Certainly the DVD of 2008 that will boast the most spots, Disney brings out its jazzy canine masterpiece in a Platinum edition.
This edition is a great film with some excellent special features that should please both the humans and the hounds in your house.
Roger (Ben Wright) is the human “pet” to his Dalmatian Pongo (Rod Taylor).
Rogers an aspiring songwriter who hasn’t had a hit, but he’s also a lonely chap and in need of some female companionship according to Pongo.
So he takes his human on an outing to the park and they meet Anita (Lisa Davis) and her Dalmatian Perdita (Cate Bauer). Some fancy footwork by Pongo gets the two humans tangled up and romance blossoms. Roger and Anita get married and soon puppies are on the way on the Dalmatian side of the family.
“Fifteen puppies!” is the exclamation by the housekeeper on the evening of the big event but a mysterious figure also joins in the outcry. This figure “who to see her is to take a sudden chill” is Cruela De Vil (Betty Lou Gerson), a socialite and classmate of Anita’s who offers to buy all fifteen of the puppies.
Roger refuses and the cadaverous De Vil leaves the apartment in a huff. She hires thieves Horace (Frederick Worlock) and Jasper (J. Pat O’Malley) Badun to break into the apartment and steal the puppies. Pongo and Perdita send out an S.O.S. via the twilight bark so that anyone knowing the whereabouts of their lost brood gets word back to them.
The Baduns have taken the fifteen back to De Vil’s ancestral home Hell Hall and this brings the count of puppies to one hundred and one. De Vil’s wicked plan is to make the puppies into a spotted coat and now our heroes and company must get the puppies before her horrible plan can come to fruition.
It’s somewhat shocking to find out that 101 Dalmatians wasn’t exactly a favorite of Walt Disney. He was more into the fantasy style associated with his previous pictures and Dalmatians modern day (well, for the time that is) setting didn’t do much for Walt.
However, the film is a masterpiece that Uncle Walt should’ve been more proud of. The modern setting has some delightful stylized backgrounds and the animation charming. It also marked a change for the studio in that they utilized the use of Xerox technology and some departments in the studio got the pink slip with the change of technology.
On the other side of charm is Cruella De Vil, a masterful villainous creation that owes both animator Marc Davis and voice talent Betty Lou Gerson a debt of gratitude. It was interesting to learn in the special features that character actress Mary Wickes (who also voices Freckles in the film) portrayed Cruella in some live action films shot for the animators to use as reference.
The song by Mel Leven about our fiendish furrier only cements De Vil’s fame, as the lyrics will have you singing along for days. “If she doesn’t scare you no evil thing will,” true enough. The film is a classic in every sense of the word and well deserving of the platinum treatment.
101 Dalmatians is presented in fullscreen and has been given a digital scrub that makes the film like as good as the day it was first projected. Disc one features two sets of pop up trivia (one for the family and the other for the fan) and the 3-minute “Cruella De Vil” music video by Selena Gomez. To see the video will give you a sudden chill, so the less said about it the better but it’s awful.
I had hoped we had gotten over this redoing of songs by Disney channel stars but alas it rears its ugly head again. Disc two is divided into three sections, “Backstage Disney,” “Music and More,” and “Games and Activities.” “Backstage Disney” contains the 34 minute “Redefining the Live: the Making of 101 Dalmatians.” The 7 minute “Cruella De Vil: Drawn to be Bad” examines the woman we love to hate.
The 12-minute “Sincerely Yours, Walt Disney” is a dramatic recreation of some of the correspondence between Dalmatians author Dodie Smith and Disney. Finally there are four trailers and television spots, three radio spots, and extensive art galleries. “Music and More” contains six extended and deleted songs (totaling about 7 minutes).
“Games and Activities” has a set top sampler of the virtual Dalmatians game that is on the DVD-ROM side of the disc. There’s also a Puppy Profiler game and some “Fun with Language” games.
101 Dalmatians is a great film and well deserving of the Platinum treatment bestowed on it here. The only disappointment is that a high-def version wasn’t released on Blu-ray (Sleeping Beauty is the first and due this fall). Do you need this one in your DVD collection? Does a Dalmatian have spots?
101 Dalmatians (Two-Disc Platinum Edition) is now available at Amazon . As of yet, there is not a release date for this version of the DVD in the UK. Visit the DVD database for more information.
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