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102 Dalmatians
R1 - America - Buena Vista Home Entertainment Review written by and copyright: Jeremiah Chin (12th November 2008). |
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The Film
 Getting actors back on from the original film to a sequel is usually a problem, especially for very large budget films with large stars. Typically when an actor returns it’s a case of passion for the project or the absurd and incredible amounts of money that a potential sequel could earn. I’m not sure exactly where Glenn Close falls with 2000’s “102 Dalmatians” since it’s not exactly a passion project since it’s a Disney sequel to a live action remake of an animated film adapted from a book, but showed an incredible potential to repeat “101 Dalmatians” 300 or so million dollar gross. The plot again follows Cruella De Vil (Close) who has supposedly been rehabilitated to abhor fur and love animals, even to the extent of appealing to her parole officer Chloe (Alice Evans) to allow her to attend fashion shows in order to protest fur on display. As a part of her parole she becomes deeply involved in the activities of a local animal shelter run by Mr. Fantastic Kevin (Ioan Gruffudd). Kevin believe that therapy has actually worked for Cruella, who now asks just to be called Ella to put her past behind her, and starts dating Chloe, hoping to convince her as such and maybe get a little closer to fellow dog-lover Chole who is the owner of Dipstick from the first “101 Dalmatians.” Eventually though Cruella reverts to her old fur-loving self after Big Ben undoes her therapy and she goes on another tirade looking in vain again to create a puppy fur coat. Although the story is oddly similar to “101 Dalmatians II” from Cruella’s parole to her return to her old ways, honestly how else are you supposed to continue the "101 Dalmatians" franchise from the original animated and the live action versions. There is no other villain than Cruella De Vil, and Close brings her back to form, embodying that cartoony version of the villain from the original cartoon. The rest of the actors are just very plain, Evans and Gruffudd are just very average main leads, though of course they’re not the focus of the film but are simply devices to achieve an hour and a half of puppies being cute or put in danger. Though Gruffudd wins a large award for most consonants conjoined in a last name. There is really no other way to look at the movie rather than a way of getting puppies to do funny things on camera for an hour and a half, only this time there’s a bird voiced by Eric Idle and a crazed French fur designer played by Gérard Depardieu. Depardieu is a dramatic powerhouse in films like “Jean de Florette” (1986) or “Cyrano de Bergerac” (1990), so seeing him in this wacky sort of comedy feels like something he did so that his children could have something to watch without feeling the need to cry from the pure tragedy of Depardieu’s tragic situation. Visuals, music everything serves the point of showing animals doing quirkier and quirkier things, being more humanlike with each sequence. Of course the wacky sort of comedy that follows would be entertaining for children, or just anyone wanting to see Dalmatian puppies on screen for an hour and a half, putting them in danger, taking them out of danger, having them eventually defeat Cruella of couse in a wacky mouse-trap situation. Yet despite the film’s obvious just-puppies focus, there’s a disturbing and constant use of the ‘diggy-diggy-dog’ audio sample that gets strangely embedded into odd scenes, playing at barely audible levels. It’s almost as if they paid so much for the clip, they tried to insert it into as many awkward points as possible. Overall the movie is a fine choice for children who just want to see some puppies for a while, but it will be harder for adults to watch along, especially with the annoying ‘diggy-diggy-dog’ sound clip that will just run under the audio at random points.
Video
Presented in 1.85:1 anamorphic widescreen the film’s transfer leaves a bit to be desired with some odd grain in any of the more brightly lit scenes that interferes with the movie, or even against darker backgrounds with some contrast. At the same time the directing is mostly inoffensive and functional, not much visually other than some puppies doing puppy or human things.
Audio
Four tracks are included in English DTS 5.1 surround, as well as English, French and Spanish Dolby Digital 5.1 surround. The DTS sound track has a fine sound mix that brings all the levels together well and keeps the feel of theatrical sound to an extent, but the almost subliminal underpinning of “diggy-diggy-dog” that I mentioned earlier is mind numbingly annoying. The better the sound system you have the more apparent and annoying it becomes, bringing down the sound almost in spite of itself. What hubris. Optional subtitles are included in English, French and Spanish.
