in 1964 A young girl named Estella was
born with her hair half-black and half-white She has always had a creative passion and
a rather feisty personality Her mother Catherine notices
and nicknames her Cruella Catherine brings Estella to a private school
where she promises to behave However, the other
children mock her because of her hair and her only friend is another girl named Anita,
along with a dog she finds and names Buddy After causing much mischief throughout her
time at the school Estella is expelled
Catherine laments their situation and goes to ask for help from her employer
who is hosting a winter ball at their estate, Hellman Hall
Catherine instructs Estella to stay in the car, but she
steps out for a moment to observe the party Estella and Buddy sneak into the mansion, where
Estella, who has always had a love for fashion, is in awe of all the gowns and dresses at the ball
Unfortunately, Buddy gets out and after Estella chases after him
she is found by a valet named John Estella escapes him
and Buddy is chased by three vicious Dalmatians Estella runs outside, where Catherine is talking
to her employer, Baroness Von Hellman The Dalmatians run past Estella and
pounce on Catherine hard enough to push her over the edge of a
cliff to her death, which Estella witnesses The partygoers go outside to see what happened,
with the Baroness lying and claiming that Catherine was trying to accost her for money
Estella runs with Buddy and travels in a garbage truck
Estella makes it to Regent’s Park in London where she had wanted to go with her mother
and she realizes that she is missing the necklace her mother had given her to hold onto
She falls asleep by the fountain and is found the next morning
by two delinquent boys brothers Horace and Jasper Badun,
along with their dog Wink They are trying to swipe
from the fountain when they meet Estella Jasper determines that she doesn’t have a family
and the three run away together when an officer catches them
Estella joins the boys at their hideout and Jasper tells Horace that
they should keep her around because having a girl might make her seem like
an innocent distraction to people they plan to rob Estella dyes her hair to go along with the schemes
and be unrecognizable Ten years later
Estella continues to pull off crimes with Horace and Jasper
to support themselves, plus Buddy and Wink Estella also continues to work on
her fashion ideas On Estella’s birthday
the brothers surprise her with a job for the Liberty department store downtown
since Jasper had noticed her always staring at the place
She is very grateful to them Estella begins working at
Liberty as a cleaning woman for a rotten boss named Gerald
He never gives Estella a chance to present her ideas
and treats her awfully Horace and Jasper bring her lunch
and Horace thinks the place can be robbed, but Estella wants to work honestly,
only to have the trash she is taking out get poured onto her when the bag rips open
Gerald then brings her back in and tells her to clean overnight
She steals a liquor bottle from his office that night
and goes to the window display, which Estella finds hideous
Estella wakes up hungover by the window with Horace, Jasper, and other patrons
seeing the display which Estella changed
radically to appeal more to her style Gerald sees and prepares to fire Estella
until he is informed that the Baroness, who owns the store, is arriving
Estella hides with Horace and Jasper, who proceed to nick Gerald’s wallet and grab a few goodies
The Baroness asks who did the window display, which she actually likes
Gerald says that Estella is the culprit and is being fired, but she instead
tells her assistant Jeffrey to give Estella her business card
Estella runs off with the Baduns in celebration of moving on up
Estella begins to work at the House of Baroness, coming up with dress ideas and designs
She sees very quickly that the Baroness is a cold and soulless woman
she only critiques the work of her employers and has rather sociopathic tendencies
such as using a razor to cut the sleeves off Estella’s design
and not care when she accidentally nicks Estella’s hand
After work she stops by a shop operated by a man named Artie
who quickly befriends Estella since she likes his fashion sense
She also notices a red dress made by the Baroness in the window
Throughout her time working, Estella shows the Baroness that she truly does
have a talent for fashion However, Estella changes
her tune toward the Baroness when she sees that she is wearing
her mother’s necklace despite the Baroness
claiming it is a family heirloom When she tells Estella that a former
employer tried to rob her and then fell off a cliff
Estella begins to feel pure hatred for the Baroness
Estella brings the news to Horace and Jasper, seeing it as an opportunity to pull off a heist
especially seeing as how the Baroness is set to host an upcoming gala
Estella memorizes the Baroness’s schedule and how the guards work and move around
to plan for the heist She knows that she will
be recognized if she tries to attend but she knows someone who can arrive
On the night of the gala Horace and Jasper sneak
into the building under the guise of pest exterminators, using Wink as a fake rat
Jasper then makes his way to the security cameras as the heist commences
Estella leaves her wig off and retains her natural hair
showing up in disguise as Cruella and wearing the Baroness’s
dress she saw in Artie’s shop She stuns everyone in attendance,
including the typically unimpressed Baroness Also viewing and astonished is Anita, who is a
journalist and recognizes Estella from her hair Estella subdues the Baroness’s guards before
having a seat with the Baroness When Horace approaches the safe
with the necklace, he finds it empty, and Estella sees that the Baroness is wearing it
Just as the Baroness realizes Cruella is trespassing,
Jasper sets off some rats into the party, causing a distraction that allows Estella to snatch the
