Angelina Jolie acted as Maleficent. For this character, she and the makeup team wanted a sharper and stronger angles on her face.
Special-effects makeup artist Rick Baker explained to Allure that they actually used Lady Gaga's forehead horns (Born This Way song) as inspiration, "I thought it didn't make sense for [Jolie] to have bones like [Lady Gaga's], but [Jolie] really liked the idea of something under her skin showing a ridge. So I moved them to her cheekbones, where I thought it would create a more elegant line. If you look closely, they actually follow the line of Maleficent's cowl in the Disney cartoon."