Cruella (2021) Review

Cruella (2021) Review

Cruella finally was available for free on Disney+. This is a movie that tells the origin story of 101 Dalmatians antagonist, Cruella de Vil. It stars Emma Stone and Emma Thompson, how is this movie? Let’s get started! 

The Good: 

For me I thought the best part about this movie was the cast, everybody in here is great. There isn’t that weak link that holds the movie done. Everybody fits the roles that they are meant to be. Two of the stand-outs are Emma Stone and Emme Thompson, of course both of them are world class actresses. And both of them steal the movie, and when they are in scenes together it was great and some of the best scenes of the movie. Emma Stone nails playing Cruella so well, you can buy her as the broken fashion designer, but as she turns into Cruella as the movie goes along, you buy her as that. Emma Thompson is great as The Baroness of the movie, as this woman who is despicable, and you hate her so much. And that’s because Emma Thompson is a great actress. Joel Fry and Paul Walter Hauser are some other stand-outs of the movie, they are fun and add a side to the Cruella character; this is a nice touch. 

This is also a super unique movie, and that’s for two reasons. First reason, this is maybe the most stylized movie of the year so far. Where certain scenes are done with so much directorial flare and they just stick in your head as being greatly directed scenes. Where most of the Disney live action remakes are just shot for shot remakes of the original animated movie, The Lion King from 2019 being a great example. This movie is the complete opposite, this movie takes the source material of 101 Dalmatians and tells the origin story of the villain of those movies. But it does so with so much energy and style. Also, the way that the costume, make-up, and production design look is great, on that level it’s one of the best of the year. And the second reason is what I just mentioned: it takes the source material of 101 Dalmatians, and does something so different with it. And it tells a familiar but unique story. The director and producers made a unique Disney live action remake. 

Another thing that surprised me about this movie is that it has a number of great twists and turns in the film’s story. And once again, that adds to the unique story that is being told. As you move into the third act of the movie, there is this big twist involving one of the characters that I didn’t see coming. But it didn’t feel out of nowhere or out of place, it made sense in the type of story that was being told. And it changed my perspective on what happened earlier in the movie. But even in the final 10-15 minutes of the movie, it throws some nice twists and turns that worked for me. 

It’s a movie that has a nice sense of humor to it, it’s not an all out comedy but there are a number of solid jokes that made me laugh. Most of the jokes come from Paul Walter Hauser and Joel Fry who just have great chemistry with one another, and their relationship is what brings out some of the humor. 

Finally, I think the soundtrack for the movie is pretty great. The movie takes place in the 1970s, and it just plays a number of great songs from the 70s. Those aren’t deep cuts, but they aren’t also the obvious stuff that are in popular movies. It’s that middle ground of great songs. 

The Bad: 

While I had a number of praises about the movie, there are also a number of issues with this movie. The big thing here is the central idea and character arc of the movie. Where they want to have this character that you are rooting for, you want her to see her take out Emma Thompson’s character in the third act of the movie. But the keyword there WANTS you to, it WANTS you to sympathies with this character. But she’s a character that does so many terrible things, that it’s near impossible to root for this character, or want her to succeed. And the big comparison of this movie was Joker, and it’s a fair comparison, but the reason why that movie worked so well. Is it portrayed as a tragedy and a character in a tragedy, this is telling a similar story but portrayed as an underdog story. Tied to that, Joel Fry’s character is the voice of reason of the movie. He's trying to help Cruella and make her a better person, but she’s just going down this dark path, ignoring her friends and that doesn’t make her likable. 

It’s a movie that I found to drag in the middle of the movie, it gets very repetitive in the second act. Where it’s a bunch of fashion shows and fashion heists, one or two of them would have been great. But it does like 4-5 times in a row, so the middle of this movie dragged for me. And this movie is 2 hours and 16 minutes long, if the removed minutes from the middle act, the movie could have been closer or under 2 hours long. 

And tied to that, I don’t get why this movie was as long as it was. Emma Stone doesn’t show up in the movie until about the 20 minute mark. Because the first 20 minutes is telling the origin story and childhood of Cruella, and it could have been shortened up by 5-10 minutes. And I think this movie was just a few changes away from being a quicker moving story.

This last part is a bit SPOILERY, so if that bothers you. Skip this final part. But the big twist that happens in this movie feels just like a twist in Joker. Involving The Baroness character, it surprised me but it also felt way too familiar to what happened with the Arthur character in Joker. 

General Thoughts: Honestly...this is the most frustrating movie of 2021 so far. It’s a movie with a bunch of style and energy to it, the cast is great. But I think the central character arc and the middle act really hold this movie down. This is a movie that I’m glad I watched, but I don’t see myself re-watching this movie anytime soon. And also, this is not a kids movie, it's a dark movie that isn’t for kids. Even if this was a kids movie, it’s pretty slow. It’s not a lot of action sequences or a bunch of jokes, in my opinion it’s targeting a 13+ age for this movie. 

The Score: 8.3/10 (B)