystopia. BY ANDY WEBSTER

C M Y K Nxxx,2014-05-30,C,001,Bs-4C,E1

over by Janet McTeer, Maleficent’s story opens when she was a happy young fairy (isobelle Molloy and ella Purnell) living in, and flying over, the moors, a lush, computer-generated wonderland populated by cute uglies and deli-cately mossy, twiggy giants.

Trouble enters in the form of a human boy, Stefan, a farmhand who’s caught pilfering a stone, a seemingly small act that reverberates as loudly as Klaxon horns. Maleficent forgives him; a friendship is born; time rushes by — it’s obvious that the filmmakers can’t wait to bring in Ms. Jolie — and the friendship evolves into a puppyish romance, sealed with a kiss. Stefan seems nice enough, if bland, and he’s played first by Michael Higgins and then, briefly, by Jackson Bews. Before long, though, Ms. Jolie has taken to the skies while, back in the human realm, Sharlto Copley has brought the adult Stefan ploddingly, disappointingly down to earth. Casting is destiny in a lot of movies; one look at the twitchy, shifty-eyed adult Stefan, and it’s clear that Mr. Copley won’t be continu-ing the romance.

He doesn’t. instead, he betrays Maleficent and, in one of the movie’s muddled sections, helps wage war against her land. Her wings lit-

erally clipped, Maleficent retreats into her dark place like a grounded Valkyrie, casting shad-ows over her world to go with her mood. Stefan assumes the throne and, years later, he and his forgettable queen have a child, aurora.

at this point, the filmmakers pick up the “Sleeping Beauty” thread and begin weaving it into Maleficent’s story, so, again, there are a christening and a curse, and aurora is squired away by a troika of pixies (a tolerably amus-ing imelda Staunton, lesley Manville and Juno Temple), who raise her in a forest cottage. There, she grows up (and eventually into elle Fanning) under the gaze of Maleficent, which is where this rethink gets going.

in broad strokes, “Maleficent” is Disney’s latest bid to recast a dusty story for a contem-

N C13THE NEW YORK TIMES, FRIDAY, MAY 30, 2014

falls into a deep, bewitched sleepafter pricking her finger on aspindle, but rather on the sinisterscene stealer who cursed her in afit of pique and a puff of acid-green smoke. As it turns out, Ma-leficent (it rhymes with magnifi-cent) had her reasons and a backstory to go with them. Soothinglyintroduced in voice-over by JanetMcTeer, Maleficent’s story openswhen she was a happy youngfairy (Isobelle Molloy and EllaPurnell) living in, and flying over,the moors, a lush, computer-gen-erated wonderland populated bycute uglies and delicately mossy,twiggy giants.

Trouble enters in the form of ahuman boy, Stefan, a farmhandwho’s caught pilfering a stone, aseemingly small act that rever-berates as loudly as Klaxonhorns. Maleficent forgives him; afriendship is born; time rushesby — it’s obvious that the film-makers can’t wait to bring in Ms.Jolie — and the friendshipevolves into a puppyish romance,sealed with a kiss. Stefan seemsnice enough, if bland, and he’splayed first by Michael Higginsand then, briefly, by JacksonBews. Before long, though, Ms.Jolie has taken to the skies while,back in the human realm, SharltoCopley has brought the adult Ste-fan ploddingly, disappointinglydown to earth. Casting is destinyin a lot of movies; one look at thetwitchy, shifty-eyed adult Stefan,and it’s clear that Mr. Copleywon’t be continuing the romance.

He doesn’t. Instead, he betraysMaleficent and, in one of themovie’s muddled sections, helpswage war against her land. Herwings literally clipped, Malefi-cent retreats into her dark placelike a grounded Valkyrie, castingshadows over her world to gowith her mood. Stefan assumesthe throne and, years later, heand his forgettable queen have achild, Aurora.

At this point, the filmmakerspick up the “Sleeping Beauty”thread and begin weaving it intoMaleficent’s story, so, again,there are a christening and acurse, and Aurora is squiredaway by a troika of pixies (a tol-erably amusing Imelda Staunton,Lesley Manville and Juno Tem-ple), who raise her in a forest cot-tage. There, she grows up (andeventually into Elle Fanning) un-der the gaze of Maleficent, whichis where this rethink gets going.

In broad strokes, “Maleficent”is Disney’s latest bid to recast adusty story for a contemporaryaudience, one that has, over theyears, complained with good rea-son about the company’s repre-sentations, particularly of femalecharacters. For decades, Disneyhas responded with an array ofplucky girls and women whosedesires extend beyond romantic

longing. Usually, they have ad-ventures, and not just dreams, togo with their wasp waists andfroufrou. Sometimes they savethe day and their true love, whichis better and more fun than wait-ing to be saved. Yet Disney hero-ines, whether princesses or not,have almost always ended up asreliably paired off as if they wereboarding Noah’s ark. A notableexception is Queen Elsa in “Fro-zen,” a very different kind ofheroine.

That Elsa remains single in“Frozen” has inspired somewidely, wildly divergent readingsof that movie, with some com-mentators claiming her as aL.G.B.T. representation, and oth-ers denouncing her for the samereason. It’s entirely possible that“Maleficent,” partly because it’snarratively weak and Ms. Jolie isa powerful screen presence, willinspire its share of warring inter-pretations (and dismissals). Themovie, directed by Robert Strom-berg from Linda Woolverton’sscript, draws on Disney’s “Sleep-ing Beauty” and Charles Per-rault’s version of the tale. Despitethis, the narrative linchpin isn’tAurora: It’s Maleficent, whodoesn’t fit the fairy tale template

largely because of her relation-ships. Stefan angers her, but sheso gets over him and soon shiftsher attention elsewhere.

Mr. Stromberg, a productiondesigner making his feature di-recting debut, does best when hescales down, as in the lovelyshots of Maleficent walking nextto a floating, unconscious Aurora,an image that telegraphs moreabout their relationship than anyline of dialogue. The actionscenes, by contrast, are visuallyuninteresting, borderline genericand unnecessary. There are alsofar too many long shots when thedigital renderings (especially

those with human figures) pullyou out of the story instead ofkeeping you immersed. Butthere’s so much to look at in themovie — from the wittily de-signed creatures to the shocks ofbilious green and purple — thatthe battles quickly fade. (The col-ors are, as is a galloping race tothe rescue, among the many nodsto the 1959 “Sleeping Beauty.”)

Ms. Jolie is, unsurprisingly, avisual marvel. Her face has beensmoothed into an alabaster Cub-ist mask, and prostheses elon-gate her already sharp cheek-bones; from some angles, it looksas if she had a second set of vesti-

gial wings riding under her skin.The exquisite attention to detailin both the makeup and costumeis routine in major productionslike this one, of course, but themixture of Old Hollywood glam-our and contemporary fetishweardoesn’t just turn Maleficent intoa pleasurable spectacle, it alsoserves a character who embodiesboth the past and the future. Ms.Jolie’s performance is similarlybifurcated, with a controlledphysicality that, just when itseems to be edging into catwalkblankness, springs to weird lifewith grotesque facial contortionsand spidery movements.

Bruno Bettelheim, that greatreader of fairy tales, saw “TheSleeping Beauty” as a story ofsexual awakening. She wakesonly when physically and emo-tionally mature enough, whenshe is ready for love and its famil-iar handmaidens: sex and mar-riage. It’s at that point, Bettel-heim writes in “The Uses of En-chantment,” “the wall of thornssuddenly turns into a wall of big,beautiful flowers, which opens tolet the prince enter.” That’s quitethe metaphor, but for women, ithas sometimes also been a curse,including in movies, where theyhave traditionally had to wait fora man to get them to their happi-ly ever after. There’s no denyingthe attractions of that narrativefor some of us: Even Lena Dun-ham got swept off her feet.

