Resolved: Trained dogs are cute, and puppies scampering about are even cuter. If you would take the con position in an Oxford-style debate on this point, then the live-action remake of Disney's 101 DALMATIANS is not going to be your cup of kibble. 101 DALMATIANS was made not simply with an awareness of the usefulness of cute animals in the making of a family film; it seems to have been constructed around that awareness. There is such a crass calculation to the use of its canine stars as bringers of innocent grins that the dogs don't even counteract the brain-damaging slapstick which is John Hughes's stock-in-trade. Somehow, they make it worse. Delivered for the holiday season in a big glossy bow, 101 DALMATIANS is a spectacularly packaged box of foul-smelling air.
The story begins with two dalmatians and their owners living blissfully unaware of each other in London. Roger Dearly (Jeff Daniels), an American software designer who has made a pilgrimage to that noted video game mecca of London, shares a flat with his male dalmatian Pongo; fashion designer Anita Campbell-Green (Joely Richardson) has a female named Perdy. When Pongo and Perdy fall in puppy love, their humans are brought together, and soon both pairs form couples. The result of the dalmatian infatuation is a litter of puppies, which comes as wonderful news to Anita's fur-obsessed boss Cruella DeVil (Glenn Close), who intends to turn dalmatian fur into a beautiful coat. Cruella sets her henchmen Jasper (Hugh Laurie) and Horace (Mark Williams) to the task of dog-napping Pongo and Perdy's fifteen puppies, and those fifteen join another 84 puppies already captured. It is up to a slew of resourceful animals to reunite puppies with parents and thwart Cruella's dastardly plans.
The 1961 animated version of 101 DALMATIANS was far from the best of Disney's self-proclaimed "masterpieces," but it had a low-key charm even in the bumblings of Horace and Jasper. Now the material has been entrusted to writer-producer John Hughes, whose basic film-making philosophy is "If more is better, and even more is even better, then please-make-it-stop too much is just right." Roger and Anita's initial meeting is punctuated not by one careening chase sequence and bicycle wreck into a pond, but two; Horace and Jasper don't just fall through rotted floors and into freezing water, but also electrocute their gonads on a high-voltage fence. Even the magnificent, maleficent Cruella is not safe from the onslaught of indignities, falling first into a vat of molasses and then into a pile of manure. It is a sign of Hughes's love affair with "America's Funniest Home Videos" humor that he replaces the original's most memorable suspense sequence -- the puppies' attempt to slip past Cruella disguised as black labradors -- and replaces it with a scene in a barn which ends with a pig landing on Cruella's chest.
Glenn Close has obvious fun as Cruella, playing her as an imperious drag queen, but I'm mystified by raves for her performance. There is no doubt that Close can be scary -- she scared a generation of married men into zipping up their pants in FATAL ATTRACTION -- but there is no malevolence in her characterization of Cruella. Disney's great villains were real threats, and they didn't take pratfalls; Cruella has Horace and Jasper so that _they_ can be the comic relief while she spooks the little ones. John Hughes and hack-for-hire Stephen Herek aren't comfortable with genuine villainy, so they have Cruella join her goons as dim-witted victims of HOME ALONE 3 mayhem. Close cuts a fine figure in Cruella's outrageous outfits and commanding some impressive sets, and she is about as intimidating as RuPaul.
Then there are those adorable puppies. There is no point arguing that kids and many adults won't enjoy the frolicking dalmatians, because they will. There are a few marvelously trained animals in 101 DALMATIANS, and they provide some amusing moments. You could also get the same reaction out of most kids if you sat them down in front of a home movie of puppies playing, or an old episode of "Those Amazing Animals," or even a Westminster Dog Show on ESPN2, because reaction to the dogs in 101 DALMATIANS is not based on any kind of plot requiring individual personality for the animal characters. Though the same kind of animatronic critters used in BABE are used in 101 DALMATIANS, the animals don't talk here. Not only does that make for some confusing narrative (one scene found several kids around me perplexed as to why Lucky was still in danger), but it makes the canine cast of 101 DALMATIANS little more than a big spotted blur. A certain kind of manipulative drama has long been called a "tear-jerker," and 101 DALMATIANS is the family film equivalent. It's an "awww-jeker," trotting out the adorable little puppies and having them yap at you until you begin to consider turning them into a coat yourself.
