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At the end of this month the long anticipated, and long delayed, Cruella will become the latest movie to bring a classic Disney animated character to life in live-action. Emma Stone will portray Cruella de Vil and while it's far too early to tell just how the movie as a whole will turn out, it's hard not to feel like Emma Stone wasn't the perfect choice to bring this character to life. Watch Emma Stone transform into Cruella, both physically, and possibly a bit mentally as well, in a new featurette from Disney which can be seen above.
Emma Stone says that when she puts on the black and white wig she begins to really feel like Cruella de Vil and that's not too shocking. Emma Stone looks perfect as Cruella de Vil and in the clip we see a time lapse video of the actress being physically transformed into the character. Once you look at yourself in the mirror and you look like that, the character must really come to life.
The last time we saw one of these live-action takes on an animated classic from Disney that worked as an origin story it was Maleficent. That movie was built on the premise that the story we knew from the animated Sleeping Beauty wasn't the real story. It made the villain, if not heroic, at the very least sympathetic. However, that doesn't seem to be the case with Cruella, this movie appears to be telling us that Cruella de Vil is just as bad as we think she is, and this is the story of how she became that way.
Which is not to say the movie won't try to have us rooting for her. Cruella's story is one of vengeance, and that's something we can all at least understand, I'm sure. Cruella may be a bad guy, but that doesn't mean there aren't other people who are worse, or that Cruella isn't at least a bit justified in her issues with others.
The fact that she's a bad guy doesn't mean that she's without good qualities. Cruella will see the young woman as an aspiring designer who has a real talent for it. She's taken under the wing of Emma Thompson's Baroness, and for some reason, stolen designs if I had to guess, the Baroness does her dirty.
The clip above also gives us better look at another character of interest. Kirby Howell-Baptiste will play the role of Anita in Cruella. The character is important because Anita is one half of the couple that raises the dalmatians Pongo and Perdita in 101 Dalmatians from which this story comes. It's mentioned in the animated film that Cruella and Anita are old school friends, and while it's unclear how big a role Anita will play here, if we happen to get a Cruella sequel, she could become a very important character indeed.
Cruella opens in theaters and on Disney+, via Premiere Access, on May 28.
