One Hundred and One Dalmatians

**One Hundred and One Dalmatians** is a 1961 animated film directed by Clyde Geronimi, Hamilton Luske and Wolfgang Reitherman. It is based on the 1956 novel The Hundred and One Dalmatians by Dodie Smith.

It is the 17th Disney animated feature film and was released on January 25, 1961.

## Plot

Roger Radcliffe is an aspiring songwriter who lives in London, England in a squalid bachelor flat near Regent's Park. His pet dalmatian dog, Pongo, decides he needs a female companion and turns to spying out the window for a suitor. Observing a woman named Anita and her Dalmatian Perdita, Pongo drags Roger to the park to arrange a meeting. Roger and Anita fall in love and get married with Pongo and Perdita.

The pair hires a nanny and moves to a small townhouse near Regent's Park. Perdita becomes pregnant with a litter of 15 puppies. Anita's spoiled, fur-obsessed former schoolmate, Cruella de Vil, stops by and inquires about the arrival of the puppies, causing fear and distrust in the family. In response, Roger writes a jazzy song to make fun of her. When the puppies are born, Cruella barges in again and demands to buy the puppies. Roger finally stands up to her and tells her the puppies are not for sale. Before leaving, Cruella vows revenge.

A few months later, Nanny puts the puppies to bed after a night of watching television, while Pongo and Perdita go for a walk with Roger and Anita at the park. Brothers Horace and Jasper Baddun, two burglars secretly hired by Cruella, pose as repair men from an electric company and steal the puppies. In response, the Radcliffe’s enlist Scotland Yard and put advertisements in all the papers. Roger immediately suspects Cruella, but a police investigation offers no evidence against her.

The Dalmatians contact Danny the Great Dane at Hampstead, who uses the Twilight Bark gossip chain to forward their request for help to dogs all over England. In Withermarsh Green, Old Towser the bloodhound passes the word on to the Colonel, a Sheepdog, and his cat friend Sgt. Tibbs. They investigate the nearby "Old De Vil Place," where puppies had been heard barking two nights earlier. Tibbs sneaks inside and is nearly killed by Jasper, but escapes. The Colonel sends word back to London that the puppies are found. Pongo and Perdita leave through a back window and begin a long cross-country journey, crossing a flooded and icy river and running through the snow towards Suffolk.

Meanwhile, Cruella tells the Baddun brothers the police are on their trail. She orders them to get rid of all the dogs by dawn. After she leaves, Tibbs helps the puppies escape through a hole in the wall, but the Baddun brothers notice and give chase. The Colonel meets up with Pongo and Perdita and tells them of the trouble. The two Dalmatians attack Jasper and Horace, destroying part of the house and giving the puppies time to flee. Pongo and Perdita reunite with their litter of 15 at Colonel and Tibbs' home farm, only to discover there are 84 more puppies with them. Upon learning from Tibbs that Cruella intends to make coats out of the puppies, Pongo and Perdita agree to take all 99 pups’ home with them.

The Dalmatians start their homeward trek, pursued by the Baddun brothers. All water has turned to ice, so the dogs use the creeks to avoid leaving tracks. They shelter from a blizzard in a dairy farm with a friendly collie and some cows, then make their way to Dinsford, where they meet a Black Labrador, who is waiting for them in a blacksmith's shop. Cruella and the Baddun brothers catch up, so Pongo has his entire family roll in a sooty fireplace to disguise themselves as other Labradors. The Labrador helps them board a moving van bound for London, but melting snow falls on Lucky and exposes his spots. Cruella pursues and tries to ram the moving van off the road. The Baddun brothers, in their truck, attempt the same thing and accidentally smash into Cruella's car instead, which sends both their vehicles into a ditch. The moving van continues to London as Cruella throws a tantrum, and Jasper, who is fed up with her, tells her to be quiet.