Extras
As a Disney disc it comes with a handful of special features, including an audio commentary, a deleted scene, and a fairly large amount of featurettes, interactive features, DVD-ROM content and bonus trailers. First up is the audio commentary with director Kevin Lima, animal coordinator Gary Gero, animal trainer David Sousa and lead puppy trainer Julie Tottman. For a film that’s all about getting live action animals into odd places doing odd things, this is a perfect choice for a commentary track that gives some interesting points about training the animals and what exactly goes in to preparing the puppies and various animals for different scenes, while Lima talks about the film’s points and how he got into the film itself. While the commentary has it’s interesting points, it has some large gaps as well as the group of five will just let moments hang in the air and almost seem to become disinterested with the film. “Creating Cruella” featurette runs for 4 minutes and 40 seconds. The director, actors and the rest of the cast and crew talk about working with Glenn Close and the character of Cruella Deville herself, putting her in the hierarchy of great Disney villains. “Animal Actors” featurette runs for 7 minutes and 3 seconds. The cast and crew talk about putting together the animal actors and getting everyone together for the different aspects of animal training and acting. There’s some discussion of the animal characters as well, a fun look at the animal training aspects though not too in depth and is more aimed at just a basic look of the animal training. “Designing Dalmatians” featurette runs for 5 minutes and 58 seconds. This clip looks at the rest of the production design of the film, including Cruella’s spotted London hallucination and the elaborate mansion that servs as her evil lair. Again it’s more of a basic look at the job of the production designer, but with some good and interesting looks at the production design of the house and the final mouse-trap that resolves the movie. “Visual Effects 102” is an interactive segment that allows the viewer to choose different scenes from the film to see them before and after CG effects are added into the film, once the segment is selected the viewer can arrange the segments of the clips to watch in the order the scene is put together. The runtime reflects the total runtime if the segments are played in sequence. - “Introduction” runs for 42 seconds, Waddlesworth introduces the segment. - “Making Birds Talk” runs for 1 minute 25 seconds, Waddlesworth narrates an explanation how the visual effects artists animated the beak to make it appear as if the birrd was speaking his lines. - “Computer Puppies” runs for 1 minute and 34 second that discusses how the cg puppies were built up from wire frames in order to match the directions needed on camera. - “Spot Removal” runs for 1 minute and 52 seconds, an interesting look at the amount of effects that went into painting out all of the spots from Oddball. - “Putting it all Together” runs for 2 minutes and 37 seconds, this segment talks about using the different techniques already shown and then put together into the final mouse-trap scene of the movie. Next is the “Cruella’s Release” deleted scene, with optional audio commentary by director Kevin Lima. This scene runs for 56 seconds and follows cruellas release from prison, Lima discusses how the scene almost became redundant for the film. “Puppy Overload” is a featurette that runs for 1 minute and 11 seconds, which is a just long compilation of diffent shots of puppies and animals from the movie set to the “diggy-diggy-dog” song. Painful overload. “Dalmatians 101” featurette runs for 1 minute and 50 seconds, Waddlesworth gives advice about Dalmatian ownership, a good clip considering the expanded Dalmatian ownership following the release of the Dalmatians movies, advising the viewers to have patience in choosing a dog that’s right for them, but it’s kind of buried in the special features so kind of misses it’s point. Next is the “Watcha Gonna Do” music video by Nobody’s Angel, very poppy, listed as a soundtrack promo, especially since it only runs for 42 seconds. The theatrical trailer for “102 Dalmatians” runs for 2 minutes and 21 seconds. There are also two DVD-ROM special features accessible through a computer, but requires the installation of ‘PCFriendly’ brand software to run: - "Cruella’s costume creator" is a digital paper doll of sorts allowing users to play around with different costumes. - There’s also a DVD Destination weblink which contains online links to other related materials. Of course last are the bonus trailers for: - “Disney Movie Rewards” runs for 21 seconds. - “High School Musical DVD Game” runs for 28 seconds. - “Disney DVD and Blu-Ray” runs for 52 seconds. - “Sleeping Beauty” runs for 1 minute 57 seconds. - “Beverly Hills Chihuahua” runs for 1 minute 33 seconds. - “101 Dalmations II: Patch’s London Adventure” runs for 1 minute and 29 seconds. - “Tinerbell” runs for 1 minute 39 seconds. - “Wall-E” runs for 2 minutes and 34 seconds. - “The Little Mermaid II: Return to the Sea: Special Edition” runs for 1 minute 16 seconds. - “Phineas and Ferb” runs for 33 seconds. - “The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian” runs for 2 minutes and 9 seconds.
Overall
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