One Hundred and One Dalmatians

This article is about the 1961 animated film. For other uses, see 101 Dalmatians.

One Hundred and One Dalmatians
Original theatrical release poster
Directed by	Wolfgang Reitherman Clyde Geronimi Hamilton Luske
Written by	The Hundred and One Dalmatians: Dodie Smith Screenplay: Bill Peet
Produced by	Walt Disney
Starring	Rod Taylor Cate Bauer Ben Wright Lisa Davis Betty Lou Gerson J. Pat O'Malley Frederick Worlock Martha Wentworth
Narrated by	Rod Taylor
Music by	Score: George Bruns Songs: Mel Leven
Production company	Walt Disney Productions
Distributed by	Buena Vista Distribution
Release date	January 25, 1961
Running time	79 minutes
Country	Template:FilmUS
Language	English
Budget	$4,000,000 USD (estimated)
Box office	$215,880,014

One Hundred and One Dalmatians (abbreviated as 101 Dalmatians) is a Template:Fy animated feature produced by Walt Disney and first released to theaters on January 25, 1961 by Buena Vista Distribution. The seventeenth animated feature in the Walt Disney Animated Classics, it is based on the novel The Hundred and One Dalmatians by Dodie Smith.

The film features Rod Taylor as the voice of Pongo, the first of the Dalmatians, and Betty Lou Gerson as the voice of the villainous Cruella de Vil. As in the book, the film centers around a bunch of dalmatian puppies, kidnapped by the villainous Cruella de Vil, who wants to use their fur to sell as coats, and the fate of the kidnapped puppies that Pongo and Perdita, their parents, must save from Cruella.

In the years since the original release of the film, Disney has taken the property in various directions. The earliest of these endeavors was the 1996 live-action remake 101 Dalmatians starring Glenn Close as Cruella De Vil. In this version none of the animals talk. This version's success in theaters led to 102 Dalmatians, released on November 22, 2000.

After the first live-action version of the movie, a cartoon called 101 Dalmatians: The Series was launched. The designs of the characters were stylized further, to allow for economic animation, and appeal to the contemporary trends.

Most recently, 101 Dalmatians II: Patch's London Adventure, a sequel to the original animated film, was released direct-to-video on January 21, 2003.

Plot

Pongo is a dalmatian that lives in a London bachelor flat with his owner Roger Radcliffe, a songwriter. Bored with bachelor life, Pongo decides to find a wife for Roger and a mate for himself. While watching various female dog-human pairs out the window, he spots the perfect couple, a woman named Anita and her female dalmatian, Perdita. He quickly gets Roger out of the house and drags him through the park to arrange a meeting. Pongo accidentally causes both Roger and Anita to fall into a pond, but it works out well as the couple falls in love. Both the human couple and the dog couple marry.

Later, Perdita gives birth to 15 puppies. One almost dies, but Roger is able to revive it by rubbing it in a towel (because of which, they would name the pup, 'Lucky'). That same night, they are visited by Cruella De Vil, a wealthy former schoolmate of Anita's. She offers to buy the entire litter of puppies for a large sum, but Roger says they are not selling any of the puppies. Weeks later, she hires Jasper and Horace Badun to steal all of the puppies. When Scotland Yard is unable to prove she stole them or find the puppies, Pongo and Perdita use the "Twilight Bark", normally a canine gossip line, to ask for help from the other dogs in England.

Colonel, an old sheepdog, along with his compatriots Captain, a gray horse, and Sergeant Tibbs, a tabby cat, find the puppies in a place called Hell Hall (aka The De Vil Place), along with other Dalmatian puppies that Cruella had purchased from various dog stores. Tibbs learns the puppies are going to be made into dog-skin fur coats and the Colonel quickly sends word back to London. Pongo and Perdita immediately leave London to retrieve their puppies. They arrive just as Horace and Jasper are about to kill the puppies. While the adult dogs attack the two men, Colonel and Tibbs guide them from the house.

After a happy reunion with their own puppies, the Pongos realize there are 84 other puppies with them. Horrified at Cruella's plans, they decide to adopt all of the puppies, certain that Roger and Anita would never reject them. The dogs begin making their way back to London, aided by other animals along the way, with Cruella and the Baduns giving chase. In one town, they cover themselves with soot so they appear to be labrador retrievers, then pile inside a moving van going back to London. As the van is leaving, melting snow clears off the soot and Cruella sees them. She follows the van in her car and rams it, but the Baduns, trying to cut off the van from above, end up colliding with her. Both vehicles crash into a deep ravine. Cruella yells in frustration as the van drives away.