But, come on! There’s more tolife and certainly more to women,which is something that, howeverimperfectly, “Maleficent” grap-ples with. I’m still not sure if themovie’s smack-down between pa-triarchy and matriarchy is theway to go, but at least nobodyhere is warbling about what shewants before hitting the road toself-actualization.

Consciously or not, coherentlyor not, “Maleficent” tells a newkind of story about how we livenow, not once upon another time.And it does so by suggesting,among other things, that buddinggirls and older women are notnatural foes, even if that’s whatfairy tales, Hollywood and theworld like to tell us. And whilethat may sound drippy, it’s exact-ly the kind of hokey that, movieby movie, may finally make a realdifference.

“Maleficent” is rated PG (Pa-rental guidance suggested). Thereis some bloodless violence, someinvolving wings.

She Was Dumped by Her Prince, So He’d Better Watch Out

KEITH HAMPSHERE/WALT DISNEY PICTURES

WALT DISNEY PICTURES

Angelina Jolie is the betrayed fairy, and Elle Fanning, right, isPrincess Aurora in “Maleficent,” from Disney.

From Weekend Page 1

MaleficentOpens on Friday. Directed by Robert Stromberg; writtenby Linda Woolverton; director of photog-raphy, Deam Semler; edited by ChrisLebenzon and Richard Pearson; musicby James Newton Howard; productiondesign by Gary Freeman and Dylan Cole;costumes by Anna B. Sheppard; seniorvisual effects supervisor, Carey Villegas;Maleficent’s makeup design by RickBaker; produced by Joe Roth; releasedby Walt Disney Pictures. Running time: 1hour 37 minutes.

WITH: Angelina Jolie (Maleficent),Sharlto Copley (Stefan), Elle Fanning(Aurora), Sam Riley (Diaval), ImeldaStaunton (Knotgrass), Juno Temple(Thistlewit), Lesley Manville (Flittle),Isobelle Molloy (young Maleficent), EllaPurnell (teenage Maleficent), MichaelHiggins (young Stefan) and JacksonBews (teenage Stefan).

Nxxx,2014-05-30,C,013,Bs-BW,E1

N C13THE NEW YORK TIMES, FRIDAY, MAY 30, 2014

falls into a deep, bewitched sleepafter pricking her finger on aspindle, but rather on the sinisterscene stealer who cursed her in afit of pique and a puff of acid-green smoke. As it turns out, Ma-leficent (it rhymes with magnifi-cent) had her reasons and a backstory to go with them. Soothinglyintroduced in voice-over by JanetMcTeer, Maleficent’s story openswhen she was a happy youngfairy (Isobelle Molloy and EllaPurnell) living in, and flying over,the moors, a lush, computer-gen-erated wonderland populated bycute uglies and delicately mossy,twiggy giants.

Trouble enters in the form of ahuman boy, Stefan, a farmhandwho’s caught pilfering a stone, aseemingly small act that rever-berates as loudly as Klaxonhorns. Maleficent forgives him; afriendship is born; time rushesby — it’s obvious that the film-makers can’t wait to bring in Ms.Jolie — and the friendshipevolves into a puppyish romance,sealed with a kiss. Stefan seemsnice enough, if bland, and he’splayed first by Michael Higginsand then, briefly, by JacksonBews. Before long, though, Ms.Jolie has taken to the skies while,back in the human realm, SharltoCopley has brought the adult Ste-fan ploddingly, disappointinglydown to earth. Casting is destinyin a lot of movies; one look at thetwitchy, shifty-eyed adult Stefan,and it’s clear that Mr. Copleywon’t be continuing the romance.

He doesn’t. Instead, he betraysMaleficent and, in one of themovie’s muddled sections, helpswage war against her land. Herwings literally clipped, Malefi-cent retreats into her dark placelike a grounded Valkyrie, castingshadows over her world to gowith her mood. Stefan assumesthe throne and, years later, heand his forgettable queen have achild, Aurora.

At this point, the filmmakerspick up the “Sleeping Beauty”thread and begin weaving it intoMaleficent’s story, so, again,there are a christening and acurse, and Aurora is squiredaway by a troika of pixies (a tol-erably amusing Imelda Staunton,Lesley Manville and Juno Tem-ple), who raise her in a forest cot-tage. There, she grows up (andeventually into Elle Fanning) un-der the gaze of Maleficent, whichis where this rethink gets going.

In broad strokes, “Maleficent”is Disney’s latest bid to recast adusty story for a contemporaryaudience, one that has, over theyears, complained with good rea-son about the company’s repre-sentations, particularly of femalecharacters. For decades, Disneyhas responded with an array ofplucky girls and women whosedesires extend beyond romantic

longing. Usually, they have ad-ventures, and not just dreams, togo with their wasp waists andfroufrou. Sometimes they savethe day and their true love, whichis better and more fun than wait-ing to be saved. Yet Disney hero-ines, whether princesses or not,have almost always ended up asreliably paired off as if they wereboarding Noah’s ark. A notableexception is Queen Elsa in “Fro-zen,” a very different kind ofheroine.

That Elsa remains single in“Frozen” has inspired somewidely, wildly divergent readingsof that movie, with some com-mentators claiming her as aL.G.B.T. representation, and oth-ers denouncing her for the samereason. It’s entirely possible that“Maleficent,” partly because it’snarratively weak and Ms. Jolie isa powerful screen presence, willinspire its share of warring inter-pretations (and dismissals). Themovie, directed by Robert Strom-berg from Linda Woolverton’sscript, draws on Disney’s “Sleep-ing Beauty” and Charles Per-rault’s version of the tale. Despitethis, the narrative linchpin isn’tAurora: It’s Maleficent, whodoesn’t fit the fairy tale template

largely because of her relation-ships. Stefan angers her, but sheso gets over him and soon shiftsher attention elsewhere.

Mr. Stromberg, a productiondesigner making his feature di-recting debut, does best when hescales down, as in the lovelyshots of Maleficent walking nextto a floating, unconscious Aurora,an image that telegraphs moreabout their relationship than anyline of dialogue. The actionscenes, by contrast, are visuallyuninteresting, borderline genericand unnecessary. There are alsofar too many long shots when thedigital renderings (especially

those with human figures) pullyou out of the story instead ofkeeping you immersed. Butthere’s so much to look at in themovie — from the wittily de-signed creatures to the shocks ofbilious green and purple — thatthe battles quickly fade. (The col-ors are, as is a galloping race tothe rescue, among the many nodsto the 1959 “Sleeping Beauty.”)

Ms. Jolie is, unsurprisingly, avisual marvel. Her face has beensmoothed into an alabaster Cub-ist mask, and prostheses elon-gate her already sharp cheek-bones; from some angles, it looksas if she had a second set of vesti-

gial wings riding under her skin.The exquisite attention to detailin both the makeup and costumeis routine in major productionslike this one, of course, but themixture of Old Hollywood glam-our and contemporary fetishweardoesn’t just turn Maleficent intoa pleasurable spectacle, it alsoserves a character who embodiesboth the past and the future. Ms.Jolie’s performance is similarlybifurcated, with a controlledphysicality that, just when itseems to be edging into catwalkblankness, springs to weird lifewith grotesque facial contortionsand spidery movements.

