By Elias Savada.
Playing like a broad comedy, Cruella offers a stereotypical look at many of the characters who parade in and out during the film’s extensive running time.”
Two well-coiffed cats are let out of their retro style, high fashion bags in a new live-action origin spectacle from Disney, and the spirited yet harried Emmas (Stone and Thompson) duke it out for top dog honors in this over-extended update based on Dodie Smith’s 1956 children’s book The One Hundred and One Dalmatians. It may be a pretty sight (277 costumes! 130 dressed sets!) for folks aching to get back into their local multiplex (or pay $29.99 on top of a Disney+ subscription — you can also wait until August 27th, when it will be available on the streaming service at no additional cost), but the experience might feel just as petty as it is pretty.
During this convoluted, overwrought tête-à-tête of a film, two high-energy villains don exquisite gowns, wear outlandish makeup and hair selections, and create wildly vogueish-in-their-own-mind accoutrements, as a mentor and her protégé take turns grabbing for the queen bitch prize. The winners actually will be the presumed sequel Cruella 2 and costume designer Jenny Beavan, a shoo-in for year-end awards consideration.
While the plot for Cruella isn’t a total wardrobe malfunction, it does seem like major alterations should have and could have been made to the film’s hefty 2¼-hour bulk. If you’re thinking of making this a family outing — especially for those of you who are parents with pre-teens (and who might think this is another Disney family pleaser) — note that the film is rated PG-13 (some material may be inappropriate for children under 13). It’s way darker and more diabolical than the G-rated animated classic 101 Dalmatians (1961) and the 1996 live-action remake with Glenn Close, although the latter had a few lightly disturbing scenes.
Observing the power dynamics of the fashion industry is nothing new to the movie world, and 2006’s The Devil Wears Prada‘s immediately popped into my head here. Cruella ups the stakes, as if the writers were watching Joker and Maleficent while brainstorming the script. At the top of the fashion chain is high maintenance and thoroughly ruthless Baroness Von Hellman (Thompson) forever berating her entire staff. Fine by me, as there are quite a few stuffed shirts on her payroll, although her valet (Mark Strong) seems more level-headed, even if he appearance is somewhat menacing. Into the Baroness’s lion den will walk Estella (Stone), first to be eaten alive before morphing into a rebellious, wild cub named Cruella.
In advance of the adult portion of the film — Dana Fox and Tony McNamara penned the screenplay from a story by Aline Brosh McKenna and Kelly Marcel & Steve Zizzis — it begins with 1964 preamble narrated by Stone, where the 12-year-old Estella (Tipper Seifert-Cleveland), a headstrong child proudly wearing her unique half jet-black, half snow-white hair as a badge of defiant honor, is cast adrift in London after the death of her mother-by-proxy (Emily Beecham). There she quickly aligns with sympathetic petty thieves Horace and Jasper, and 15 minutes in, all are ten years older and wiser. Well, older at least. Thick as thieves, they pick pockets and steal, all in seemingly good fun, with Paul Walter Hauser and Joel Fry picking up the comedy slack as the rest of this friendly triumvirate.
When the men finagle Estella a truly introductory level position at the acclaimed Liberty of London – House of Baroness, the young woman assumes her rise in the design world is assured, but the next half hour is just one stumble after another at the hand of one nasty taskmistress. There also a heist sub-plot in here that is played strictly for yukes.
Director Craig Gillespie seems to be repurposing moments from I, Tonya, his 2017 comedy-drama featuring Margot Robbie as the overly competitive ice skater Tonya Harding. At least his new film is quite a methodical approach to its theme. Cinematographer Nicholas Karakatsanis does a lovely job of capturing the well-designed film, his camera ever moving, with some sequences flowing with swooping tracking shots (particularly when Estella enters her new place of employment for the first time). And the music supervisor had fun picking dozens of memorable 1970s tunes for the jukebox soundtrack. So, at least, you can hum along.
Playing like a broad comedy, Cruella offers a stereotypical look at many of the characters who parade in and out during the film’s extensive running time. The reimagined, color-blind, LBGTQ-friendly tale offers a schizophrenic approach to Cruella’s inspired antics at fulfilling her designer dreams, but the comic book attitude just wants you to admire the scenery and laugh at the slapstick. I can do without the escalating histrionics, but Disney apparently sees it as a dark and edgy plunge in a different direction. Can an R-rated sequel be next?
Elias Savada is a movie copyright researcher, critic, craft beer geek, and avid genealogist based in Bethesda, Maryland. He helps program the Spooky Movie International Movie Film Festival, and previously reviewed for Film Threat and Nitrate Online. He is an executive producer of the horror film German Angst and the documentary Nuts! He co-authored, with David J. Skal, Dark Carnival: the Secret World of Tod Browning (a revised edition will be published by Centipede Press).
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