Back in London, Roger and Anita are attempting to celebrate Christmas and Roger's first big hit, a song about Cruella, but they miss their canine friends. Suddenly barking is heard outside and after their nanny opens the door, the house is filled with dogs. After wiping away more of the soot, the couple is delighted to realize their companions have returned home. They decide to use the money from the song to buy a large house in the country so they can keep all 101 Dalmatians.

Production

Development

File:DodieSmith 101Dalmations.jpg

Dodie Smith's The Hundred and One Dalmatians

Dodie Smith published her children's book, The Hundred and One Dalmatians in 1956. The story was inspired by an incident with a friend who commented that Smith's Dalmatians would make attractive fur coats. The following year, Walt Disney learned of the book and, intrigued by its premise, purchased the rights to adapt the story into an animated feature film.

Disney and Smith kept in touch through a letter correspondence that lasted during and beyond the film's production. In one of her earlier letters, Smith stated that when she was writing her book, she had hoped Disney would adapt it into a film and even visualized the characters and plot as if they were animated. Before production on Dalmatians was complete, Disney proposed that Smith come up with another story for the studio. Despite the letter correspondence continuing until well after Dalmatians was released, another collaboration between the two never materialized.

At the time of the film's production, Disney was pre-occupatied with the expansion of his company; accordingly, not as much of his attention could be devoted to One Hundred and One Dalmatians. Thus, following the completion of Sleeping Beauty in February 1958, pre-production on Dalmatians was assigned to Bill Peet, an artist and story writer who began working for Disney in 1937 and contributed to films such as Dumbo, Cinderella and Peter Pan. Peet scripted and storyboarded the entire film himself — a task typically assigned to a whole crew.

Peet's interpretation of Damatians was received warmly by Smith, who said that the script, which changed the story's structure and further defined the characters' personalities, improved on her book. She did, however, express sadness over the exclusions and re-naming of some of the characters. Many of the Disney animators were excited to begin work on the film because they felt that Peet's infusion of contemporary thematic elements into the narrative represented a change from the types of films they had done before.

Early in development for The Rescuers, the Disney animators briefly considered reusing Cruella de Vil as the villainess, but quickly dropped the idea, since they felt that reusing Cruella would make The Rescuers feel like a sequel to an otherwise unrelated film. As a result, Madame Medusa, the villainess in the final film, shared several similarities with Cruella, including the tendancy to drive wrecklessly, the fixation on a single goal, and a short, fiery temper.

Animation

One Hundred and One Dalmatians marked a departure for Disney's animation department from traditional methods. Prior to Dalmatians, animators' sketches were traced over and colored manually, frame by frame, onto celluloids, clear plastic sheets that were laid over backgrounds and presented in the final version of the film. However, this method was costly and time-consuming, and after Sleeping Beauty failed financially, Disney's animation department was forced to look for a more economic approach.

"The Xerox process was a delight, really, for the animator ... because this was the first time we ever saw our drawings directly on the screen."

Marc Davis, Directing Animator

Ub Iwerks, a friend of Disney's, began investigating Xerography, a photocopying technique that makes use of electrostatic printing and photography to reproduce images. Iwerks correctly believed that the process could be applied to copying images from animators' sketches directly on to clear celluloids, eliminating the need for others to do so; this new method resulted in the closure of the studio's ink and paint department after Sleeping Beauty, the climactic scene of which had been produced using the technique. Xerography was further tested in a short called Goliath II, prior to being used on Dalmatians.

Three hundred artists worked for three years with over 1,000 shades of color to produce the film's 113,760 frames on a budget of $4 million.

Serveral famous animators from the group known as Disney's Nine Old Men animated characters and directed sequences for the film. Wolfgang Reitherman directed "The Twilight Bark" and chose to include several characters from Lady and the Tramp in the sequence, including Jock and Lady. Frank Thomas and Ollie Johnston were responsible for the design and animation of the dogs. An entire unit was responsible for animating the 6,469,952 spots on the dogs in the film; Pongo was drawn with 72, Perdita with 68 and each puppy with 32. Milt Kahl designed Roger and Anita, who was based on the character's voice actress Lisa Davis.

File:Cruella.gif

Marc Davis' design for the film's primary antagonist Cruella De Vil

Cruella De Vil was designed and entirely animated by Marc Davis, whose animating career came to an end after production on Dalmatians was complete. Many of Cruella's characteristics, poses and mannerisms were developed by Bill Peet in the storyboarding stages but the character's black and white hair was the idea of author Dodie Smith's. Davis modeled Cruella's movements after those of Mary Wickes, who portrayed the character in live-action reference footage. The character's trademark cigarette holder was modeled after Davis' own. Despite positive reception to the character, Davis did admit in his later years that he wondered if he designed Cruella too extravagently.