Bruno Bettelheim, that greatreader of fairy tales, saw “TheSleeping Beauty” as a story ofsexual awakening. She wakesonly when physically and emo-tionally mature enough, whenshe is ready for love and its famil-iar handmaidens: sex and mar-riage. It’s at that point, Bettel-heim writes in “The Uses of En-chantment,” “the wall of thornssuddenly turns into a wall of big,beautiful flowers, which opens tolet the prince enter.” That’s quitethe metaphor, but for women, ithas sometimes also been a curse,including in movies, where theyhave traditionally had to wait fora man to get them to their happi-ly ever after. There’s no denyingthe attractions of that narrativefor some of us: Even Lena Dun-ham got swept off her feet.

But, come on! There’s more tolife and certainly more to women,which is something that, howeverimperfectly, “Maleficent” grap-ples with. I’m still not sure if themovie’s smack-down between pa-triarchy and matriarchy is theway to go, but at least nobodyhere is warbling about what shewants before hitting the road toself-actualization.

Consciously or not, coherentlyor not, “Maleficent” tells a newkind of story about how we livenow, not once upon another time.And it does so by suggesting,among other things, that buddinggirls and older women are notnatural foes, even if that’s whatfairy tales, Hollywood and theworld like to tell us. And whilethat may sound drippy, it’s exact-ly the kind of hokey that, movieby movie, may finally make a realdifference.

“Maleficent” is rated PG (Pa-rental guidance suggested). Thereis some bloodless violence, someinvolving wings.

She Was Dumped by Her Prince, So He’d Better Watch Out

KEITH HAMPSHERE/WALT DISNEY PICTURES

WALT DISNEY PICTURES

Angelina Jolie is the betrayed fairy, and Elle Fanning, right, isPrincess Aurora in “Maleficent,” from Disney.

From Weekend Page 1

MaleficentOpens on Friday. Directed by Robert Stromberg; writtenby Linda Woolverton; director of photog-raphy, Deam Semler; edited by ChrisLebenzon and Richard Pearson; musicby James Newton Howard; productiondesign by Gary Freeman and Dylan Cole;costumes by Anna B. Sheppard; seniorvisual effects supervisor, Carey Villegas;Maleficent’s makeup design by RickBaker; produced by Joe Roth; releasedby Walt Disney Pictures. Running time: 1hour 37 minutes.

WITH: Angelina Jolie (Maleficent),Sharlto Copley (Stefan), Elle Fanning(Aurora), Sam Riley (Diaval), ImeldaStaunton (Knotgrass), Juno Temple(Thistlewit), Lesley Manville (Flittle),Isobelle Molloy (young Maleficent), EllaPurnell (teenage Maleficent), MichaelHiggins (young Stefan) and JacksonBews (teenage Stefan).

Nxxx,2014-05-30,C,013,Bs-BW,E1

N C13THE NEW YORK TIMES, FRIDAY, MAY 30, 2014

falls into a deep, bewitched sleepafter pricking her finger on aspindle, but rather on the sinisterscene stealer who cursed her in afit of pique and a puff of acid-green smoke. As it turns out, Ma-leficent (it rhymes with magnifi-cent) had her reasons and a backstory to go with them. Soothinglyintroduced in voice-over by JanetMcTeer, Maleficent’s story openswhen she was a happy youngfairy (Isobelle Molloy and EllaPurnell) living in, and flying over,the moors, a lush, computer-gen-erated wonderland populated bycute uglies and delicately mossy,twiggy giants.

Trouble enters in the form of ahuman boy, Stefan, a farmhandwho’s caught pilfering a stone, aseemingly small act that rever-berates as loudly as Klaxonhorns. Maleficent forgives him; afriendship is born; time rushesby — it’s obvious that the film-makers can’t wait to bring in Ms.Jolie — and the friendshipevolves into a puppyish romance,sealed with a kiss. Stefan seemsnice enough, if bland, and he’splayed first by Michael Higginsand then, briefly, by JacksonBews. Before long, though, Ms.Jolie has taken to the skies while,back in the human realm, SharltoCopley has brought the adult Ste-fan ploddingly, disappointinglydown to earth. Casting is destinyin a lot of movies; one look at thetwitchy, shifty-eyed adult Stefan,and it’s clear that Mr. Copleywon’t be continuing the romance.

He doesn’t. Instead, he betraysMaleficent and, in one of themovie’s muddled sections, helpswage war against her land. Herwings literally clipped, Malefi-cent retreats into her dark placelike a grounded Valkyrie, castingshadows over her world to gowith her mood. Stefan assumesthe throne and, years later, heand his forgettable queen have achild, Aurora.

At this point, the filmmakerspick up the “Sleeping Beauty”thread and begin weaving it intoMaleficent’s story, so, again,there are a christening and acurse, and Aurora is squiredaway by a troika of pixies (a tol-erably amusing Imelda Staunton,Lesley Manville and Juno Tem-ple), who raise her in a forest cot-tage. There, she grows up (andeventually into Elle Fanning) un-der the gaze of Maleficent, whichis where this rethink gets going.

In broad strokes, “Maleficent”is Disney’s latest bid to recast adusty story for a contemporaryaudience, one that has, over theyears, complained with good rea-son about the company’s repre-sentations, particularly of femalecharacters. For decades, Disneyhas responded with an array ofplucky girls and women whosedesires extend beyond romantic

longing. Usually, they have ad-ventures, and not just dreams, togo with their wasp waists andfroufrou. Sometimes they savethe day and their true love, whichis better and more fun than wait-ing to be saved. Yet Disney hero-ines, whether princesses or not,have almost always ended up asreliably paired off as if they wereboarding Noah’s ark. A notableexception is Queen Elsa in “Fro-zen,” a very different kind ofheroine.

That Elsa remains single in“Frozen” has inspired somewidely, wildly divergent readingsof that movie, with some com-mentators claiming her as aL.G.B.T. representation, and oth-ers denouncing her for the samereason. It’s entirely possible that“Maleficent,” partly because it’snarratively weak and Ms. Jolie isa powerful screen presence, willinspire its share of warring inter-pretations (and dismissals). Themovie, directed by Robert Strom-berg from Linda Woolverton’sscript, draws on Disney’s “Sleep-ing Beauty” and Charles Per-rault’s version of the tale. Despitethis, the narrative linchpin isn’tAurora: It’s Maleficent, whodoesn’t fit the fairy tale template

largely because of her relation-ships. Stefan angers her, but sheso gets over him and soon shiftsher attention elsewhere.

Mr. Stromberg, a productiondesigner making his feature di-recting debut, does best when hescales down, as in the lovelyshots of Maleficent walking nextto a floating, unconscious Aurora,an image that telegraphs moreabout their relationship than anyline of dialogue. The actionscenes, by contrast, are visuallyuninteresting, borderline genericand unnecessary. There are alsofar too many long shots when thedigital renderings (especially

those with human figures) pullyou out of the story instead ofkeeping you immersed. Butthere’s so much to look at in themovie — from the wittily de-signed creatures to the shocks ofbilious green and purple — thatthe battles quickly fade. (The col-ors are, as is a galloping race tothe rescue, among the many nodsto the 1959 “Sleeping Beauty.”)

Ms. Jolie is, unsurprisingly, avisual marvel. Her face has beensmoothed into an alabaster Cub-ist mask, and prostheses elon-gate her already sharp cheek-bones; from some angles, it looksas if she had a second set of vesti-

gial wings riding under her skin.The exquisite attention to detailin both the makeup and costumeis routine in major productionslike this one, of course, but themixture of Old Hollywood glam-our and contemporary fetishweardoesn’t just turn Maleficent intoa pleasurable spectacle, it alsoserves a character who embodiesboth the past and the future. Ms.Jolie’s performance is similarlybifurcated, with a controlledphysicality that, just when itseems to be edging into catwalkblankness, springs to weird lifewith grotesque facial contortionsand spidery movements.

