Cruella

Craig Gillespie is a very skilled director and Cruella confirms it. The ridiculously overblown running time was a bit jarring at first, but this Disney original paces unexpectedly well. Emma Stone is very likeable most of the time, to the point where you wonder if she's actually supposed to be the villain, but the moments where she turns into a sociopath out for (justified) revenge work so well because of it. Emma Thompson enjoys playing the top-notch bitch, too, and Gillespie pours one visual idea after another from his sleeve, plucking a bit from Joker here and Burton there, and his stylish 1970s London is damn good to look at. Like the whole film, in fact. I was quite sorry that they obviously had to rein themselves in a bit at times. Overall though, it's a damn entertaining and audiovisually polished spectacle that works as a drama, a comedy, a family film and a heist. I don't know if I'd sign off on the claim that of all the live-action throwbacks to Disney classics, Cruella is the best, but it's certainly the most distinctive and daring. (09.06.2021)

Along with the evil queens from Snow White and Alice in Wonderland, Cruella is one of the top villainous female characters from the Disney Kingdom, along with Maleficent and Ursula. Moreover, she is one of the cherished ones whose films were made during Disney's lifetime. As far as feature remakes go, only Maleficent has had her own films so far, and there have been two updated Alice in Wonderland films, with a new Snow White and The Little Mermaid in the pipeline. Few would have guessed, therefore, that a standalone Cruella would be much more reminiscent of I, Tonya in terms of style (including Paul Walter Hauser) than anything else. Craig Gillespie was a great choice and signed off on a prequel to 101 Dalmatians that would even get Dodie Smith out of his chair. The result is an experience I will definitely not deny myself for future reruns. It’s also the first movie where I don't mind Emma Stone after all the flat and uninteresting futile girl characters. (10.04.2022)

Cruella is a Disney villain origin film that is surprisingly stylish. Genre-wise, it's completely different than what I normally watch and seek out, but it has to be said that considering it’s 140 minutes long and has no action or violence, I had an above-average time. Cruella has her own flair, a nice London setting, an impressive Emma Stone, who steals the whole show for herself, her entrances to the stage are always both epic and engaging, and the cool retro music playing all the time is a delight. Emma Thompson is also brilliant, playing the Baroness to a great standard, she commands respect and plays the bitch decently. The clashes between the two main characters are the strongest of the whole film. I also liked the dogs, the occasional humorous interludes. There are fine twists (though some are predictable), and it works as a heist genre film with a revenge theme all in one. The fashion element is also a big plus, with some of the dresses taking your breath away. Fashion oriented women will probably marvel here. A nice nice and entertaining film. 7.5/10. (28.05.2021)

As Disney's version of Joker, Cruella forges its own path (unlike Disney's previous live-action remakes) telling the origin story of the de-mon-ic lover of black-and-white polka dots in a slyly, almost mischievously funny way. I liked how they managed to incorporate various motifs that would later appear in the Dalmatian sequel (I loved Roger and Anita). From an audiovisual point of view, it is a spectacular piece with a decent soundtrack and a plethora of gorgeous costumes, though at times the overly artificial visual effects (the dogs) spoiled the impression a bit. Emma Stone is likeable, Joel Fry and Paul Walter Hauser are funny second fiddles, and the whole thing was superbly capped by the coolly elegant Emma Thompson. The plot twists are all predictable, but what the hell, I had fun in the cinema and thoroughly enjoyed the black and white quest for revenge. (12.06.2021)

It's a lot better than I expected. It's more of a glamour movie than a Disney movie, the costumes are fantastic, Emma Stone is my kryptonite, and it's decently paced until a good two thirds in. But then there's everything else. Cruella doesn't have many reasons to justify not being an animated film. The actors act like a cartoon and the internal logic of the film is like a cartoon: everyone has infinite energy, they don't sleep, they do things overnight and unnoticed that normally take teams of people weeks and months to work on, the protagonists have a blank check for everything, there's no causality, and nothing happens in the world unless it's in a given scene. The environments are CGI for the most part anyway, and the camera flies around in them regardless of physical obstacles. And my eye truly ached whenever it beheld digital dogs. What puzzled me most, though, was why the film was practically about the fight against Cruella, who was supposed to be the main character. Here Emma Stone plays the usual slightly dodgy juvenile girl with a tragic past while Emma Thompson, her nemesis, is the one with all the makings of the classic Cruella. After all, the character has always been a model of the cynical establishment, while here, WTF, they make her a parlor anarchist standing in some kind of resistance to the system. So why does Disney entice us to see a movie with a classic baddie in the lead role when they leave nothing but the barest of the character and instead serve up the most hackneyed, annoying story with a family twist without a microscopic shred of moral ambivalence? Rhetorical question. I know, because Disney. Disney, who can buy the rights to any song, from the Rolling Stones to Nina Simone to the Stooges, and then pepper them one by one without taste or balance into a monstrous 100-200M original intended for a tween audience from the wealthy American suburbs. Well gee, I’ve gotten all worked up again. (08.09.2021)