The use of Xerography required animators to begin drawing more neatly and precisely; they were encouraged to avoid showing their constructions and errors because the images on paper would be transferred directly onto the celluloids that would appear in the film. Many of the animators' assistants were called upon to fix drawings for neatness but some errors are still visible in the final cut.

Ken Anderson, an animator who won Disney's praise for the backgrounds he developed for the Silly Symphonies, was the film's production designer. Anderson came up with a contemporary, angular and slightly abstract style for the background that he wanted to unify with the animation by using Xerography. Anderson's initial background drawings were revised by Ernie Nordli. They were then Xeroxed over color sylist Walt Peregoy's abstract colorings of background objects and landscapes such that background colors were not always confined to the lines of the objects they were a part of. Having multiple layers ensured that the quality of the final backgrounds matched that of the animation. Disney, however, was not initially pleased. He preferred the cleaner backgrounds of his earlier films such as Sleeping Beauty and Cinderella, but, eventually, accepted Anderson's work.

The idea to use the Xerox machines for the copying of drawings onto celluloids was expanded upon when it came to animating the vehicles. Cardboard models of Cruella's car, Jasper and Horace's van and the van the Dalmatians hide in at the end of the film were created and outlined with black lines. Each model was propped up on wooden wheels that were hidden beneath a black sheet; kite strings were attached to the tops of the models and were pulled to mobilize the vehicles. Springs were included in the models' designs to achieve a rumbling effect. The Xerox camera was then used to recreate images of the black lines and transfer them onto celluloids. In the climactic scene, a car chase, Cruella's car is shown driving up a snowy hill that was actually a model of a hill with sand substituting for snow.

Graphic reproduction

The film is a landmark in animation history for many reasons. It is the first Disney animated film to be set in a contemporary setting. It is also the first Disney film created by a single story man (Bill Peet). The production of the film also signaled a change in the graphic style of Disney's animation. Ub Iwerks, in charge of special processes at the studio, had been experimenting with Xerox photography to aid in animation. By 1959 he had modified a Xerox camera to transfer drawings by animators directly to cels, eliminating the inking process and preserving the spontaneity of the penciled elements.

The introduction of xerography eased graphic reproduction requirements, but at the price of being unable to deviate from a scratchy outline style because of the new (and time and money saving) technology's limitations. Since the line would not have fit the "round" Disney drawing style used until then (with the exception of Sleeping Beauty), a more graphic, angular style was chosen for this and subsequent films. Rotoscoping, a technique formerly used for tracing live action human characters into animated drawings, became less important. Another reason for its look was that the animators were used to producing sketchy drawings, as the clean-up was done in the process of transferring the drawings to the cels. With the hand inkers gone, the animation remained as the animators drew it. Later it became common to do clean-up on paper before the animation was copied, and with time and experience, the process improved. According to Chuck Jones, Disney was able to bring the movie in for about half of what it would have cost if they'd had to animate all the dogs and spots.

The studio cut its animation department after the failure of the very expensive Sleeping Beauty, resulting in a reduction of staff from over 500 to less than 100. Walt Disney, who for some years had spent his attention more towards television and his Disneyland amusement park and less on his animated features, disliked this development. The "sketchy" graphic style would remain the norm at Disney for years until the technology improved prior to the release of The Rescuers. In later animated features the Xeroxed lines could be printed in different colors. Unlike previous Walt Disney animated features, One Hundred and One Dalmatians features only three songs, with just one, "Cruella De Vil", playing a big part in the film. Even this song isn't sung in one setting (a scene between Cruella and Anita splits it into two parts). The other two songs are "Kanine Krunchies Jingle" (sung by Lucille Bliss, who voiced Anastasia in Disney's 1950 film Cinderella), and "Dalmatian Plantation" in which only two lines are sung at the film's closure.

To achieve the spotted Dalmatians, the animators used to think of the spot pattern as a constellation. Once they had one "anchor spot", the next was placed in relation to that one spot, and so on and so on until the full pattern was achieved. All total, 101 Dalmatians featured 6,469,952 spots, with Pongo sporting 72 spots, Perdita 68, and each puppy having 32.

Live-action reference

As done with other Disney films, Walt Disney hired an actress to perform live-action scenes as a reference for the animation process. Actress Helene Stanley performed the live-action reference for the character of Anita. She did the same kind of work for the characters of Cinderella and Princess Aurora in Sleeping Beauty.

According to Christopher Finch, author of The Art of Walt Disney:

Disney insisted that all scenes involving human characters should be shot first in live-action to determine that they would work before the expensive business of animation was permitted to start. The animators did not like this way of working, feeling it detracted from their ability to create character. [...] [The animators] understood the necessity for this approach and in retrospect acknowledged that Disney had handled things with considerable subtlety.

Music

One Hundred and One Dalmatians was scored by George Bruns, who, in keeping with the film's contemporary feel, avoided the orchestral music used in earlier Disney films and, instead, incorporated jazz into his compositions.

Mel Leven wrote five original songs for the film, three of which were used in the final cut. Two of these three were different versions of what he originally composed. The following is a list of the musical numbers featured in the film, in the order of their presentation:

• "Cruella De Vil" is the first song featured in the film. Before coming to the version that was used in the final cut, Leven had composed another version entitled "The Creation of Cruella De Vil." However, when driving to work one day, Leven decided that a blues melody was more appropriate for the character and rewrote it. Ben Wright, the speaking voice of Roger, recorded the song over two days in 1958. His singing was replaced with that of Bill Lee's for the final version. The version heard on the radio at the end of the film was sung by Jeanne Bruns, who recorded three different versions for the filmmakers to choose from.

• "Kanine Krunchies" was written as a spoof of the television commercials of the late 1950s. At least nine different singers and actors sang the song in 1959 before the filmmakers decided upon Lucille Bliss' recording for use in the final version of the film.

• "Dalmatian Plantation" is the last song featured in the film. The song was re-written several times after Leven's original version was rejected by Bill Peet, who felt that the film's ending song should have words that rhymed with a "shun" sound. The final version used in the film overlapped many of Leven's lyrics with barking noises.

The other two songs Leven wrote, as well as one written by Buddy Baker and Tom Adair, were included as bonus features in the Platinum Edition DVD release. They are presented in alphabetical order:

• "Cheerio, Good-Bye, Toodle-oo, Hip Hip!" was a song that was written in October 1958 and was intended to be sung by the puppies as they ventured toward London, concluding with a Christmas theme in accordance with the film's ending.

• "Don't Buy A Parrot From A Sailor" was a song Leven wrote the characters of Jasper and Horace that was proposed for use in a scene at the De Vil Mansion.

• "March of the One Hundred and One" was written by Baker and Adair in 1959 and was supposed to replace "Cheerio, Good-Bye, Toodle-oo, Hip Hip!" in the film's climactic scene. Despite being recorded by cast members and storyboarded, the song was not included in the final version of the film.

Cast

File:Movies cruella.jpg

Cruella DeVil takes out her anger on Jasper and Horace, her bumbling henchman. This image illustrates the exaggerated mannerisms and appearance of De Vil, key to her character's continued success among audiences and critics alike.

• Rod Taylor as Pongo, One of the film's Dalmatian protagonists. He is Roger's pet, Perdita's mate and the father of 15 of the 99 puppies.
• Lisa Daniels and Cate Bauer as Perdita, Anita's Dalmatian pet, Pongo's mate and the mother of 15 of the 99 puppies. Lisa Daniels voiced Perdita for the first two thirds of the film but married and moved to New York, leaving her voice work as Perdita incomplete. Cate Bauer voiced the character for the remainder of the film.
• Betty Lou Gerson as Cruella De Vil, The film's primary antagonist who has Pongo and Perdita's puppies kidnapped with the intention of making fur coats out of them. She is an eccentric rich woman who has an obsession for pelts, but is only shown wearing a single, voluminous white coat. Beneath this, she wears a skintight swimming suit. Cruella smokes constantly and drives a long red Bugatti Type 57. She is considered to be among Disney's best villins, and is number 6 on the Ultimate Disney Villians countdown
• Ben Wright as Roger Radcliffe - Pongo's owner and Anita's husband. He works as a songwriter and later becomes rich when creating the song about "Cruella de Vil". Roger's singing voice was provided by Bill Lee.
• Lisa Davis as Anita Radcliffe, Perdita's owner and Roger's wife.
• Martha Wentworth as Nanny, The Radcliffes' maid. She is very maternal and fussy, detests Cruella, has no patience for teasing, and is very attached to the puppies.
• Frederick Worlock and J. Pat O'Malley as Horace and Jasper, respectively, Cruella's comic relief henchmen who carry out the kidnapping. Jasper is tall and thin, while Horace is short and fat; otherwise, they are obviously twin brothers. They argue often. Although they appear to be stupid, Horace appears to be the more intelligent of the two, but is absolutely intimidated by his brother, who has the more ready tongue. Jasper has a closed mind to the possibility of sapience in dogs—as well as the equal possibility of cleverness in his brother. He drinks alcohol, whereas Horace eats sandwiches. Both enjoy watching a weekly television program called "What's My Crime?", wherein the misdeeds of lawbreakers are guessed by a panel of contestants. One of the guest stars of this program, Percival "Meathead" Faunsquater, is an acquaintance of theirs.
• J. Pat O'Malley, Thurl Ravenscroft, and David Frankham as The Colonel, the Captain, and Sergeant Tibbs - three animals who aid Pongo and Perdita in finding the puppies.
• Mimi Gibson as Lucky, the runt puppy from Pongo and Perdita who nearly dies after being born. He is given the name "Lucky" because of being revived by Roger. He loves watching T.V. Lucky is played as a troublemaker.
• Barbara Baird as Rolly, a pup who is always hungry, and shown as pudgier than the rest of the young puppies. His collar is tight around his neck with his fat bunched up around it.
• Mickey Maga as Patch, a pup who loves Thunderbolt and has a spot on his eye. Patch is aggressive, barking and growling, but is being afraid of Cruella De Vil. He is the star of the animated sequel, 101 Dalmations II: Patch's London Adventure.
• Sandra Abbott as Penny, the only pup not named for her appearance or habits. She is one of only two female pups, the other being Freckles.
• Mary Wickes as Freckles, a pup who has a pattern of spots over the bridge of her nose resembling freckles on a human child. Freckles is shown very tired, or asking many questions.

Release

Disney hoped to have One Hundred and One Dalmatians ready for theatrical release by Christmas 1960. The film was completed on time and was released on January 25, 1961, exactly one month later. During its initial run, the film grossed $14 million in the United States alone, making a $10 million profit for the studio. The film was re-released to theaters four more times throughout the following thirty years, the first time being on January 1, 1969. During this second run, Dalmatians made another $18 million. The third re-release, on January 1, 1979, grossed $19 million. On December 20, 1985, almost five months after the Disney failer that was The Black Cauldron, which was released on the 24 of July of the same year, Dalmatians was released theatrically a fourth time and grossed another $33 million to become the twenty-seventh highest grossing film of the year. The fifth and final theatrical release, on July 12, 1991 was the twentieth highest grossing feature of 1991 and made $60.8 million to bring the film's domestic total to $144.9 million. When this number is adjusted for ticket price inflation, however, the film's cumulative domestic gross is $707.4 million, making it the eleventh highest grossing film in general and the second highest grossing animated film, after Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. The film was the tenth highest grossing film of 1961, accruing $6,400,000 in distributors' domestic (U.S. and Canada) rentals during its first year of release, and one of the studio's most popular films of the decade. The 1991 reissue was the twentieth highest earning film of the year for domestic earnings in a year when the studio had few hits. It has earned $215,880,014 in worldwide box office earnings during its lengthy history.

One Hundred and One Dalmatians theatrical release history

Release	Gross (USD)	% Total
January 25, 1961	$14,000,000	9.7%
January 1, 1969	$18,000,000	12.4%
January 1, 1979	$19,000,000	13.2%
December 20, 1985	$33,000,000	22.8%
July 12, 1991	$60,800,000	41.9%
Total	$144,900,000	100.0%

One Hundred and One Dalmatians international box office revenue

Source	Gross	% Total
Domestic	$144,900,000	67.1%
Foreign	$71,000,000	32.9%
Worldwide	$215,900,000	100.0%

Reception

One Hundred and One Dalmatians was the tenth highest grossing film of 1961, accruing $6,400,000 in distributors' domestic (U.S. and Canada) rentals during its first year of release, and one of the studio's most popular films of the decade. The film was re-issued to theaters in 1969, 1979, 1985, and 1991. The 1991 reissue was the twentieth highest earning film of the year for domestic earnings. It has earned $215,880,014 in worldwide box office earnings during its lengthy history, and currently holds a 97% "fresh" rating from critics and users on Rotten Tomatoes.

Sequels and spin-offs

In the years since the original release of the movie, Disney has taken the property in various directions. The earliest of these endeavors was the live-action remake, 101 Dalmatians. Starring Glenn Close as Cruella De Vil, none of the animals talked in this 1996 edition. This version's success in theaters led to 102 Dalmatians, released on November 22, 2000.

After the first live-action version of the movie, a cartoon called 101 Dalmatians: The Series was launched. The designs of the characters were stylized further, to allow for economic animation, and appeal to the contemporary trends.

Most recently, 101 Dalmatians II: Patch's London Adventure, the official sequel to the original animated film, was released straight-to-VHS/DVD on January 21, 2003.

External links

• Disney's 101 Dalmatians Platinum Edition DVD Website
• One Hundred and One Dalmatians at IMDb