Bruno Bettelheim, that greatreader of fairy tales, saw “TheSleeping Beauty” as a story ofsexual awakening. She wakesonly when physically and emo-tionally mature enough, whenshe is ready for love and its famil-iar handmaidens: sex and mar-riage. It’s at that point, Bettel-heim writes in “The Uses of En-chantment,” “the wall of thornssuddenly turns into a wall of big,beautiful flowers, which opens tolet the prince enter.” That’s quitethe metaphor, but for women, ithas sometimes also been a curse,including in movies, where theyhave traditionally had to wait fora man to get them to their happi-ly ever after. There’s no denyingthe attractions of that narrativefor some of us: Even Lena Dun-ham got swept off her feet.

But, come on! There’s more tolife and certainly more to women,which is something that, howeverimperfectly, “Maleficent” grap-ples with. I’m still not sure if themovie’s smack-down between pa-triarchy and matriarchy is theway to go, but at least nobodyhere is warbling about what shewants before hitting the road toself-actualization.

Consciously or not, coherentlyor not, “Maleficent” tells a newkind of story about how we livenow, not once upon another time.And it does so by suggesting,among other things, that buddinggirls and older women are notnatural foes, even if that’s whatfairy tales, Hollywood and theworld like to tell us. And whilethat may sound drippy, it’s exact-ly the kind of hokey that, movieby movie, may finally make a realdifference.

“Maleficent” is rated PG (Pa-rental guidance suggested). Thereis some bloodless violence, someinvolving wings.

She Was Dumped by Her Prince, So He’d Better Watch Out

KEITH HAMPSHERE/WALT DISNEY PICTURES

WALT DISNEY PICTURES

Angelina Jolie is the betrayed fairy, and Elle Fanning, right, isPrincess Aurora in “Maleficent,” from Disney.

From Weekend Page 1

MaleficentOpens on Friday. Directed by Robert Stromberg; writtenby Linda Woolverton; director of photog-raphy, Deam Semler; edited by ChrisLebenzon and Richard Pearson; musicby James Newton Howard; productiondesign by Gary Freeman and Dylan Cole;costumes by Anna B. Sheppard; seniorvisual effects supervisor, Carey Villegas;Maleficent’s makeup design by RickBaker; produced by Joe Roth; releasedby Walt Disney Pictures. Running time: 1hour 37 minutes.

WITH: Angelina Jolie (Maleficent),Sharlto Copley (Stefan), Elle Fanning(Aurora), Sam Riley (Diaval), ImeldaStaunton (Knotgrass), Juno Temple(Thistlewit), Lesley Manville (Flittle),Isobelle Molloy (young Maleficent), EllaPurnell (teenage Maleficent), MichaelHiggins (young Stefan) and JacksonBews (teenage Stefan).

Nxxx,2014-05-30,C,013,Bs-BW,E1

N C13THE NEW YORK TIMES, FRIDAY, MAY 30, 2014

falls into a deep, bewitched sleepafter pricking her finger on aspindle, but rather on the sinisterscene stealer who cursed her in afit of pique and a puff of acid-green smoke. As it turns out, Ma-leficent (it rhymes with magnifi-cent) had her reasons and a backstory to go with them. Soothinglyintroduced in voice-over by JanetMcTeer, Maleficent’s story openswhen she was a happy youngfairy (Isobelle Molloy and EllaPurnell) living in, and flying over,the moors, a lush, computer-gen-erated wonderland populated bycute uglies and delicately mossy,twiggy giants.

Trouble enters in the form of ahuman boy, Stefan, a farmhandwho’s caught pilfering a stone, aseemingly small act that rever-berates as loudly as Klaxonhorns. Maleficent forgives him; afriendship is born; time rushesby — it’s obvious that the film-makers can’t wait to bring in Ms.Jolie — and the friendshipevolves into a puppyish romance,sealed with a kiss. Stefan seemsnice enough, if bland, and he’splayed first by Michael Higginsand then, briefly, by JacksonBews. Before long, though, Ms.Jolie has taken to the skies while,back in the human realm, SharltoCopley has brought the adult Ste-fan ploddingly, disappointinglydown to earth. Casting is destinyin a lot of movies; one look at thetwitchy, shifty-eyed adult Stefan,and it’s clear that Mr. Copleywon’t be continuing the romance.

He doesn’t. Instead, he betraysMaleficent and, in one of themovie’s muddled sections, helpswage war against her land. Herwings literally clipped, Malefi-cent retreats into her dark placelike a grounded Valkyrie, castingshadows over her world to gowith her mood. Stefan assumesthe throne and, years later, heand his forgettable queen have achild, Aurora.

At this point, the filmmakerspick up the “Sleeping Beauty”thread and begin weaving it intoMaleficent’s story, so, again,there are a christening and acurse, and Aurora is squiredaway by a troika of pixies (a tol-erably amusing Imelda Staunton,Lesley Manville and Juno Tem-ple), who raise her in a forest cot-tage. There, she grows up (andeventually into Elle Fanning) un-der the gaze of Maleficent, whichis where this rethink gets going.

In broad strokes, “Maleficent”is Disney’s latest bid to recast adusty story for a contemporaryaudience, one that has, over theyears, complained with good rea-son about the company’s repre-sentations, particularly of femalecharacters. For decades, Disneyhas responded with an array ofplucky girls and women whosedesires extend beyond romantic

longing. Usually, they have ad-ventures, and not just dreams, togo with their wasp waists andfroufrou. Sometimes they savethe day and their true love, whichis better and more fun than wait-ing to be saved. Yet Disney hero-ines, whether princesses or not,have almost always ended up asreliably paired off as if they wereboarding Noah’s ark. A notableexception is Queen Elsa in “Fro-zen,” a very different kind ofheroine.

That Elsa remains single in“Frozen” has inspired somewidely, wildly divergent readingsof that movie, with some com-mentators claiming her as aL.G.B.T. representation, and oth-ers denouncing her for the samereason. It’s entirely possible that“Maleficent,” partly because it’snarratively weak and Ms. Jolie isa powerful screen presence, willinspire its share of warring inter-pretations (and dismissals). Themovie, directed by Robert Strom-berg from Linda Woolverton’sscript, draws on Disney’s “Sleep-ing Beauty” and Charles Per-rault’s version of the tale. Despitethis, the narrative linchpin isn’tAurora: It’s Maleficent, whodoesn’t fit the fairy tale template

largely because of her relation-ships. Stefan angers her, but sheso gets over him and soon shiftsher attention elsewhere.

Mr. Stromberg, a productiondesigner making his feature di-recting debut, does best when hescales down, as in the lovelyshots of Maleficent walking nextto a floating, unconscious Aurora,an image that telegraphs moreabout their relationship than anyline of dialogue. The actionscenes, by contrast, are visuallyuninteresting, borderline genericand unnecessary. There are alsofar too many long shots when thedigital renderings (especially

those with human figures) pullyou out of the story instead ofkeeping you immersed. Butthere’s so much to look at in themovie — from the wittily de-signed creatures to the shocks ofbilious green and purple — thatthe battles quickly fade. (The col-ors are, as is a galloping race tothe rescue, among the many nodsto the 1959 “Sleeping Beauty.”)

Ms. Jolie is, unsurprisingly, avisual marvel. Her face has beensmoothed into an alabaster Cub-ist mask, and prostheses elon-gate her already sharp cheek-bones; from some angles, it looksas if she had a second set of vesti-

gial wings riding under her skin.The exquisite attention to detailin both the makeup and costumeis routine in major productionslike this one, of course, but themixture of Old Hollywood glam-our and contemporary fetishweardoesn’t just turn Maleficent intoa pleasurable spectacle, it alsoserves a character who embodiesboth the past and the future. Ms.Jolie’s performance is similarlybifurcated, with a controlledphysicality that, just when itseems to be edging into catwalkblankness, springs to weird lifewith grotesque facial contortionsand spidery movements.

