Thursday, June 26, 2008

Stars Over Angelina Jolie -- Death and Life and Motherhood

Happy Birthday to Angelina Jolie, who turns 33 this year!

The number one actress over the past decade has been Angelina Jolie, who is known only by her first and middle names. She has fascinated all audiences, not just men, and it is interesting to follow her life arc from a gothic wannabe to a wife, mom, and globetrotting representative for the United Nations (as well as Oscar-winning actress).

Angelina was born in Los Angeles on June 4, 1975 at 9:09 am. Her ascendant is 29 degrees Cancer. Let me give her planet placements in case the chart does not load on this platform correctly. The Sun is at 13 degrees Gemini, Moon 13 degrees Aries, Jupiter 17 Aries at Midheaven (in 9th House), Mercury 22 Gemini, Venus 28 Cancer (just above Ascendant), Mars 10 Aries, Saturn 17 Cancer, Uranus 28 Libra in the 4th House, Neptune 10 Sagittarius retrograde in 5th House, Pluto 6 Libra in 4th House, the Midheaven is at 17 Aries.

From first glance, it is clear her chart is dominated by the stellium of planets in Gemini-Cancer around her Ascendant, with Venus most closely conjunct and just above the horizon. Venus or Moon on the angles are commonly found among actresses who become sex symbols, and natives with those placements are successful at embodying, portraying, and expressing the most feminine archetypes. Her chart is doubly activated in this regard (befitting a Gemini) because not only is Venus on her Ascendant, but the Moon is at her Midheaven in Aries.

A Cancer rising with an angular Moon (ruler of Cancer) gives her a face that is a photographer’s dream. Several famous actresses have had a Cancer Sun or Moon -- such as Greta Garbo and Meryl Streep. Their faces express their feelings without any script necessary, and are often lit by an inner luminosity. Stop and notice her face’s rounded outlines sometime.

This stellium is further activated by a Moon-Mars-Jupiter placements in Aries, squaring her Saturn in Cancer. From all I have read about astrology and about Angelina Jolie, I feel this is the key driving force behind her personality and her professional ambition. Saturn squaring these personal planets gives an unusual somberness to her as a young person, as she suffered through a youth without a father -- (her parents separated when she was only a year old) -- but it also gives her the discipline to achieve her career goals. Her Saturn in Cancer shows the emotional wounding and rejection that she felt deeply growing up without a father at home, and possibly made her emotionally needy in her youth. It also tends to make one feel like an alien in one’s own family, and to create a new family based on one’s personal connection to others rather than a blood relationship.

A Mars in Aries is extremely high energy, extremely independent, refuses demands put on her by others, and can be abrasive if not raised to practice normal social etiquette. A Moon in Aries is also very independent, to the point where the native might prefer living alone rather than risk stating one’s needs and try to work out one’s differences. This Moon also is not very comfortable expressing emotion unless in control of the situation -- a dynamic that fits perfectly with expressing only as much emotion as is called for in a script, in a film where she gets no rude surprises from others’ emotional outbursts. Her Jupiter (ruler of actors) in Aries in the tenth house of career expresses perfectly her great luck as an actress, especially considering that Sagittarius, ruled by Jupiter, is her fifth house of creativity and rules the stage, acting -- and children.

One factor that jumps out at me is that her Moon is her ruling sign, due to her Cancer ascendant, it is not only placed near the Midheaven, but it is at a critical degree -- 13 degrees of Aries, a cardinal sign. [I will have to write an article on critical degrees sometime soon to explain more about this, but the critical degrees are: zero, 13 and 26 of the Cardinal signs (Aries Cancer Libra and Capricorn), 8-9 and 21-22 degrees of the Fixed signs (Taurus Leo Scorpio Aquarius) and 4 and 17 degrees of the Mutable signs (Gemini, Virgo Sagittarius Pisces)]

This puts an great emphasis on the things ruled by that planet in her life and career. Her acting career utilizes her feelings and memories, and what is unusual in a female sex symbol is that many of her roles have been action oriented, befitting an Aries placement.

Look at some details of her teen years, look at some of the roles in her career, that seem tailored to express a Moon-Mars in Aries square the Saturn in Cancer -- at 14 she wore black, adored the gothic look, and considered a career as funeral director; a criminal’s moll in ‘Playing God’, a dying drug addict in ‘Gia’, a police officer coping with her father’s suicide in ‘The Bone Collector’, a sociopath free-spirited friend in ‘Girl, Interrupted’, another criminal’s moll in ‘Gone in 60 Seconds’, the action hero of ‘Lara Croft’, a mail-order bride in the thriller ‘Original Sin’, a dying TV reporter in ‘Life or Something Like It’, another thriller role in ‘Taking Lives’, an adventure role in the sci-fi film ‘Sky Captain’, an ACTION-comedy film ‘Mr & Mrs Smith’ where she plays a hit-woman, a CIA wife in ‘The Good Shepherd’, the wife of a kidnapped and murdered reporter in ‘Mighty Heart’. I mean, these are not your typical frothy sex symbol roles.

