Film This is one movie whose bark is definitely worse than its bite
And I didn't say that just to make a 101 Dalmatians pun. Cruella is a movie that feels, in a word, defanged— like it had higher aspirations to be something truly, delightfully wicked but is held back by Disney's standards to being merely okay. Emma Stone certainly looks the part of a budding villain, but merely looking the part is all we get. Plot-wise, we are given what feels more like a cross between a kid-friendly take on The Devil Wears Prada and a very watered-down version of Joker where the Joker is somehow depicted as a hero and given an even worse villain to fight.
This wouldn't matter quite as much if this movie were meant to take Cruella in a new direction, the way Maleficent did for the titular Sleeping Beauty villain. In that movie, Maleficent was portrayed as a hero, but the entire story was an alternate retelling of the animated movie— there was no implication that the wicked fairy who cursed Aurora in the original version was actually good. Not here, though. We're told that this is the origin story of the very same Cruella de Vil who goes on to kidnap 99 Dalmatian puppies and plans to slaughter them for their fur. If Cruella is meant to be evil, then the movie should let her be evil.
As it is, though, Cruella's actions in this movie are hard to contextualize with the character we know she will eventually become. At no point does Cruella ever truly snap and embrace her evil side. She remains a protagonist, if a somewhat off-kilter one, throughout the movie, never truly sliding into full-blown villain territory and emerging as the character we are all familiar with. It doesn't tell an alternative version of the story with Cruella as the hero, but neither does it allow her to fully become a villain, the way Arthur Fleck does in Joker.
The end result of all this is a movie that seems almost calculated, designed to be just "edgy" enough to appear rebellious and novel while in truth not attempting anything new.
On a final note, the movie implies that Pongo and Perdita are siblings. Make of that what you will.
Film De Vil Wears Prada
This is the first movie based on the story that I've seen, but I know what it's about. And so it's very odd that the cartoonishly evil villain characterized foremost as "dog killer" is turned into a hero, and the camp and rebel aesthetics co-opted by the film can be well criticized as misused and appropriative. But...it's fun?
I like how the film feels like a whole TV series, with separated arcs and episodes that still build on each other. I like that so much occurs in it. Emma Stone, as well, was an extremely confusing choice when the casting was announced, but man, she makes it work and is really compelling to watch.
Estella is a girl born with black-and-white hair told to be good and not be "Cruella", but when her mother dies at a party, she becomes an orphan thief with two friends. Later, she gets a job at a fashion studio and loves the work until she realizes her boss, the Baroness, has her mother's necklace. Estella decides to let Cruella loose to take revenge and destroy the company she works for.
As a film about fashion, the costumes are wonderful, and Cruella's outrageous stunts and looks are magnetic and enjoyable. It's definitely campy, and the film gives some credit— Cruella's biggest influence is a gay clothing expert, and her dynamic with the Baroness throws back to the origins of camp with catty, glam powerful women going at each other. Still, it feels weird for a modern film to use camp to lift up a character with zero queer subtext, and feels like more of Disney manipulating queer audiences- giving enough flavor to make a movie appealing, but not enough to give interesting queer representation because that scares China.
The Cruella persona is interesting. No wonder people were calling her the female edgy-Joker equivalent, because Cruella delivers those vibes of edge and creepiness, if not very harshly. The film handles it a bit more like Harley Quinn, though, with the Cruella side eventually turning the original persona into the costume. The film explores how dysfunctional Cruella is, but seems to side with it being an acceptable choice as long as she doesn't mistreat her friends. I do kind of like that, but I feel like her traumas go seriously unaddressed, and I really dislike the way the film attributes Cruella to nature as if she's born to be a monster...and she's not even much of a monster in this film. The timeline not matching the original film suggests it's an alternate continuity, and she doesn't actually kill dogs here, so maybe this version of Cruella is just destined to be extra and annoying instead of monstrous, but it's very muddled what she thinks of her morality after all she has learned about herself.
Problematic? Yes. Entertaining? Yeah. Make of it what you will.