Bruno Bettelheim, that greatreader of fairy tales, saw “TheSleeping Beauty” as a story ofsexual awakening. She wakesonly when physically and emo-tionally mature enough, whenshe is ready for love and its famil-iar handmaidens: sex and mar-riage. It’s at that point, Bettel-heim writes in “The Uses of En-chantment,” “the wall of thornssuddenly turns into a wall of big,beautiful flowers, which opens tolet the prince enter.” That’s quitethe metaphor, but for women, ithas sometimes also been a curse,including in movies, where theyhave traditionally had to wait fora man to get them to their happi-ly ever after. There’s no denyingthe attractions of that narrativefor some of us: Even Lena Dun-ham got swept off her feet.

But, come on! There’s more tolife and certainly more to women,which is something that, howeverimperfectly, “Maleficent” grap-ples with. I’m still not sure if themovie’s smack-down between pa-triarchy and matriarchy is theway to go, but at least nobodyhere is warbling about what shewants before hitting the road toself-actualization.

Consciously or not, coherentlyor not, “Maleficent” tells a newkind of story about how we livenow, not once upon another time.And it does so by suggesting,among other things, that buddinggirls and older women are notnatural foes, even if that’s whatfairy tales, Hollywood and theworld like to tell us. And whilethat may sound drippy, it’s exact-ly the kind of hokey that, movieby movie, may finally make a realdifference.

“Maleficent” is rated PG (Pa-rental guidance suggested). Thereis some bloodless violence, someinvolving wings.

She Was Dumped by Her Prince, So He’d Better Watch Out

KEITH HAMPSHERE/WALT DISNEY PICTURES

WALT DISNEY PICTURES

Angelina Jolie is the betrayed fairy, and Elle Fanning, right, isPrincess Aurora in “Maleficent,” from Disney.

From Weekend Page 1

MaleficentOpens on Friday. Directed by Robert Stromberg; writtenby Linda Woolverton; director of photog-raphy, Deam Semler; edited by ChrisLebenzon and Richard Pearson; musicby James Newton Howard; productiondesign by Gary Freeman and Dylan Cole;costumes by Anna B. Sheppard; seniorvisual effects supervisor, Carey Villegas;Maleficent’s makeup design by RickBaker; produced by Joe Roth; releasedby Walt Disney Pictures. Running time: 1hour 37 minutes.

WITH: Angelina Jolie (Maleficent),Sharlto Copley (Stefan), Elle Fanning(Aurora), Sam Riley (Diaval), ImeldaStaunton (Knotgrass), Juno Temple(Thistlewit), Lesley Manville (Flittle),Isobelle Molloy (young Maleficent), EllaPurnell (teenage Maleficent), MichaelHiggins (young Stefan) and JacksonBews (teenage Stefan).

Nxxx,2014-05-30,C,013,Bs-BW,E1

N C13THE NEW YORK TIMES, FRIDAY, MAY 30, 2014

falls into a deep, bewitched sleepafter pricking her finger on aspindle, but rather on the sinisterscene stealer who cursed her in afit of pique and a puff of acid-green smoke. As it turns out, Ma-leficent (it rhymes with magnifi-cent) had her reasons and a backstory to go with them. Soothinglyintroduced in voice-over by JanetMcTeer, Maleficent’s story openswhen she was a happy youngfairy (Isobelle Molloy and EllaPurnell) living in, and flying over,the moors, a lush, computer-gen-erated wonderland populated bycute uglies and delicately mossy,twiggy giants.

Trouble enters in the form of ahuman boy, Stefan, a farmhandwho’s caught pilfering a stone, aseemingly small act that rever-berates as loudly as Klaxonhorns. Maleficent forgives him; afriendship is born; time rushesby — it’s obvious that the film-makers can’t wait to bring in Ms.Jolie — and the friendshipevolves into a puppyish romance,sealed with a kiss. Stefan seemsnice enough, if bland, and he’splayed first by Michael Higginsand then, briefly, by JacksonBews. Before long, though, Ms.Jolie has taken to the skies while,back in the human realm, SharltoCopley has brought the adult Ste-fan ploddingly, disappointinglydown to earth. Casting is destinyin a lot of movies; one look at thetwitchy, shifty-eyed adult Stefan,and it’s clear that Mr. Copleywon’t be continuing the romance.

He doesn’t. Instead, he betraysMaleficent and, in one of themovie’s muddled sections, helpswage war against her land. Herwings literally clipped, Malefi-cent retreats into her dark placelike a grounded Valkyrie, castingshadows over her world to gowith her mood. Stefan assumesthe throne and, years later, heand his forgettable queen have achild, Aurora.

At this point, the filmmakerspick up the “Sleeping Beauty”thread and begin weaving it intoMaleficent’s story, so, again,there are a christening and acurse, and Aurora is squiredaway by a troika of pixies (a tol-erably amusing Imelda Staunton,Lesley Manville and Juno Tem-ple), who raise her in a forest cot-tage. There, she grows up (andeventually into Elle Fanning) un-der the gaze of Maleficent, whichis where this rethink gets going.

In broad strokes, “Maleficent”is Disney’s latest bid to recast adusty story for a contemporaryaudience, one that has, over theyears, complained with good rea-son about the company’s repre-sentations, particularly of femalecharacters. For decades, Disneyhas responded with an array ofplucky girls and women whosedesires extend beyond romantic

longing. Usually, they have ad-ventures, and not just dreams, togo with their wasp waists andfroufrou. Sometimes they savethe day and their true love, whichis better and more fun than wait-ing to be saved. Yet Disney hero-ines, whether princesses or not,have almost always ended up asreliably paired off as if they wereboarding Noah’s ark. A notableexception is Queen Elsa in “Fro-zen,” a very different kind ofheroine.

That Elsa remains single in“Frozen” has inspired somewidely, wildly divergent readingsof that movie, with some com-mentators claiming her as aL.G.B.T. representation, and oth-ers denouncing her for the samereason. It’s entirely possible that“Maleficent,” partly because it’snarratively weak and Ms. Jolie isa powerful screen presence, willinspire its share of warring inter-pretations (and dismissals). Themovie, directed by Robert Strom-berg from Linda Woolverton’sscript, draws on Disney’s “Sleep-ing Beauty” and Charles Per-rault’s version of the tale. Despitethis, the narrative linchpin isn’tAurora: It’s Maleficent, whodoesn’t fit the fairy tale template

largely because of her relation-ships. Stefan angers her, but sheso gets over him and soon shiftsher attention elsewhere.

Mr. Stromberg, a productiondesigner making his feature di-recting debut, does best when hescales down, as in the lovelyshots of Maleficent walking nextto a floating, unconscious Aurora,an image that telegraphs moreabout their relationship than anyline of dialogue. The actionscenes, by contrast, are visuallyuninteresting, borderline genericand unnecessary. There are alsofar too many long shots when thedigital renderings (especially

those with human figures) pullyou out of the story instead ofkeeping you immersed. Butthere’s so much to look at in themovie — from the wittily de-signed creatures to the shocks ofbilious green and purple — thatthe battles quickly fade. (The col-ors are, as is a galloping race tothe rescue, among the many nodsto the 1959 “Sleeping Beauty.”)

