The high audience score on Rotten Tomatoes, which currently stands at 97 percent, and the stellar CinemaScore for the feature might have swayed things. “Cruella” was initially slated for a theatrical release before the pandemic caused it to play both theaters and on Disney+. It’ll be interesting to see if a sequel is exclusive to one or the other.
“Cruella” is just one in a litany of live-action remakes of Disney’s original animated features and the latest in a continued push to show the backstories of its famous villains. Stone herself, when asked who she’d love to see get the origin story treatment, mentioned that Ursula from “The Little Mermaid” should be on the docket next.
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The look at Cruella’s backstory has certainly received mixed reviews from critics. IndieWire’s Kate Erbland wrote in her B- review that, “‘Cruella’ ends with both a definitive answer to ‘Hey, what made Cruella this way?’ and a kind of hedging that seems destined to both rework the Disney canon (the answer is, of course, not ‘she’s a nut who wants to kill dogs!’) and leave open room for more films.”
Conversely, Paul Walter Hauser, who plays Horace in the film, has been frank about his views on those critiquing the feature. In a recent interview with Insider, the actor said, “If you feel you hated two things, but we did these five other things great, then you can’t tell people not to see the movie. That’s ridiculous. It’s like me telling you not to eat at a restaurant because I didn’t like the toilet paper in the bathroom and my waiter was unattractive. You would be like, ‘Um, how was the chicken?’ So that’s my whole take on film criticism.”
“Cruella” is out in theaters and available to rent via Disney+ Premier Access.
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