One Hundred and One Dalmatians (1961)
Composite Score: 81.99
Starring: Rod Taylor, Betty Lou Gerson, J. Pat O’Malley, Martha Wentworth, Ben Wright, Cate Bauer, David Frankham, Frederick Worlock, and Lisa Davis
Directors: Clyde Geronimi, Hamilton Luske, and Wolfgang Reitherman
Writer: Bill Peet
Genres: Animation, Adventure, Comedy, Family
MPAA Rating: G
Box Office: $215.88 million worldwide
Why should you Watch This Film?
One Hundred and One Dalmatians is the Disney animated classic about a group of dogs fighting to survive against a crazed fashionista and her henchmen who want to turn them into fur coats. All told, Dalmatians is an animated hit, featuring an absolutely iconic villain, a beautifully jazzy soundtrack, and an entertaining enough story. The film deviates enough from a typical family film to make itself unique, dipping into the crime and escape genres but basing them around dogs. It might not be the deepest of Disney’s films, focusing mainly on the unbreakable spirit of dogs and the ways that they connect with humans. It works as a family film for pet-lovers and is certainly a triumph of animation and film craft.
Why shouldn’t you Watch This Film?
One Hundred and One Dalmatians struggles in the entertainment department for basically the entire first half hour. If you are not thrilled by dogs or surface-level romances or the dogs’ perspective on human things, it’s not a very interesting first act. Mostly it consists of Pongo (the main male dalmatian) trying to hook his “pet” (owner) Roger up with the owner of a girl dalmatian that he saw through a window. The romance between the two is quickly summarized by a quick fit of laughter and then a wedding ceremony. Roger’s work is featured heavily, but Anita’s is only hinted at. Perdita’s (the female dalmatian) pregnancy is rapidly glossed over, and the birth scene (off-screen of course) is only mildly comedic with Roger and Pongo sitting highly concerned in the other room. Rapid-fire as it is, it still takes up the first third of the film, filling it with exposition that feels forced but also unnecessarily brief. It’s not until the puppies are kidnapped that anything really begins to happen.
Another mild flaw in the film comes in its believability. Obviously, this is a family film and suspension of belief should be well in effect, but Roger and Anita and Nanny might be certifiably insane. First, after fifteen puppies are born, they decide to keep all of them and not sell any, not just reasonably refusing to sell to Cruella’s sketchy endeavor but apparently anyone at all simply because it would make Perdita sad. These people are a struggling musician and some kind of writer living in a cramped flat in London – seventeen dogs would be crazy. Then at the film’s conclusion, after Roger’s song has hit it big and the dogs have returned home with ninety-nine puppies, they decide to move out to the country and have a “dalmatian plantation” (which has its own problematic connotations) – again, an absolutely wild choice that nobody questions at all because it’s a dog movie. I love dogs and consider myself a dog person, but anything more than two or maybe three feels excessive.
So wait, why should you Watch This Film?
For one thing, the villain is one of Disney’s most iconic. Cruella De Vil is arguably the least redeemable villain in all of the animated Disney pantheon with a goal of simply turning puppies into fur coats. Her eccentricities, iconic car, unique character design, and phenomenal theme song (fictionally composed by Roger) help her to stand out among Disney’s rogues gallery. Sometimes, it is nice to have a villain so absolutely depraved, especially when your heroes are dogs. Betty Lou Gerson’s voice acting lends itself nicely to Cruella’s characterization as a wildly disconnected, fur-obsessed socialite. It also makes her sound about twenty years older than the dalmatian’s owners with whom she apparently went to school, so that’s interesting. Nonetheless, she remains one of the highlights of the film by far.
To go along with Cruella, the film has a score/soundtrack that is jazzily delightful. George Bruns’s compositions help fill the less exciting moments with auditory delights that keep the film’s pace up. The sounds of upright basses, jazz piano, trumpets, saxophones, and drums play delightfully over the relatively lighthearted film. The score works to elevate the film by making it feel at times like an extended animated sequence set to a jazz piece, especially in that difficult to get through first act.
A quality family film with one of the most iconic animated villains and a phenomenal soundtrack, One Hundred and One Dalmatians has earned a spot among the ranks of the Greatest Films of All Time. Though it might not be the most consistently exciting family film, and some of its protagonist’s decisions might feel incredibly out of place, the film is nonetheless iconic and has brought great success to the Disney company. Currently streaming on Disney+, check it out if you haven’t in a while.
