Cruella

Leave it to director Craig Gillespie, the man responsible for humanizing controversial former figure skater Tonya Harding in I, Tonya, to now attempt to humanize the cartoon dog-napping villain, Cruella de Vil.  Wisely, he knows just what to do to accomplish this task, by making his antiheroine plenty wicked, but maybe just making her a bit more sympathetic than before, though not to the extremes that Angelina Jolie went with Maleficent.  Cruella is probably the darkest film Disney has ever done, and is quite a lot of fun, especially when stars Emma Stone and Emma Thompson are going at each other's throats as dueling divas.  It just never gets around to answering the key question I'm sure everyone is asking - Why does Cruella need an origin story in the first place?

This makes the movie more of a fun diversion than a substantial blockbuster, but after the past year, a fun diversion might be just the ticket some people need.  That's not to say the movie isn't engaging, as it certainly is.  In the title role, Emma Stone wisely downplays the over the top cartoonish antics of the character that Glenn Close embraced in her two attempts at the role in the live action 101 Dalmatians movie, and its sequel.  Instead, she embraces the cunning and scheming of the character, as well as the venomous insults.  With her every step of the way is Thompson as a fashion figure who starts out as kind of an ice-cold mentor, becomes a competitor, and ultimately becomes a target of mad vengeance and determined malice.  This movie doesn't so much make us like Cruella as a person, but rather get caught up in her transformation from a bullied private school student, to an orphan, to a lowly pickpocket, to a dress designer, and ultimately into the flamboyant and evil fashion figure that she would ultimately become.

Of course, a good chunk of the film is devoted to her humble beginnings.  Born with her trademark two-toned hair, Cruella (named Estella at this point in the story, and played as a child by Tipper Seifert-Cleveland) was shunned by many, and learned early on that she would have to fight back in order to get ahead, despite her mother's constant pleas for her to behave.  After she gets kicked out of school for causing trouble one too many times, her mother (Emily Beecham) decides that the two should head to London for a fresh start.  On the way to their new life, mom decides to stop by a party being held by an old friend to ask a favor.  It's at this party that young Estella witnesses her mom die in a rather freak accident. (Did I mention this movie is very dark, and fully embraces its PG-13 rating?) Now an orphan, she runs to London on her own, where she happens to have a chance encounter with a pair of young pickpockets named Jasper (Joel Fry) and Horace (Paul Walter Hauser), who will become her family and eventual partners in crime.

It's these opening moments that let us know what Gillespie is going for with his film, and that there will be a definite edge to the events to come.  The film's 1970s London setting, accompanied by hit songs from the era, only add to the tone that the film is going for.  We watch Estella learn how to take care of herself on the streets, and become a thief who knows all the angles.  But, her heart has always been with fashion design, and due to a series of lucky accidents, she ends up in what she thinks is her dream job, working directly under the Baroness (Emma Thompson), the leading fashion figure in London.  Like all dreams, however, there is a very dark undercurrent that rears its ugly head, and before long, Estella is forced to fully embrace her "Cruella" persona in order to go head-to-head with the Baroness in an attempt to dethrone her from the top of the fashion world, or possibly destroy her, whichever may happen first.

There are many who will deem Cruella unnecessary, and likely too long at 135 minutes, and they are certainly right.  But the movie finds such a perfect tone of comedic darkness and wickedness that I found myself having a great time while I was watching it.  Sure, it starts to fade from your mind almost the second the end credits come up, but while it was playing out and I was watching Stone and Thompson up on the screen trying to out-camp and out-vamp one another, there's no denying that it was working for me.  The gritty urban vibe of 1970s London works well here, the costume and set design are impeccable and certain to be up for some Awards next year, and the movie has more than enough energy so that I didn't really mind its extended running time as much as I thought I would.  

I also appreciated how the movie does not try to slavishly connect itself to the earlier tellings of the 101 Dalmatians story.  Yes, there are obvious nods, with a few of the characters from the story popping up, though in different roles than we are familiar with.  The movie even manages to work some dalmatians in, though probably not the cute and child-friendly way that you are expecting.  As a stand alone movie, it works as the story of a woman who goes a bit mad, gets a hold of some power, and tries to destroy her enemies.  We know in the back of our minds what eventually will happen to the character, but at this point in the story, she's getting her first taste of glory, and learning to like it.  The movie's strongest asset is Stone's performance, who embraces all sides of the title character, and excels at them all.

In the end, I think Gillespie and his team of writers found the perfect angle in which to make the character someone we want to follow in a two hour-plus film, while at the same time sacrificing little.  Cruella is far from perfect, but it's honestly much more fun that I was expecting walking in, and surprised me greatly with its delightful mean streak. 

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