In London, a melancholy Nanny and the Radcliffe’s try to enjoy Christmas, and the wealth they have acquired from the song about Cruella, which has become a big radio hit. The soot-covered Dalmatians suddenly flood the house. Upon removing the soot and counting the massive family of dogs, Roger chooses to use the money from his song to buy a big house in the country, forming a "Dalmatian Plantation." All the dogs of London begin barking, celebrating the return of the Dalmatian puppies and their parents.

## Cast and Characters

* Rod Taylor as Pongo
* Lisa Daniels and Cate Bauer as Perdita
* Betty Lou Gerson as Cruella de Vil / Miss Birdwell
* Ben Wright as Roger Radcliffe
* Lisa Davis as Anita Radcliffe
* Frederick Worlock as Horace Baddun / Inspector Graves
* J. Pat O'Malley as Jasper Baddun / Colonel
* Martha Wentworth as Nanny / Queenie / Lucy the White Goose
* Thurl Ravenscroft as Captain
* David Frankham as Sergeant Tibbs
* Mimi Gibson as Lucky
* Barbara Beaird as Rollu
* Mickey Mag as Patch
* Sandra Abbott as Penny
* Tudor Owen as Old Towser
* George Pelling as Danny
* Junius Matthews as Scottie
* Queenie Leonard as Princess
* Marjorie Bennett as Duchess
* Barbara Luddy as Rover
* Rickie Sorensen as Spotty
* Tom Conway as Collie / Quizmaster
* Ramsay Hill as Labrador Retriever
* Paul Wexler as Mechanic
* Basil Ruysdael as Driver
* Paul Frees as Dirty Dawson
* Lucille Bliss as TV Commercial Singer

## Music

See Also: One Hundred and One Dalmatians (Soundtrack)

## Sequel

* 101 Dalmatians II: Patch's London Adventure (2003)

### Live-action

* 101 Dalmatians (1996)
* 102 Dalmatians (2000)

## Production

### Story Development

Dodie Smith wrote the book The Hundred and One Dalmatians in 1956. When Walt Disney read it in 1957, it immediately grabbed his attention, and he promptly obtained the rights. Smith had always secretly hoped that Disney would make it into a film. Disney assigned Bill Peet to write the story, which he did, marking the first time that the story for a Disney animated film was written by a single person. Writing in his autobiography, Peet was tasked by Disney to write a detailed screenplay first before storyboarding. Because Peet never learned to use a typewriter, he wrote the initial draft by hand on legal paper.

He condensed elements of the original book while enlarging others, some of which included eliminating Cruella's husband and cat, as well merging the two mother Dalmatians, birth mother Missis and adopted mother Perdita, into one character. Another notable character loss was Cadpig, the female runt of Pongo and Missis' puppies, whose traits were transferred between Lucky and the newly-established Penny in the film (although it is never indicated outright that Cadpig was dropped); the Colonel's cat assistant was re-gendered from being a female by the name of Lieutenant Willow in the book, and Horace Baddun was renamed from Saul to presumably make him sound more akin in tone to Jasper. Bill Peet did retain a scene in which Pongo and Perdita exchange wedding vows in unison with their owners, by which the censor board warned that it might offend certain religious audiences if the animals repeated the exact words of a solemn religious ceremony. The scene was reworked to be less religious with Roger and Anita dressed in formal clothes.

Two months later, Peet completed the manuscript and had it typed up. Walt said the script was "great stuff" and commissioned Peet to begin storyboarding. Additionally, Peet was charged with recording the voice-over process. Although Disney had not been as involved in the production of the animated films as frequently as in previous years nevertheless, he was always present at story meetings. When Peet sent Dodie Smith some drawings of the characters, she wrote back saying that he had improved her story and that the designs looked better than the illustrations in the book.

### Animation

#### Art Direction

After Sleeping Beauty (1959) disappointed at the box-office, there was some talk of closing down the animation department at the Disney studio. During the production of it, Disney told animator Eric Larson: "I don't think we can continue; it's too expensive." Despite this, he still had deep feelings towards animation because he had built the company upon it.