Is it any wonder that she at one time had a tattoo of the Chinese character for death? In keeping with her transformation into a mother figure, having adopted children from every continent and about to give birth to twins, she has had that tattoo removed. As an archetype, she has gone from being a 'Tomb Raider' to being 'The Cradle of Life'.

As her progressed Sun moved thru her chart, it eventually entered the sign of her Ascendant, Cancer. When it hit 6 degrees Cancer, it triggered a square to her natal Pluto at 6 degrees Libra. Pluto is concerned with death, it’s true, but it is also part of the intergenerational legacy bequeathed by one generation to the next, whether it is property or DNA. Pluto is evolution and survival of the species. Pluto in Libra in particular is convinced that it can transform the world and bring about greater cooperation between nations. She is building her own little United Nations in her growing brood, with children representing every continent. Her personal progression to Pluto must have spawned the desire to leave a personal legacy that meant something to her. Not only does she work as a U.N. ambassador, but she also leaves her DNA encoded in her daughter Shiloh and the twins expected any day now.

Pluto was further activated by her filming of the first Lara Croft film in Cambodia; ‘Lara Croft: Tomb Raider’ was released in 2001 -- in August of that year, Maddox (the child she would later adopt in March of 2002) was born and she was also named a U.N. Ambassador. She willingly ditched hubby Billy Bob Thornton, whom she had married May 5, 2000, when he preferred a life unencumbered with babies. In 2005, she both released a big hit co-starring Brad Pitt with ‘Mr & Mrs Smith’ and adopted Zahara. She and Brad have obviously been an item ever since, and gave birth to their biological child Shiloh, another Gemini, born in Namibia on May 27, 2006. Her brood grew again when she adopted Pax from Vietnam in 2007.

What is it about all these foreign babies that struck the motherhood chord in her heart? Her Moon is in the ninth house of long trips and world affairs. And Aries’ ruler Mars is there, too. Her fifth house of children is Sagittarius, the ruler of that ninth house; Sag’s ruler Jupiter is at the top of the chart in the tenth, suggesting that children are her second career.

Let’s back up a bit and look at her marriages. Not everyone knows that Jolie first married on March 28, 1996 to J Lee (Lonny) Miller in Los Angeles. What stands out about that chart? It has a lot of Aries energy with Mars, the Sun, and Mercury there. They trine Pluto in Sagittarius, and sextile Uranus in Aquarius. They also trine her North Node and Neptune in Sagittarius. Venus trines Neptune in earth signs, but this does not resonate with Jolie’s chart as her chart is a bit unusual in that it HAS NO EARTH PLACEMENTS. The wedding’s Moon is in Cancer, which ought to have helped her feel nurtured and nurturing, but they divorced three years later. The Moon was applying to a trine to Saturn in Pisces, as well as an opposition to Neptune; progressions to an event Saturn can predict the end of the situation, so it did not take long for the Moon to progress to an exact aspect and end it.

Next up, the aforementioned celebrity wedding to Billy Bob Thornton on May 5, 2000 in Los Angeles. This one is interesting because of some Pluto-Neptune aspects. Her natal Sun was opposite event Pluto as well as natal Neptune; the event Pluto trined her Aries stellium, and event Neptune trined her natal Pluto. She may have had some kind of Gothic romantic idea about theirs being a fated love, involving a romantic notion (Neptune) of transformational alchemy (Pluto).

At any rate, the wedding had a stellium in Taurus, with Venus, Mercury, Sun, Jupiter and Saturn in the sign of the bull. All that fixity was just not Angelina’s thing. Having no earth placements in her own natal chart, I don’t see how she could adapt to living in just one place and putting down any roots. And with the Sun applying to a conjunction to Saturn, it could not have lasted more than four years and in fact it began to splinter under these heavy-duty energies very quickly. They were divorced in May of 2003.

What’s in the stars for Angelina Jolie this year? The New Moon in Gemini the day before her birthday puts a lot of energy into the Gemini energies of her chart. This Moon is also sextile Mars in Leo, which in turn is trining her natal Aries planets. I see a happy and healthy addition to her family; she is reportedly carrying twins which is befitting a Gemini New Moon. One twin should be a boon companion to the little Leo member of the brood, Maddox, and also to the Arian, Pax. These twins will I predict grow up to be more like friends to Angelina than children.
The New Moon Saturn in Virgo will square Angelina’s Nodes, so the babies may be more of a burden or may require closer attention than the other kids for awhile. Angelina’s progressed Mars entered Taurus a couple years ago, which is probably also a factor in making her more nurturing and stable, and that Mars is trining transiting Saturn in Virgo. This enhances her discipline and ability to work hard and attend to detail this year. It also gives her a tie between her natal chart and some earth planets, so I look to hear something about her and Brad establishing a main home base or tying the knot.

The lunation Neptune is trining her progressed Mercury (and possible Moon), making her feel that her ideals and daydreams are being realized at last. It also enhances her ability to empathize and understand others, and aids in any form of communication. The lunation Jupiter is squaring the progressed Jupiter, so I expect her year will be pretty hectic and she will spread herself too thin with too many commitments.

Happy birthday, Angelina Jolie, and Best Wishes for a great solar return!

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