Ms. Jolie is, unsurprisingly, avisual marvel. Her face has beensmoothed into an alabaster Cub-ist mask, and prostheses elon-gate her already sharp cheek-bones; from some angles, it looksas if she had a second set of vesti-

gial wings riding under her skin.The exquisite attention to detailin both the makeup and costumeis routine in major productionslike this one, of course, but themixture of Old Hollywood glam-our and contemporary fetishweardoesn’t just turn Maleficent intoa pleasurable spectacle, it alsoserves a character who embodiesboth the past and the future. Ms.Jolie’s performance is similarlybifurcated, with a controlledphysicality that, just when itseems to be edging into catwalkblankness, springs to weird lifewith grotesque facial contortionsand spidery movements.

Bruno Bettelheim, that greatreader of fairy tales, saw “TheSleeping Beauty” as a story ofsexual awakening. She wakesonly when physically and emo-tionally mature enough, whenshe is ready for love and its famil-iar handmaidens: sex and mar-riage. It’s at that point, Bettel-heim writes in “The Uses of En-chantment,” “the wall of thornssuddenly turns into a wall of big,beautiful flowers, which opens tolet the prince enter.” That’s quitethe metaphor, but for women, ithas sometimes also been a curse,including in movies, where theyhave traditionally had to wait fora man to get them to their happi-ly ever after. There’s no denyingthe attractions of that narrativefor some of us: Even Lena Dun-ham got swept off her feet.

But, come on! There’s more tolife and certainly more to women,which is something that, howeverimperfectly, “Maleficent” grap-ples with. I’m still not sure if themovie’s smack-down between pa-triarchy and matriarchy is theway to go, but at least nobodyhere is warbling about what shewants before hitting the road toself-actualization.

Consciously or not, coherentlyor not, “Maleficent” tells a newkind of story about how we livenow, not once upon another time.And it does so by suggesting,among other things, that buddinggirls and older women are notnatural foes, even if that’s whatfairy tales, Hollywood and theworld like to tell us. And whilethat may sound drippy, it’s exact-ly the kind of hokey that, movieby movie, may finally make a realdifference.

“Maleficent” is rated PG (Pa-rental guidance suggested). Thereis some bloodless violence, someinvolving wings.

She Was Dumped by Her Prince, So He’d Better Watch Out

KEITH HAMPSHERE/WALT DISNEY PICTURES

WALT DISNEY PICTURES

Angelina Jolie is the betrayed fairy, and Elle Fanning, right, isPrincess Aurora in “Maleficent,” from Disney.

From Weekend Page 1

MaleficentOpens on Friday. Directed by Robert Stromberg; writtenby Linda Woolverton; director of photog-raphy, Deam Semler; edited by ChrisLebenzon and Richard Pearson; musicby James Newton Howard; productiondesign by Gary Freeman and Dylan Cole;costumes by Anna B. Sheppard; seniorvisual effects supervisor, Carey Villegas;Maleficent’s makeup design by RickBaker; produced by Joe Roth; releasedby Walt Disney Pictures. Running time: 1hour 37 minutes.

WITH: Angelina Jolie (Maleficent),Sharlto Copley (Stefan), Elle Fanning(Aurora), Sam Riley (Diaval), ImeldaStaunton (Knotgrass), Juno Temple(Thistlewit), Lesley Manville (Flittle),Isobelle Molloy (young Maleficent), EllaPurnell (teenage Maleficent), MichaelHiggins (young Stefan) and JacksonBews (teenage Stefan).

Nxxx,2014-05-30,C,013,Bs-BW,E1

N C13THE NEW YORK TIMES, FRIDAY, MAY 30, 2014

falls into a deep, bewitched sleepafter pricking her finger on aspindle, but rather on the sinisterscene stealer who cursed her in afit of pique and a puff of acid-green smoke. As it turns out, Ma-leficent (it rhymes with magnifi-cent) had her reasons and a backstory to go with them. Soothinglyintroduced in voice-over by JanetMcTeer, Maleficent’s story openswhen she was a happy youngfairy (Isobelle Molloy and EllaPurnell) living in, and flying over,the moors, a lush, computer-gen-erated wonderland populated bycute uglies and delicately mossy,twiggy giants.

Trouble enters in the form of ahuman boy, Stefan, a farmhandwho’s caught pilfering a stone, aseemingly small act that rever-berates as loudly as Klaxonhorns. Maleficent forgives him; afriendship is born; time rushesby — it’s obvious that the film-makers can’t wait to bring in Ms.Jolie — and the friendshipevolves into a puppyish romance,sealed with a kiss. Stefan seemsnice enough, if bland, and he’splayed first by Michael Higginsand then, briefly, by JacksonBews. Before long, though, Ms.Jolie has taken to the skies while,back in the human realm, SharltoCopley has brought the adult Ste-fan ploddingly, disappointinglydown to earth. Casting is destinyin a lot of movies; one look at thetwitchy, shifty-eyed adult Stefan,and it’s clear that Mr. Copleywon’t be continuing the romance.

He doesn’t. Instead, he betraysMaleficent and, in one of themovie’s muddled sections, helpswage war against her land. Herwings literally clipped, Malefi-cent retreats into her dark placelike a grounded Valkyrie, castingshadows over her world to gowith her mood. Stefan assumesthe throne and, years later, heand his forgettable queen have achild, Aurora.

At this point, the filmmakerspick up the “Sleeping Beauty”thread and begin weaving it intoMaleficent’s story, so, again,there are a christening and acurse, and Aurora is squiredaway by a troika of pixies (a tol-erably amusing Imelda Staunton,Lesley Manville and Juno Tem-ple), who raise her in a forest cot-tage. There, she grows up (andeventually into Elle Fanning) un-der the gaze of Maleficent, whichis where this rethink gets going.

In broad strokes, “Maleficent”is Disney’s latest bid to recast adusty story for a contemporaryaudience, one that has, over theyears, complained with good rea-son about the company’s repre-sentations, particularly of femalecharacters. For decades, Disneyhas responded with an array ofplucky girls and women whosedesires extend beyond romantic

longing. Usually, they have ad-ventures, and not just dreams, togo with their wasp waists andfroufrou. Sometimes they savethe day and their true love, whichis better and more fun than wait-ing to be saved. Yet Disney hero-ines, whether princesses or not,have almost always ended up asreliably paired off as if they wereboarding Noah’s ark. A notableexception is Queen Elsa in “Fro-zen,” a very different kind ofheroine.

That Elsa remains single in“Frozen” has inspired somewidely, wildly divergent readingsof that movie, with some com-mentators claiming her as aL.G.B.T. representation, and oth-ers denouncing her for the samereason. It’s entirely possible that“Maleficent,” partly because it’snarratively weak and Ms. Jolie isa powerful screen presence, willinspire its share of warring inter-pretations (and dismissals). Themovie, directed by Robert Strom-berg from Linda Woolverton’sscript, draws on Disney’s “Sleep-ing Beauty” and Charles Per-rault’s version of the tale. Despitethis, the narrative linchpin isn’tAurora: It’s Maleficent, whodoesn’t fit the fairy tale template

largely because of her relation-ships. Stefan angers her, but sheso gets over him and soon shiftsher attention elsewhere.

Mr. Stromberg, a productiondesigner making his feature di-recting debut, does best when hescales down, as in the lovelyshots of Maleficent walking nextto a floating, unconscious Aurora,an image that telegraphs moreabout their relationship than anyline of dialogue. The actionscenes, by contrast, are visuallyuninteresting, borderline genericand unnecessary. There are alsofar too many long shots when thedigital renderings (especially

those with human figures) pullyou out of the story instead ofkeeping you immersed. Butthere’s so much to look at in themovie — from the wittily de-signed creatures to the shocks ofbilious green and purple — thatthe battles quickly fade. (The col-ors are, as is a galloping race tothe rescue, among the many nodsto the 1959 “Sleeping Beauty.”)

