Not as good as Disney's best...

Rating: 8/10 (16 August 2008)

Let's get the spoilers over with then! As most people will know, this movie is based on the book by Dodie Smith. And a lot of changes were made from the book, but I'll come to that later. Anyway, basically the story goes that a male dalmatian, Pongo, finds both himself and his 'pet', Roger, a wife/the equivalent in dog-world. Anyway, he spots Anita and her dalmatian, Perdita-and of course they both get the girl (or dog?). Perdita soon gives birth to fifteen puppies-but Anita's old friend, Cruella DeVil has her eye on their beautiful spotted coats, and hires two men to kidnap them. Pongo and Perdita then set out to find the puppies and save them from being made into a coat-but Cruella has also got her hands on other puppies too, making 99 in total. And the parents have to get all 99 back to London, while being chased by Cruella and her henchmen...
To be honest, I adore the original book. And, as much as I do like this movie, it doesn't really compare. For example, in the book the mother of the puppies is Missus-Perdita is another dog found by Anita to help Missus feed all her puppies. When Pongo and Missus go to find their puppies, Perdita stays in London to comfort their 'pets'. The relationship between Pongo and Missus is the focus of the story (apart from the main plot) which is not really explored in this movie. And there were only 97 puppies, another dog (Captain?) who (if I recall correctly) is Perdita's long-lost love, is also adopted by the 'pets' at the end of the book, making 101.
Of course, I'm not going to lower the rating of this movie just because it isn't faithful to the book. My "problem" with this movie is that it doesn't feel like the other Disney classics. To put it bluntly, it feels rushed and, at times, forced.
There are only three songs, unlike most other Disney movies, which I feel were only put in because it's a Disney tradition. In my opinion, this movie would have worked fine without any songs at all. I don't mind the songs really-they just feel like an afterthought in the context of the movie. "Cruella DeVil" is very catchy, while the "Kanine Krucnhies Jingle" and "Dalmation Plantation" are easy to pass over and forget.
The animation, as with most Disney classics, is excellent. I have no problems from that angle.
The human characters didn't seem to have any real thought put into them, with the exception of the villains. Roger had some promise at the beginning (writing songs about romance hen he apparently had no experience, being so awkward with Anita, decidingly not liking Cruella from the start), but was quickly shoved into the background. with the exception of him standing up to Cruella over selling the puppies. Anita was just utterly bland (she meets Roger, gets married, then spends the rest of the movie whining about Cruella, the puppies and Perdita), Nanny was hardly on screen and when she was, it seemed as though we should sympathise with her (when Jasper and Horace break in, when she's crying about thinking she can hear the dogs barking)-but she had just appeared after Roger and Anita's wedding, with no introduction or anything. In my opinion, the relationships between the human characters should have been properly explored.
Cruella DeVil steals the show easily. She comes across as being somewhat psychotic, and you immediately agree with Perdita-she is a threat to the dogs in the movie. The continuity with this character, at least, Way brilliant-she is over the top and eccentric, before (literally) going over the edge. Jasper and Horace provide a lot of the comic relief, but are also interesting-Horace appears to be more clever then he thinks, but Jasper (the self appointed brains of the duo) constantly puts him down for his thinking.
As it's late at night, I think I shall now conclude my review of this movie. Although I did enjoy it, I did find that it was lacking-the relationships between characters were not fully explored and I was not particularly happy with many of the characters. But overall, although it does not stand up beside classics such as Snow White, Bambi or even The Lion King, 101 Dalmations is a very entertaining movie.
7/10