Why Angelina called off the wedding

When he responded to the pre-Oscars question of whether or not he and Angelina Jolie would ever actually tie the knot by saying, "We'd actually like to", Brad Pitt knew he was taking a risk on publicly forcing Ange's hand on the marriage conundrum that has plagued their relationship of late. Adding that he "didn't think they would be able to hold out" on not marrying, the Moneyball actor called "ludicrous" the idea that he couldn't marry due to his previous statements about only marrying when all couples were legally allowed to. But Brad's gamble backfired, after a furious Angelina put a halt to all his wedding plans - which had included starting renovations on the couple's Italian chateau - claiming that he'd backed her into a corner, and that she didn't appreciate him involving the world in their private business. All plans are off Even though Angelina had gone as far as to pick her wedding dress designer (with style sources whispering that she'd opted for Armani), the actress, 36, had no qualms about calling off the wedding - even though the couple's six kids were looking forward to the big day. "She wanted to take back control," spilled an insider. "She was furious that Brad started to speak publicly about something they had discussed in private between themselves. She thought he was trying to drum up interest in his Oscar campaign and didn't appreciate her private life being used in this way." Adding, "Even though it crushed the kids, she put the brakes on the wedding straight away." What the Jolie-Pitt kids had planned Although Angelina had joked in the past of her six children's attitude to marriage, "The kids asked me the other day and I asked them if it was just because they wanted to have a big cake", insiders say the older children, Maddox, 10, Pax, eight, Zahara, seven and Shiloh, five, were excited about joining in their parents' big day - with mini-fashionista Zahara already pointing out the dresses she liked. Maddox would get all proprietary and say he was going to give Angelina away - it was so cute," spilled a source. "And Zahara, who loves getting dressed up in girly outfits, was always finding pictures of pretty dresses she thought Angelina would wear." And the kids has also divvied up duties, including who'd be the ring-bearer, between them, with Shiloh insisting she'd walk down the aisle with Jacques, the family bulldog. "When the kids went to Brad and Ange with their list of what they would do on the big day, they thought it was adorable - and it added fuel to how fast they would move on tying the knot and making the kids happy." Very different wedding ideas But the couple had also struggled to reconcile their different ideas of what a wedding should be, with Brad looking to replicate the fun he had at his first wedding to Jennifer Aniston, and Ange looking for a more spiritual, rather than legal commitment, ceremony; and the pair couldn't even agree on a guest list. "She wanted a tiny wedding," said a mole. "Immediate family and very, very close friends. Brad thinks a wedding is about having a giant blow-out party, and he'd already mentally put together a list that read like a who's who of Hollywood, including Matt Damon, George Clooney and Jerry Weintraub." But Angelina was said to prefer to marry abroad to avoid a media circus, with insiders saying she had her heart set on Thailand. "Clearly, she's more interested in having control than she is in making her family truly happy," an insider sniped to In Touch. Adding, "She refused to let him pick out her ring or to have a wedding cake." Haunted by his previous wedding Whereas Angelina's previous two weddings were unconventional to say the least, with the actress famously writing her husband's name in blood on her white shirt when she married Scottish actor Jonny Lee Miller back in 1996; then opting for a quickie Vegas wedding to Billy Bob Thornton in 2000, for which they both wore jeans; Brad's was a fairytale day, that was highly run-of-the-mill by Hollywood standards. "Brad had the string quartet, fireworks display, impressive cake and sit-down meal, the whole shebang," said an insider of his Dh3.6 million wedding to Jennifer Aniston back in 2000. "Angelina thought the whole thing just too hokey for words." With another adding, "Brad's first wedding was her idea of hell, so she'd go out of her way to brush aside any suggestion of ‘tradition'." Adding, "She feels she wouldn't know herself if she looked in the mirror and saw a huge white dress and a veil."