"Cruella" Gives You A Villain You Can't Help But Root For
Starring Emma Stone, Emma Thompson, Joel Fry, Paul Walter Hauser, John McCrea, Emily Beecham, Mark Strong and Kirby Howell-Baptiste
Rated PG-13
Comedy, Drama
Run time: 2 hrs, 14 min
Directed by Craig Gillespie
In theaters and on Disney+ with premium access May 28
Here is something I never thought I’d say: I was enthralled by an origin story about a woman who at one point in time has a singular goal to kidnap and skin puppies for fashion. Maybe it is a cast containing multiple powerhouse Emmas. Maybe it’s some of the most incredible costuming I’ve seen in any film throughout the last few years. Maybe it’s a story so rich that I did not realize more than two hours had passed by the time the credits rolled. This movie isn’t perfect, but for my first blockbuster-adjacent movie I got to see in a theater, it was one of the best I could have hoped for.
Disney is continuing on its journey to give every one of their villains an origin story, whether we want it or not. (Thanks, Maleficent.) At first thought, who on earth would want to see the humanity behind one of the most appalling animated antagonists? I definitely didn’t. But Emma Stone manages to bring the story of Estella-turned-Cruella to life in a manner that blew me away. Unsurprisingly, this girl wasn’t always evil - though perhaps she was a bit mad. After a Disney-patented parental tragedy, she falls into a world of thievery and shenanigans and is shown the way by fellow shady imps Horace and Jasper (Joel Fry and Paul Walter Hauser). She survives, has a dream of becoming a fashion designer and fails upward into working for her idol (Emma Thompson), but naturally, things aren’t all sunshine and daisies.
101 Dalmatians kind of started the whole animated-turned-live-action trend before it was cool, but it was also one I never expected to actually enjoy another iteration of. Like most other dog-loving millennials, the second you were old enough to take a step back and realize just how horrifying the plot - and its villain - is, it isn’t one you often revisit. I’m so happy my skepticism was proven wrong. This movie was one of the most stylish and energetic films that I’ve gotten to enjoy in quite some time. The weakest link in this cast is a tie between Stone’s imperfect British accent and the dogs that seem to shift between real and CGI at the most unsettling times that borders on the canine version of uncanny valley. Thankfully, for a movie about a future-dog-obsessed lead, it doesn’t happen as often as you’d think, and is balanced out by every human member of Cruella’s crew being surprisingly endearing in their own way.
The only true complaint I have about this film is that at its endpoint, it truly does not line up with the events that happened in De Vil’s original appearance in movies. Her darkest characteristics don’t quite make sense in how we know they will manifest in the future. Howell-Baptiste plays an adorable Anita Darling, but her occupation change and change of status from the original movie’s role of being Cruella’s younger fashion design protege to being a peer and a photographer weirdly threw me. Besides these few mismatches when it comes to continuity within the Dalmatian Cinematic Universe, this movie is a total joy to watch. All the reviews and posts calling it Disney’s Joker is clearly missing the point: Cruella is obviously more of a Harley Quinn.