Maleficent (2014) Maleficent is a live-action adaptation/remake of 1959's animated film
Sleeping Beauty, from the
eponymous antagonist. In 2003, during
Don Hahn's meeting with Disney's animation department, it was suggested to create an
origin film about
Maleficent from Disney's animated film
Sleeping Beauty in the same vein as then just released
Broadway musical
Wicked. The film was originally conceived as animated, but, according to Hahn, it was "too difficult", so it was decided to go for a live-action approach instead. In 2005, but did not start working on it until around the summer of 2009, when he was finishing
Alice in Wonderland (2010). Burton personally supervised the development of the film for six months to a year, Following Burton's departure, the studio considered
David Yates, and
David O. Russell to take over as director.
Guillermo del Toro also expressed a desire to direct the film, citing
Sleeping Beauty (1959) as one of his three favorite Disney films. In September 2011,
Joe Roth joined the project as a producer, and in January 2012 it was announced that
Robert Stromberg, the production designer of
Avatar (2009),
Alice in Wonderland (2010) and
Oz the Great and Powerful (2013), would direct the film in his directional debut. A month later, during the
62nd Berlin International Film Festival, Jolie officially confirmed her involvement in the project. Linda Woolverton's screenplay went through at least 15 versions as the film progressed in production. Stromberg said: "I met many times with Linda Woolverton, the writer. We did lots of roundtable discussions and sort of cut out the fat as much as we could and sort of purified the storyline as much as we could".
Paul Dini also performed rewrites on the project with Stromberg, and was credited in early press. In some earlier versions of the story, Stefan was the half-human, half-fairy bastard son of King Henry. The version of the screenplay that went into shooting originally included two characters called Queen Ulla and King Kinloch, the fairy queen and fairy king of the Moors and the aunt and uncle of Maleficent.
Miranda Richardson and
Peter Capaldi were cast and shot the Queen Ulla and King Kinloch scenes, but their roles were cut in the editing process together with more than 15 minutes of the first act of the film. Stromberg said, "We spent a bit more time originally in the fairy world before we got into the human side of things ... we wanted to get it [the film] under two hours. So we cut about 15 minutes out of the first act, and then that had to be seamed together with some pretty basic reshoots." Stromberg later claimed in an interview that he employed an "age-old" emotional storytelling for the film and called it "the biggest thrill" against all technology advances. "And the way we play with that is we have somebody who's perhaps in love but betrayed and doesn't believe that true love exists. So the moral to it is we can all feel dark ourselves but not to lose hope because there is light in places where we might not be expecting", he explained. Some filming took place in the
Buckinghamshire countryside near
Turville. The film was originally slated for a March 14, 2014 release, before it was changed to July 2, 2014. On September 18, 2013, the film's release date was preponed to May 30, 2014, as
Pixar's
The Good Dinosaur faced production issues and delayed to 2015. In the United Kingdom, the film was released on May 28, 2014.
Maleficent: Mistress of Evil (2019) Maleficent: Mistress of Evil is the sequel of the 2014 film
Maleficent, continuing the story of the first film. The film was released on October 18, 2019. On June 3, 2014, following the release of the first film,
Angelina Jolie hinted that a sequel to
Maleficent was a possibility. On June 15, 2015,
Walt Disney Pictures announced that the sequel was in the works and that
Linda Woolverton would return to write the screenplay for the film. Although Jolie's return to the sequel was not yet certain, the script was intended to be written with her in mind. On August 29, 2017, it was reported that
Jez Butterworth would rewrite Woolverton's script while Roth was confirmed as returning as producer. In September 2017, Jolie stated that they "have been working on the script and this is going to be a really strong sequel." On October 3, 2017,
Deadline reported that the film would be directed by
Joachim Rønning and it would start filming in the first quarter of 2018. In April 2018,
Ed Skrein was cast in the film to play a dark fae, with
Elle Fanning returning to play Princess Aurora from the previous film.
Michelle Pfeiffer was also added as a character described as a queen, later clarified to be an evil queen named Queen Ingrith. In May 2018, it was announced that
Harris Dickinson would replace
Brenton Thwaites in the role of Prince Phillip, due to scheduling conflicts with the latter actor. Later it was also confirmed that
Jenn Murray,
David Gyasi,
Chiwetel Ejiofor and
Robert Lindsay had also joined the cast.
Sam Riley,
Imelda Staunton,
Juno Temple and
Lesley Manville were also confirmed to reprise their roles from the prior film. In June 2018
Judith Shekoni joined the cast. The movie was theatrically released on October 18, 2019 by
Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures, moving up from the film's previously announced date of May 29, 2020., and on December 31, 2019 by
Walt Disney Studios Home Entertainment on
Digital HD, followed by a
4K Ultra HD,
Blu-ray and
DVD release on January 14, 2020.
Maleficent: Mistress of Evil was released on
Disney+ on May 15, 2020.
Future film in development A third film is in early development. In December 2023, Angelina Jolie stated that she is returning to the title role. == Video game ==