101 Dalmations 1996

     This film is based on a novel by Dodie Smith and the setting is London England.  It is also based on a cartoon film from 1961.  Roger is a struggling computer game author and composer.  He meets Anita in St. James Park and she is a fashion designer.  Roger has a male Dalmation, Pongo.  Anita has a female Dalmation, Perdia.  It’s a match made in heaven for Roger and Anita plus Pongo and Perdita.  Not much time later, Perdita is going to have puppies.  Everyone is excited about that.  Even Anita’s aunt Cruella DeVil is excited about the puppies but for a different reason.  Unfortunately, Cruella sees Dalmatian fur coats???

     Everything is going smoothly until the puppies are dog napped by two men hired by Cruella.  The dogs in London and the country dogs get together and send barking messages to each other about the puppies being kidnapped.  The two men also kidnap more Dalamation puppies and now there are 101 puppies.  They are being kept in the run down old DeVille mansion. 

     This is very good, interesting and and just a few tense scenes with the bad guys.  The adult dogs and also all the puppies are very cute.  Children will not think about the logistics about having 101 puppies plus two adult dogs!!  There is a LOT of smoking and drinking by Cruella and her two henchmen.  Language is idiot, imbecile, fools mostly directed at the henchmen by Cruella.  5* (I really liked this movie) 

       

103 minutes, adventure directed by Stephen Herek and written by John Hughes with the voices of Glenn Close, Jeff Daniels, Joely Richardson, Joan Plowright, Hugh Laurie, Mark Williams, John Shrapnel, Tim McInnery, Hugh Fraser, Zohren Weiss, Mark Haddigan, Michael Percival, Neville Phillips, John Evans, Hilda Braid.

Note:  Imdb 5.7 out of 10 with 98, 960 reviews, Common Sense Media Nell Minow, age 5+, positive messages 3*, role models 3*, violence 3*, sex 1*, language 1*, consumerism 2*, drinking drugs & smoking 3*., Amazon 4.7* out of 5* with 2258 ratings, Metacritic 49 out of 100 with 20 critic reviews (positive 8, mixed 9, negative 3),  6 out of 10 with 125 user scores (positive 36, mixed 77, negative 12), Letterboxd 2.7* out of 5* with 12 reviews, Rotten Tomatoes 42% with 36 critics 40% audience with 625,268 ratings, Roger Ebert 2 1/2*, Empire Online 5* Phil Thomas, Telegraph 4* out of 5* Alice Vincent, dove.org 1* violence and 0* for sex language, drugs, nudity and other.

Special Note:  230 Dalmatian puppies and 20 adult Dalmatians were used during filming.  Despite her character Cruella’s passion for fur coats, Glenn Close insisted that her character wear fake fur coats.  When Cruella appears on set in her wig, make-up and costume one of the dogs tried to sneak away.  Jeff Daniels in the role of Roger heard a voice on set short sit.  Immediately he sat in a chair and then he was told.  “Not you, Jeff!!  John Hughes made more money on this movie than any other movie in his career.  He received a piece of the merchandising profits.  The car driven by Cruella is a 1974 Panther DeVille.