Movie Reaction: Cruella

Formula: (The Devil Wears Prada + Ocean's Eight) ^ 101 Dalmatians

 

Do we need a movie based on Cruella de Vil? No. But that's a stupid critique disguised as a question. We don't need a movie about a time-travelling ginger. We don't need a movie about pirates based on a Disney ride. We don't need a modern retelling of Emma. We don't need most movies, and the stories you'd argue that we do need are often more preachy as movies than worthwhile. The truth is, all studios are creatively bankrupt and have been for years. As long as there have been movies, there have been people complaining about how they don't make good ones anymore ("Remember when movies Were just people leaving a factory at the end of a work day? Now that was cinema!"). The better question that people should be asking is "Have they made a Cruella de Vil movie that is worthwhile?" My answer to that is mixed but leaning toward the negative.

 

I'll assume you know the 101 Dalmatians story. Roger and Anita fall in love and their dalmatians have a bunch of puppies. Anita's old friend Cruella steals the puppies to make a coat out of. Those are the only bounds for a Cruella de Vil origin story, other than you can't kill those characters. This Cruella origin story decides that Cruella, birthname Estella, is an iconoclast child turned orphan thief turned fashion designer. She begins a rivalry with her fashion mentor that takes on some high stakes. 101 Dalmatians isn't a mythology-heavy franchise the way that a Sleeping Beauty is, but Cruella decides to add a lot of complexities anyway. There are a lot of twists in this movie. Few are worth the effort. Most distract from the simpler things that the movie does tremendously.

 

Like the cast. I love this cast. Emma Stone has always had a little madness to her. I like when she goes big, and Cruella is a great role for that. Her fashion rival is played by Emma Thompson, who plays this like she's been stewing over not getting Meryl's role in The Devil Wears Prada for the last 15 years. These two are over the top and wonderful. Cruella's two henchmen Jasper and Horace get increased roles as well, player by Joel Fry and Paul Walter Hauser respectively. I was surprised how much I came out of this liking them. Fry gives the movie a needed emotional core and Hauser is a scene-stealer. I'm slowly coming around to the idea that Hauser is a treasure that must be protected at all costs. I would've loved a movie that was more about Cruella and Thompson's Baroness matching wits. The movie keeps adding to the story and raising the stakes though, like it doesn't realize it has two Oscar winners ready to chew scenery like masters.

 

One thing the convoluted story can't get in the way of is the costume design and makeup & hairstyling. If this doesn't get nominations for those a year from now, what are we even doing? The looks in this movie are loud, clever, and fun. It basically took all the fairy-tale magic from these other Disney live-action adaptations and applied it to the costuming. It's all unreal and fantastical in the best way. This is a great movie to look at.

 

I'd almost recommend watching this with the sound of, because the music is very aggressive. There are a lot needle drops and they are all very on the nose. Some of the song choices are even pretty good. There are just so many though that there was a diminish return effect on them. Then it held back the one song I was waiting for the whole time. There's the famous Cruella de Vil song that they could've worked into a more substantial musical score. It's finally featured in a credits stinger, but that scene isn't worth sitting on the song the whole time. What's up with these movies lately saving the famous song for the credits? Mortal Kombat did the same thing. Am I the only one who thinks it would've been more effective to have a score that slowly developed into the Cruella de Vil song over time, as she crossed closer to the dark side?

 

I wish Disney realized they didn't need to eventize all these live-action remakes. Remember how Christopher Robin and Pete's Dragon got to be these quiet little movies? Why couldn't Cruella just be a simple fashion feud movie? They get all of that stuff right and got the right people for it. I'm not even against the idea of trying to turn this into a franchise. I'd love to see Emma Stone return to the role. Get Glen Close in the sequel too for all I care. The problem with Cruella isn't that we didn't need this movie. It's that we didn't need this movie to be so complex.

 

Verdict: Weakly Recommend