Ms. Jolie is, unsurprisingly, avisual marvel. Her face has beensmoothed into an alabaster Cub-ist mask, and prostheses elon-gate her already sharp cheek-bones; from some angles, it looksas if she had a second set of vesti-

gial wings riding under her skin.The exquisite attention to detailin both the makeup and costumeis routine in major productionslike this one, of course, but themixture of Old Hollywood glam-our and contemporary fetishweardoesn’t just turn Maleficent intoa pleasurable spectacle, it alsoserves a character who embodiesboth the past and the future. Ms.Jolie’s performance is similarlybifurcated, with a controlledphysicality that, just when itseems to be edging into catwalkblankness, springs to weird lifewith grotesque facial contortionsand spidery movements.

Bruno Bettelheim, that greatreader of fairy tales, saw “TheSleeping Beauty” as a story ofsexual awakening. She wakesonly when physically and emo-tionally mature enough, whenshe is ready for love and its famil-iar handmaidens: sex and mar-riage. It’s at that point, Bettel-heim writes in “The Uses of En-chantment,” “the wall of thornssuddenly turns into a wall of big,beautiful flowers, which opens tolet the prince enter.” That’s quitethe metaphor, but for women, ithas sometimes also been a curse,including in movies, where theyhave traditionally had to wait fora man to get them to their happi-ly ever after. There’s no denyingthe attractions of that narrativefor some of us: Even Lena Dun-ham got swept off her feet.

But, come on! There’s more tolife and certainly more to women,which is something that, howeverimperfectly, “Maleficent” grap-ples with. I’m still not sure if themovie’s smack-down between pa-triarchy and matriarchy is theway to go, but at least nobodyhere is warbling about what shewants before hitting the road toself-actualization.

Consciously or not, coherentlyor not, “Maleficent” tells a newkind of story about how we livenow, not once upon another time.And it does so by suggesting,among other things, that buddinggirls and older women are notnatural foes, even if that’s whatfairy tales, Hollywood and theworld like to tell us. And whilethat may sound drippy, it’s exact-ly the kind of hokey that, movieby movie, may finally make a realdifference.

“Maleficent” is rated PG (Pa-rental guidance suggested). Thereis some bloodless violence, someinvolving wings.

She Was Dumped by Her Prince, So He’d Better Watch Out

KEITH HAMPSHERE/WALT DISNEY PICTURES

WALT DISNEY PICTURES

Angelina Jolie is the betrayed fairy, and Elle Fanning, right, isPrincess Aurora in “Maleficent,” from Disney.

From Weekend Page 1

MaleficentOpens on Friday. Directed by Robert Stromberg; writtenby Linda Woolverton; director of photog-raphy, Deam Semler; edited by ChrisLebenzon and Richard Pearson; musicby James Newton Howard; productiondesign by Gary Freeman and Dylan Cole;costumes by Anna B. Sheppard; seniorvisual effects supervisor, Carey Villegas;Maleficent’s makeup design by RickBaker; produced by Joe Roth; releasedby Walt Disney Pictures. Running time: 1hour 37 minutes.

WITH: Angelina Jolie (Maleficent),Sharlto Copley (Stefan), Elle Fanning(Aurora), Sam Riley (Diaval), ImeldaStaunton (Knotgrass), Juno Temple(Thistlewit), Lesley Manville (Flittle),Isobelle Molloy (young Maleficent), EllaPurnell (teenage Maleficent), MichaelHiggins (young Stefan) and JacksonBews (teenage Stefan).

Nxxx,2014-05-30,C,013,Bs-BW,E1

N C13THE NEW YORK TIMES, FRIDAY, MAY 30, 2014

falls into a deep, bewitched sleepafter pricking her finger on aspindle, but rather on the sinisterscene stealer who cursed her in afit of pique and a puff of acid-green smoke. As it turns out, Ma-leficent (it rhymes with magnifi-cent) had her reasons and a backstory to go with them. Soothinglyintroduced in voice-over by JanetMcTeer, Maleficent’s story openswhen she was a happy youngfairy (Isobelle Molloy and EllaPurnell) living in, and flying over,the moors, a lush, computer-gen-erated wonderland populated bycute uglies and delicately mossy,twiggy giants.

Trouble enters in the form of ahuman boy, Stefan, a farmhandwho’s caught pilfering a stone, aseemingly small act that rever-berates as loudly as Klaxonhorns. Maleficent forgives him; afriendship is born; time rushesby — it’s obvious that the film-makers can’t wait to bring in Ms.Jolie — and the friendshipevolves into a puppyish romance,sealed with a kiss. Stefan seemsnice enough, if bland, and he’splayed first by Michael Higginsand then, briefly, by JacksonBews. Before long, though, Ms.Jolie has taken to the skies while,back in the human realm, SharltoCopley has brought the adult Ste-fan ploddingly, disappointinglydown to earth. Casting is destinyin a lot of movies; one look at thetwitchy, shifty-eyed adult Stefan,and it’s clear that Mr. Copleywon’t be continuing the romance.

He doesn’t. Instead, he betraysMaleficent and, in one of themovie’s muddled sections, helpswage war against her land. Herwings literally clipped, Malefi-cent retreats into her dark placelike a grounded Valkyrie, castingshadows over her world to gowith her mood. Stefan assumesthe throne and, years later, heand his forgettable queen have achild, Aurora.

At this point, the filmmakerspick up the “Sleeping Beauty”thread and begin weaving it intoMaleficent’s story, so, again,there are a christening and acurse, and Aurora is squiredaway by a troika of pixies (a tol-erably amusing Imelda Staunton,Lesley Manville and Juno Tem-ple), who raise her in a forest cot-tage. There, she grows up (andeventually into Elle Fanning) un-der the gaze of Maleficent, whichis where this rethink gets going.

In broad strokes, “Maleficent”is Disney’s latest bid to recast adusty story for a contemporaryaudience, one that has, over theyears, complained with good rea-son about the company’s repre-sentations, particularly of femalecharacters. For decades, Disneyhas responded with an array ofplucky girls and women whosedesires extend beyond romantic

longing. Usually, they have ad-ventures, and not just dreams, togo with their wasp waists andfroufrou. Sometimes they savethe day and their true love, whichis better and more fun than wait-ing to be saved. Yet Disney hero-ines, whether princesses or not,have almost always ended up asreliably paired off as if they wereboarding Noah’s ark. A notableexception is Queen Elsa in “Fro-zen,” a very different kind ofheroine.

That Elsa remains single in“Frozen” has inspired somewidely, wildly divergent readingsof that movie, with some com-mentators claiming her as aL.G.B.T. representation, and oth-ers denouncing her for the samereason. It’s entirely possible that“Maleficent,” partly because it’snarratively weak and Ms. Jolie isa powerful screen presence, willinspire its share of warring inter-pretations (and dismissals). Themovie, directed by Robert Strom-berg from Linda Woolverton’sscript, draws on Disney’s “Sleep-ing Beauty” and Charles Per-rault’s version of the tale. Despitethis, the narrative linchpin isn’tAurora: It’s Maleficent, whodoesn’t fit the fairy tale template

largely because of her relation-ships. Stefan angers her, but sheso gets over him and soon shiftsher attention elsewhere.

Mr. Stromberg, a productiondesigner making his feature di-recting debut, does best when hescales down, as in the lovelyshots of Maleficent walking nextto a floating, unconscious Aurora,an image that telegraphs moreabout their relationship than anyline of dialogue. The actionscenes, by contrast, are visuallyuninteresting, borderline genericand unnecessary. There are alsofar too many long shots when thedigital renderings (especially

those with human figures) pullyou out of the story instead ofkeeping you immersed. Butthere’s so much to look at in themovie — from the wittily de-signed creatures to the shocks ofbilious green and purple — thatthe battles quickly fade. (The col-ors are, as is a galloping race tothe rescue, among the many nodsto the 1959 “Sleeping Beauty.”)

