A Bubblegum Cartoon

Rating: 7/10 (29 October 2009)

And yet another dog film brought to us by Disney.
When it comes to animation, Dalmatians started a trend in Disney I don't really care for. Strapped budgets required some money-saving scheme, so in walked Xerox and with it the very scratchy-outliney style that lasted through The Rescuers. There's just something about that style that bugs me- perhaps it suggests a lack of refinement and finishing. Anywho, it is what it is, and despite my predisposition, I did love the elegance of the dogs- they always felt wonderfully sleek and fluid. Surprisingly, there are very few songs. In fact, there is only the infamous Cruella De Vil and a short blurb at the ending. I guess the extreme popularity of Cruella more than made up for the lack of other songs.
When reviewing this film, I feel I must draw at least some upon comparisons to Lady and the Tramp. They were made so close together, yet appear so radically different. You can see the radical changes in Disney really start to break through around 1960 (it happens again at the end of the 80s). Once again, we are dealing with a dog's point of view, but for some reason it does not feel as entirely faithful to that point as in its predecessor. There is just a little too much focus on the human characters- the dogs begin to run into danger of stepping the boundary of cartoon-animals-that-talk land, instead of being purely animated characters (that trend only gets worse from here).
What keeps this film from getting a higher score is it's not as easy to get plugged into as some stories. Being more of an adventure film than a love story, Dalmations just doesn't leave that much impact on me. It was suspenseful and well-crafted, but it never gripped me with meaningful relationships or outstanding characters or charged lines. Not to say that adventure films are inherently bad, but outside of spectacular sequences or plots, they are harder to invest in. And Dalmatians simply didn't offer me anything investable.
So in the end, Dalmatians is kind of like a piece of bubble gum. I never really crave it, but it's fun to get as a novelty once in a blue moon. And after 10 minutes of unsuppressed bubbles, I spit it out and it doesn't cross my mind again. It's good for a pleasurable throw-away afternoon, but has little use beyond that.
Quote of the Film:
-I live for furs. I worship furs! After all, is there a woman in all this wretched world who doesn't?