By : Scott Renshaw
Source: rec.art.movies.reviews newsgroup
Rating: 2
Conventional wisdom suggests that Walt Disney Pictures produces some of the best available animated films and some of the worst available live-action films. 101 DALMATIANS, a shamelessly sickening example of on-screen marketing, is neck-and-neck with SPACE JAM for the most obvious, feature-length commercial of the 1996 holiday season. The difference is, for all its attempts to hawk merchandise, SPACE JAM still manages to be sporadically entertaining. 101 DALMATIANS, on the other hand, is a one-hundred-plus minute bore. Even children, who will be enthralled by all the puppies, may have a hard time not fidgeting for protracted portions of the running time.
With a script by John Hughes, it's no surprise that parts of this movie play like HOME ALONE. Unfortunately, we've been exposed to this brand of nasty, moronic physical humor ad nauseum in the past half-dozen years, primarily through a never-ending series of HOME ALONE sequels, clones, and rip-offs (most produced by Hughes himself). It's not remotely funny here. See Jeff Daniels slam his bicycle into a park bench and go flying into a lake. See two bad guys get zapped by an electrical fence. See Glenn Close take a bath in marmalade. Ha-ha-ha.
The first 101 DALMATIANS, produced by Disney in 1961, is not one of my favorite animated classics, but its brand of charm and humor are completely lost in this version. Back then, the dogs talked, and their dialogue made the film. Here, the four-legged protagonists are completely without voice, and, consequently, without personality. Virtually half this movie lacks dialogue (unless you count occasional yaps by the dogs and quips by the bad guys as "dialogue"), and, with nothing to fill the void, 101 DALMATIANS turns out to be a stale, lifeless movie-going experience. I felt like going to sleep and asking someone to wake me for the closing credits (which feature a jazzed-up rendition of the song, "Cruella DeVil", from the original).
The villain of the piece, Cruella DeVil, has long been one of Disney's nastiest baddies, and Glenn Close seems the perfect choice for the role. Sadly, although Close does her over-the-top best, Cruella doesn't really work. In one of its few sly observations, the script notes that for a villain to be successful, the viewer's feelings for him/her have to go well beyond hatred. We don't feel much for Cruella, and certainly not anything as passionate as the desire to see her annihilated (unless such an occurrence shortened the film).
The story -- or rather what passes for a story -- takes place in contemporary England, and features some wonderful set design (101 DALMATIANS' sole redeeming grace). It tells of how, through the connivance of two Dalmatian, a computer game designer, Roger (Jeff Daniels), meets a fashion designer, Anita (Joely Richardson), one day in the park. They fall in love and get married. Anita's Dalmatian, Perdy, and Roger's dog, Pongo, follow suit, and soon, puppies are on the way. But all is not well. Cruella DeVil, Anita's boss and a lover of real fur coats, has decided that she wants something with spots. When Roger and Anita refuse her generous financial offer for the little dogs, she tries nefarious means, sending a pair of paid thugs (Hugh Laurie and Mark Williams) out to do some dog-napping. In short order, not only do they have Perdy and Pongo's fifteen puppies in custody, but 84 others, as well. (99 + Perdy + Pongo = 101, if you feel obligated to do the arithmetic.)
There's not enough human characterization in this film to fill a thimble. Jeff Daniels (FLY AWAY HOME) and Joely Richardson (I'LL DO ANYTHING) seem almost superfluous, creating personalities that are as richly-textured as cardboard. The crooks are generic -- if you lose track of which movie you're watching, you can be forgiven for confusing Hugh Laurie and Mark Williams with Joe Pesci and Daniel Stern, the inept burglars from the HOME ALONE series. And Joan Plowright, who plays Roger and Anita's housekeeper, is nearly invisible.
This is a despicable motion picture. Not only is it completely unnecessary (the animated version is perfectly adequate), but it's a blatant example of Disney's commercialism run rampant. Simply and succinctly put, 101 DALMATIANS has one overriding aim: to sucker parents into buying spotted paraphernalia for their children. Worse still, thousands of real Dalmatian puppies purchased in pet stores this year will end up being destroyed by animal shelters when their new owners tire of, then discard, them. The movie is bad, but the mentality behind it is worse, and, for that reason, 101 DALMATIANS belongs in the dog house.