Ms. Jolie is, unsurprisingly, avisual marvel. Her face has beensmoothed into an alabaster Cub-ist mask, and prostheses elon-gate her already sharp cheek-bones; from some angles, it looksas if she had a second set of vesti-

gial wings riding under her skin.The exquisite attention to detailin both the makeup and costumeis routine in major productionslike this one, of course, but themixture of Old Hollywood glam-our and contemporary fetishweardoesn’t just turn Maleficent intoa pleasurable spectacle, it alsoserves a character who embodiesboth the past and the future. Ms.Jolie’s performance is similarlybifurcated, with a controlledphysicality that, just when itseems to be edging into catwalkblankness, springs to weird lifewith grotesque facial contortionsand spidery movements.

Bruno Bettelheim, that greatreader of fairy tales, saw “TheSleeping Beauty” as a story ofsexual awakening. She wakesonly when physically and emo-tionally mature enough, whenshe is ready for love and its famil-iar handmaidens: sex and mar-riage. It’s at that point, Bettel-heim writes in “The Uses of En-chantment,” “the wall of thornssuddenly turns into a wall of big,beautiful flowers, which opens tolet the prince enter.” That’s quitethe metaphor, but for women, ithas sometimes also been a curse,including in movies, where theyhave traditionally had to wait fora man to get them to their happi-ly ever after. There’s no denyingthe attractions of that narrativefor some of us: Even Lena Dun-ham got swept off her feet.

But, come on! There’s more tolife and certainly more to women,which is something that, howeverimperfectly, “Maleficent” grap-ples with. I’m still not sure if themovie’s smack-down between pa-triarchy and matriarchy is theway to go, but at least nobodyhere is warbling about what shewants before hitting the road toself-actualization.

Consciously or not, coherentlyor not, “Maleficent” tells a newkind of story about how we livenow, not once upon another time.And it does so by suggesting,among other things, that buddinggirls and older women are notnatural foes, even if that’s whatfairy tales, Hollywood and theworld like to tell us. And whilethat may sound drippy, it’s exact-ly the kind of hokey that, movieby movie, may finally make a realdifference.

“Maleficent” is rated PG (Pa-rental guidance suggested). Thereis some bloodless violence, someinvolving wings.

She Was Dumped by Her Prince, So He’d Better Watch Out

KEITH HAMPSHERE/WALT DISNEY PICTURES

WALT DISNEY PICTURES

Angelina Jolie is the betrayed fairy, and Elle Fanning, right, isPrincess Aurora in “Maleficent,” from Disney.

From Weekend Page 1

MaleficentOpens on Friday. Directed by Robert Stromberg; writtenby Linda Woolverton; director of photog-raphy, Deam Semler; edited by ChrisLebenzon and Richard Pearson; musicby James Newton Howard; productiondesign by Gary Freeman and Dylan Cole;costumes by Anna B. Sheppard; seniorvisual effects supervisor, Carey Villegas;Maleficent’s makeup design by RickBaker; produced by Joe Roth; releasedby Walt Disney Pictures. Running time: 1hour 37 minutes.

WITH: Angelina Jolie (Maleficent),Sharlto Copley (Stefan), Elle Fanning(Aurora), Sam Riley (Diaval), ImeldaStaunton (Knotgrass), Juno Temple(Thistlewit), Lesley Manville (Flittle),Isobelle Molloy (young Maleficent), EllaPurnell (teenage Maleficent), MichaelHiggins (young Stefan) and JacksonBews (teenage Stefan).

Nxxx,2014-05-30,C,013,Bs-BW,E1

porary audience, one that has, over the years, complained with good reason about the com-pany’s representations, particularly of female characters. For decades, Disney has responded with an array of plucky girls and women whose desires extend beyond romantic longing. Usu-ally, they have adventures, and not just dreams, to go with their wasp waists and froufrou. Sometimes they save the day and their true love, which is better and more fun than wait-ing to be saved. Yet Disney heroines, whether princesses or not, have almost always ended up as reliably paired off as if they were boarding noah’s ark. a notable exception is Queen elsa in “Frozen,” a very different kind of heroine.

That elsa remains single in “Frozen” has inspired some widely, wildly divergent read-ings of that movie, with some commentators claiming her as a l.g.B.T. representation, and others denouncing her for the same reason. it’s entirely possible that “Maleficent,” partly because it’s narratively weak and Ms. Jolie is a powerful screen presence, will inspire its share of warring interpretations (and dismiss-als). The movie, directed by Robert Strom-berg from linda Woolverton’s script, draws on Disney’s “Sleeping Beauty” and Charles Perrault’s version of the tale. Despite this, the narrative linchpin isn’t aurora: it’s Maleficent, who doesn’t fit the fairy tale template largely because of her relationships. Stefan angers her, but she so gets over him and soon shifts her at-tention elsewhere.

Mr. Stromberg, a production designer making his feature directing debut, does best when he scales down, as in the lovely shots of Maleficent walking next to a floating, un-conscious aurora, an image that telegraphs more about their relationship than any line of dialogue. The action scenes, by contrast, are visually uninteresting, borderline generic and unnecessary. There are also far too many long shots when the digital renderings (especially those with human figures) pull you out of the story instead of keeping you immersed. But there’s so much to look at in the movie — from the wittily designed creatures to the shocks of bilious green and purple — that the battles quickly fade. (The colors are, as is a galloping race to the rescue, among the many nods to the 1959 “Sleeping Beauty.”)

Ms. Jolie is, unsurprisingly, a visual marvel. Her face has been smoothed into an alabaster Cubist mask, and prostheses elongate her al-ready sharp cheekbones; from some angles, it looks as if she had a second set of vestigial wings riding under her skin. The exquisite attention to detail in both the makeup and costume is routine in major productions like this one, of course, but the mixture of Old Hollywood glamour and con-temporary fetishwear doesn’t just turn Malefi-cent into a pleasurable spectacle, it also serves a character who embodies both the past and the future. Ms. Jolie’s performance is similarly bifurcated, with a controlled physicality that, just when it seems to be edging into catwalk blank-ness, springs to weird life with grotesque facial contortions and spidery movements.

Bruno Bettelheim, that great reader of fairy tales, saw “The Sleeping Beauty” as a story of sexual awakening. She wakes only when physi-cally and emotionally mature enough, when she is ready for love and its familiar handmaid-ens: sex and marriage. it’s at that point, Bet-telheim writes in “The Uses of enchantment,” “the wall of thorns suddenly turns into a wall of big, beautiful flowers, which opens to let the prince enter.” That’s quite the metaphor, but for women, it has sometimes also been a curse, including in movies, where they have tradition-ally had to wait for a man to get them to their happily ever after. There’s no denying the at-tractions of that narrative for some of us: even lena Dunham got swept off her feet.

But, come on! There’s more to life and cer-tainly more to women, which is something that, however imperfectly, “Maleficent” grapples with. i’m still not sure if the movie’s smack-down between patriarchy and matriarchy is the way to go, but at least nobody here is war-bling about what she wants before hitting the road to self-actualization.

Consciously or not, coherently or not, “Maleficent” tells a new kind of story about how we live now, not once upon another time. and it does so by suggesting, among other things, that budding girls and older women are not natural foes, even if that’s what fairy tales, Hollywood and the world like to tell us. and while that may sound drippy, it’s exactly the kind of hokey that, movie by movie, may finally make a real difference. n