Ub Iwerks, in charge of special processes at the studio, had been experimenting with Xerox photography to aid in animation. By 1959, he had modified a Xerox camera to transfer drawings by animators directly to animation cels, eliminating the inking process, thus saving time and money while preserving the spontaneity of the pencilled elements. However, because of its limitations, the camera was unable to deviate from a black scratchy outline and lacked the fine lavish quality of hand inking. Disney would first use the Xerox process for a thorn forest in Sleeping Beauty, and the first production to make full use of the process was Goliath II. For One Hundred and One Dalmatians, one of the benefits of the process was that it was a great help towards animating the spotted dogs. According to Chuck Jones, Disney was able to complete the film for about half of what it would have cost if they had had to animate all the dogs and spots.

Ken Anderson proposed the use of the Xerox on Dalmatians to Walt, who was disenchanted with animation by then, and replied "Ah, yeah, yeah, you can fool around all you want to". For the stylized art direction, Anderson took inspiration from British cartoonist Ronald Searle, who once advised him to use a Mont Blanc pen and India ink for his artwork. In addition to the character animation, Anderson also sought to use Xerography on "the background painting because I was going to apply the same technique to the whole picture." Along with colour stylist Walt Peregoy, the two had the line drawings be printed on a separate animation cel before being laid over the background, which gave the appearance similar to the Xeroxed animation. Disney disliked the artistic look of the film and felt he was losing the "fantasy" element of his animated films. In a meeting with Anderson and the animation staff concerning future films, Walt said, "We're never gonna have one of those goddamned things" referring to Dalmatians and its technique, and stated, "Ken's never going to be an art director again."

#### Live-action Reference

As with the previous Disney films, actors provided live-action reference in order to determine what would work before the animation process begun. Actress Helene Stanley performed the live-action reference for the character of Anita. She did the same work for the characters of Cinderella and Princess Aurora in Sleeping Beauty. Meanwhile, Mary Wickes provided the live-action reference for Cruella de Vil.

#### Characters

Marc Davis was the sole animator on Cruella De Vil. During production, Davis claimed her character was partly inspired by Bette Davis (no relation), Rosalind Russell, and Tallulah Bankhead. He took further influence from her voice actress, Betty Lou Gerson, whose cheekbones he added to the character. He later complimented, "that her voice was the greatest thing I've ever had a chance to work with. A voice like Betty Lou's gives you something to do. You get a performance going there, and if you don't take advantage of it, you're off your rocker". While her hair colouring originated from the illustrations in the novel, Davis found its dishevelled style by looking "through old magazines for hairdos from 1940 till now". Her coat was exaggerated to match her oversized personality, and the lining was red because "there's a devil image involved".

### Casting

Before starring in high-profile roles such as The Birds and The Time Machine, Australian actor Rod Taylor had extensive radio experience and was cast as Pongo. The filmmakers deliberately cast dogs with deeper voices than their human owners, so they had more power. Walt Disney originally had Lisa Davis read for the role of Cruella De Vil, but she did not think that she was right for the part, and wanted to try reading the role of Anita. Disney agreed with her after the two of them read the script for a second time.

Betty Lou Gerson, who was previously the narrator for Cinderella, auditioned for the role of Cruella De Vil in front of Marc Davis and sequence director Wolfgang Reitherman, and landed it. While searching for the right accent of the character, Gerson landed on a "phony theatrical voice, someone who's set sail from New York but hasn't quite reached England". During the recording process, she was thought to be imitating Tallulah Bankhead. However, Gerson disputed, "Well, I didn't intentionally imitate her... I was raised in Birmingham, Ala., and Tallulah was from Jasper, Ala. We both had phony English accents on top of our Southern accents and a great deal of flair. So our voices came out that way". In addition to voicing Mrs. Birdwell, Gerson finished recording in fourteen days.

## Release

One Hundred and One Dalmatians was first released in theatres on January 25, 1961. The film was re-released theatrically in 1969, 1979, 1985, and 1991. The 1991 reissue was the 20th highest-grossing film of the year for domestic earnings.

