101 Dalmatians, based on the book by Dodie Smith, is directed by Clyde Geronimi, Hamilton Luske, and Wolfgang Reitherman. The film features the voices of Rod Taylor (The Time Machine (1960 Version)), Cate Bauer, Betty Lou Gerson (Cinderella), and Ben Wright (The Jungle Book, The Little Mermaid.) One of the most famous of all the Disney feature-length animated features, 101 Dalmatians features two Dalmatians who fall in love, and consequently, so do their owners. The two dogs give birth to a litter of puppies, but the joy is short-lived. Cruella De Vil, an old acquaintance of the household's wife, wants to get her hands on the dogs so she can make a dog-skin coat. When the owners refuse to relinquish the dogs, she hires burglars to steal them. Once in the home that could be their final resting place, however, the puppies meet up with a gaggle of other store-bought dogs that will be victims of the evil scheme. It's up to all of the dogs to work together to break free, and get home safely. ***

It's no surprise that 101 Dalmatians remains one of the most popular films in the entire Disney catalogue. There are lovable protagonists, one of the most iconic villains in Disney history, and an easy-to-follow storyline that works better than you'd expect. Everything comes together nicely. It's truly one of the best films to ever come from the Disney catalogue. ***

If there's one thing in this movie that people remember (apart from the obvious gaggle of pups), it's Cruella De Vil. Voiced here brilliantly by Betty Lou Gerson (she also voiced the narrator in the Disney version of Cinderella), the character is one of Disney's finest central antagonists. In many ways, she's a far more memorable and effective character than any of the heroes ***

There are a few weaknesses with 101 - fewer songs than in your typical animated Disney adventure, relatively short run time, lack of a central hero to cheer for - but in the long run these are nothing more than little flaws. It's still one of the best movies in the Disney library. ---

Image And Sound:

One thing that will immediately catch your eye when you see the case for this DVD is that the image is presented in a 1:33:1 full screen aspect ratio, not the typical widescreen presentation you'd expect. But fear not! Weird as it may sound, even long after most theaters began using widescreen as the standard presentation for movies, Disney still went ahead and shot 101 in the old full screen format. In other words, it was actually theatrical airings and other widescreen presentations that had a cropped image. This is the first time (to my knowledge) the movie has ever been made available in its original aspect ratio on the DVD format. The image itself has gotten much needed remastering - and it looks absolutely incredible. I had no idea Disney could make the picture of a nearly half-century old movie look so good. The audio quality is clean and without blemishes of any kind. To put it simply, it both looks and sounds fantastic. Even if you bought an earlier issue of the film on some format, this one is worth investing in for the uncropped picture and image quality alone. ---

As with most of their reissues of classic animated films, Disney really went overboard on 101 Dalmatians - and they've got plenty of bonus material, so much so that the package is two discs! ***

The first disc contains the movie itself, the two pop-up fact tracks, and the music videos. The pop-up tracks are a nice extra feature, with the so-called “family” track focusing on the differences between Dodie Smith's book and the film, and the “fan” track emphasizing interesting facts dealing with the making of the film and the production process. Lastly is the Selena Gomez music video, which this DVD could seriously have done without (I know there's an audience out there for this stuff, but it's not going to have much appeal to older fans of the movie.)

Disc two contains the rest of the extras. Plenty of DVD-ROM material and games are included on this disc, but like the music video on the first disc, it's mostly only going to appeal to the youngsters. Of particular interest is a collection of deleted songs, consisting of both music that wasn't used in the final film, as well as some alternative versions of cuts that did make the movie - stuff that any fan of the film will definitely want to check out.

The best material on here is the Redefining The Line making-of documentary, which runs for over half an hour, and gives some interesting insight into the making of process. There are also two lesser featurettes - one of which dealing with Cruella De Vil, and another dealing with communications between Walt Disney and Dodie Smith (author of the book on which the film was based.) While interesting, both of these featurettes will leave you wanting more. Lastly is a collection of film-related art, as well as various trailers and television spots for the movie, and even radio spots promoting the film. Disney did a terrific job with the extras on this set, I only wish they'd focused more on the behind-the-scenes and making-of stuff than the kiddie material.

Final Words: