Murray Baer – Google

It was entertaining and interesting for sure, and the cast did well. However, Bruce Wayne simply did not exist in this film. His Batman was good, but his Bruce Wayne was just emo and charmless. Also, just gonna say it, I hated the Riddler, he was equally charmless. Which given that he’s one of the more whimsical and playful characters in the Batman series, it felt sort of empty seeing him portrayed this way. They could have met in the middle a bit, made him more serious (which is clearly what they wanted,) but still left some of the charm of the Riddler. A little “riddle me this” and what not. They did not do that though, he was just portrayed as bitter and angry. Not much of a character really. Other than that, I though it was a great film. The cinematographer was good, the plot was interesting enough for a first instalment, lots of good stuff.

I wasn’t expecting much from Cruella, I had intended to watch it at home, but I actually only went to see it to get in an air conditioned room while Vancouver is having this heat wave. I was pleasantly surprised. It was very well throughout, with lots of clever plots, good actors, good cinematography, good production design, all around a great movie. Most of all I really appreciated how well they kept up the suspension of disbelief. They were maybe only two moments where I questioned the logic, it mostly all made sense and had believable obstacles and plot twists to drive the character’s arc. Not an easy thing to do when you are trying to make a character go from good to bad but not go over bored so that their hated by the viewers. Well done, this might actually be my favourite recent Disney film.