### Home Media

One Hundred and One Dalmatians was first released on VHS on April 10, 1992, as part of the Walt Disney Classics video series. By June 1992, it had sold 11.1 million copies. At the time, it was the sixth best-selling video of all time. It was re-released on March 9, 1999, as part of the Walt Disney Masterpiece Collection video series. Due to technical issues, it was later released on LaserDisc and was delayed numerous times before its release on DVD. The film was re-released on VHS, and for the first time on DVD, in December 1999, as a Walt Disney Limited Issue for a limited 60-day time period before going into moratorium. A two-disc Platinum Edition DVD was released on March 4, 2008. It was released on Blu-ray Disc in the United Kingdom on September 3, 2012. A Diamond Edition Blu-ray of the film was released in North America on February 10, 2015. A Limited Edition from Disney Movie Club was released on Blu-ray and DVD combo on November 6, 2018. Then it was re-released on HD digital download and Blu-ray on September 24, 2019 as part of the Walt Disney Signature Collection.

## Reception

### Critical Response

In its initial release, the film received critical acclaim from critics, many of whom hailed it as the studio's best release since Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937) and the closest to a real "Disney" film in many years. Howard Thompson of The New York Times wrote, "While the story moves steadily toward a stark, melodramatic "chase" climax, it remains enclosed in a typical Disney frame of warm family love, human and canine". However, he later opined that the "songs are scarce, too. A few more would have braced the final starkness". Variety claimed that "While not as indelibly enchanting or inspired as some of the studio's most unforgettable animated endeavours, this is nonetheless a painstaking creative effort". Time praised the film as "the wittiest, most charming, least pretentious cartoon feature Walt Disney has ever made". Harrison's Reports felt all children and adults will be "highly entertained by Walt Disney's latest, a semi-sophisticated, laugh-provoking, all cartoon, feature-lengther in Technicolor." Dodie Smith also enjoyed the film where she particularly praised the animation and backgrounds of the film.

Contemporary reviews have remained positive. Reviewing the film during its 1991 re-release, Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times, while giving the film three stars out of four, asserted that "it's an uneven film, with moments of inspiration in a fairly conventional tale of kidnapping and rescue. This is not one of the great Disney classics, it's not in the same league with Snow White or Pinocchio, but it's passable fun, and will entertain its target family audiences." Chicago Tribune film critic Gene Siskel, in his 1991 review, also gave the film three stars out of four. Ralph Novak of People wrote "What it lacks in romantic extravagance and plush spectacle, this 1961 Disney film makes up for in quiet charm and subtlety. In fact, if any movie with dogs, cats, and horses who talk can be said to belong in the realm of realistic drama, this is it". However, the film did receive a few negative reviews. In 2011, Craig Berman of MSNBC ranked it and its 1996 remake as two of the worst children's films of all time, saying that, "The plot itself is a bit nutty. Making a coat out of dogs? Who does that? But worse than Cruella de Vil's fashion sense is the fact that your children will definitely start asking for a Dalmatian of their own for their next birthday".

The review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes reported the film received an approval rating of 98% based on 52 reviews with an average score of 8.2 out of 10. The website's critical consensus reads, "With plenty of pooches and a memorable villain (Cruella De Vil), this is one of Disney's most enduring, entertaining animated films."

### Box Office

During its initial theatrical run, the film grossed $14 million in the United States and Canada, which generated $6.2 million in distributor rentals. It was also the most popular film of the year in France, with admissions of 14.7 million ranking tenth on their all-time list.

The film was re-released in 1969, where it earned $15 million. In its 1979 theatrical re-release, it grossed $19 million, and in 1985, the film grossed $32 million. During its fourth re-release in 1991, it grossed $60.8 million.

Prior to 1995, the film had grossed $86 million overseas. In 1995, it grossed $71 million overseas bringing its international total to $157 million. The film's total domestic lifetime gross is $145 million, and its total worldwide gross is $303 million. Adjusted for inflation, and incorporating subsequent releases, the film has a lifetime gross of $900.3 million.

## Awards and Nominations

### American Film Institute

The film is recognized by American Film Institute in these lists:

* AFI's 100 Years... 100 Heroes and Villains: Cruella de Vil (No. 39)