necklace off the Baroness and give it to Buddy Unfortunately, the Baroness’s Dalmatians come out,
and one of them swallows it after trying to take it back from Buddy
Estella sees that the Baroness is using a whistle to control the dogs,
which is what she also used when Catherine died, meaning the Baroness deliberately
called upon her dogs to kill Catherine After their truck is towed, Estella hot-wires
a car to get away with the Baduns and their dogs Estella stops and cries over the fact that
her boss murdered her mother The next morning, Estella is
still acting as her Cruella persona, ordering Horace and Jasper to steal the Baroness’s dogs,
so one of them can pass the necklace Estella then goes off to Anita’s workplace,
still as Cruella, and asks her to get the word out about her personal exploits
Meanwhile, Horace and Jasper find the Dalmatians as they are being given baths,
and they use Wink as bait to get them to come out, before taking them away in a van
Cruella soon begins to crash many more events held by the Baroness
and with Anita covering it in the paper, Cruella becomes a fashion sensation, completely upstaging
and overshadowing the Baroness She grows more and more agitated,
even firing her lawyer Roger for failing to have Cruella arrested, then instructs
Estella to come up with a new design for an upcoming spring collection presentation
Estella orders a special material and creates the dress
which the Baroness is clearly impressed by although she plans to take credit for it
Estella has Horace and Jasper sneak into the House of Baroness
and create a commotion to make it appear as though Cruella tried to break in
leading the Baroness to have her dresses stored inside a top secret vault
Back at home, Estella’s increasingly arrogant behavior has begun to put a
strain on her relationship with Horace and Jasper The Baroness holds her spring collection show,
but when they open the vault, a swarm of moths fly out, having torn through almost all the dresses
This is because the material with which Estella made her dress were special cocoons
Outside, Horace and Jasper, accompanied by Artie, put on a real show
where Artie sings “I Wanna Be Your Dog” and Cruella emerges with a dress
made of Dalmatian fur leading the Baroness
to think that Cruella killed her dogs When Estella returns home, she finds Horace
and Jasper tied up, with the Baroness and her henchman having deduced that Cruella is Estella
The henchmen grab Estella and tie her to a chair, with the Baroness planning to have Horace
and Jasper framed for killing Cruella in a fire Estella fires back that she knows the Baroness
killed her mother, but by her words, she is implied to have killed others when she doesn’t
immediately know who Estella is talking about She leaves Estella, plus Buddy and Wink,
to burn, but Estella sees a mysterious figure coming to get her
The place burns down, and word spreads that Cruella has died
Estella wakes up in John’s house, along with Buddy and Wink
He brings her Catherine’s necklace and lets her know that it’s been thoroughly bleached, which,
to Estella’s surprise, contains a key to a box Inside the box is a birth certificate of Estella’s
John then reveals that the Baroness is Estella’s true biological mother
Although the Baron did want children, the Baroness thought being a mother would hinder her success,
so she ordered John to have the baby killed after she was born, but he instead found Catherine and
gave Estella to her so she can be raised properly Estella is in disbelief and runs away,
stealing a motorcycle from a delivery boy She rides back to Regent’s Park where she
addresses the space as Catherine While she is in disbelief at being
lied to about Catherine not being her mother, she still viewed her as such, and now decides
to embrace her new identity as Cruella Estella gets a truck and busts through
the front of the police station, then sets Wink inside to get a key to Horace and Jasper’s cells
Although they break out, they are still mad at Estella for how she treated them
After she tells them about the Baroness being her real mother, they go back to John’s home, where
she says that Horace and Jasper are her family They then gather to come up with a final plan
to bring down the Baroness, and Estella later goes to Artie for help as well
Horace comes back with the Baroness’s Panther De Ville car, and Estella likes the sound of the name
The Baroness hosts another ball, were all in attendance are wearing wigs to honor Cruella
Estella grabs a pin and pokes the Baroness, distracting her
long enough to grab her dog whistle She uses it to bring the Dalmatians
outside by the cliffside Horace, Jasper, Artie,
and John gather people to start heading outside Estella gets the Dalmatians to obey her, and then
reveals to the Baroness that she is her daughter The Baroness once again takes credit
for Estella’s talent and pretends to want to
take over the business alongside her She approaches her as if to hug her,
but instead pushes Estella over the edge This is witnessed by everyone, just as the police
arrive, and the Baroness is unable to cover it up Luckily, Estella prepared for this,
and she uses a parachute to stop her fall As the Baroness is being arrested,
Cruella arrives, once again surprising everyone Estella, through narration, reveals that she
bequeathed her will to Cruella, knowing that Baroness would try to kill her,
which now leaves her with her mother’s fortune Cruella holds a funeral for Estella, then takes
Horace and Jasper plus Buddy, Wink, and the newly adopted Dalmatians back to the estate
Together with John and Artie as part of the team, Cruella tells the brothers that she
has some big plans in store Cruella leaves a Dalmatian
puppy named Pongo at Roger’s home and another named Perdita at Anita’s home
Roger, who has now become a songwriter, begins to write Cruella’s iconic theme song