Review: Cats

[dorchadas]

"At 9:20pm? That movie? Then?"
-wanderluster_kp

"You guys are insane. I would rather die."
-My Japanese tutor

"The second time through was genuinely everything I hoped it would be 😻"
-arsduo

" Cats , or 'What if American Idol Winners got Reincarnated?' "
-tom.hen.12

" Cats was okay."
-hillel.wayne

"That was the worst movie I’ve ever seen."
-britshlez

So I saw Cats .

So what I knew about Cats beforehand was all about the musical. My parents owned an Andrew Lloyd Webber's Greatest Hits CD, and two of the songs were on there: "Magical Mister Mistoffelees" and "Memory." I'd since heard it described as a poignant meditation on lost youth, aging, the frailty of existence, and the temporary nature of all things, surrounded by a thick shell of a cat dance-off to determine who can die and go to Cat Heaven. I'd seen a bunch of tweets from people who saw the movie, having no idea what the musical was about, and then said, "Wait, this ran on Broadway for twenty years?!?" And of course, I've read the article about when the exact moment that reviewers lost their minds was.

For me, I think it was once I realized it was impossible to tell how big the cats were.

The most striking thing about Cats is that it's probably the horniest movie I've ever seen. With the cats constantly writhing about and rubbing against each other, and with the way that they're all in fur, except some of them are wearing clothes, so that means most of the cats are naked, which wouldn't normally be a problem except that they look much more like people than cats. Most of them still have human faces! And we saw Cats 1.0, the unpatched version with Dame Judy Dench's bewedding-ringed human hand and some cats still wearing sneakers, which just made things so much worse. And with the camera angles and dancing, I told people as I was leaving:

"The last time I spent that long looking at peoples' crotches, I was actively having sex with them."

I saw a tweet that said the movie would be much hornier if actual furries had been behind it, and that's probably true. It also would probably have been far less uncomfortable if that were the case. Is Old Deuteronomy wearing a coat, or is that her fur? How was Jennyanydots able to unzip her fur and come out in a dress? How does this work? Are they wearing clothes, or skin? How big are they? They look too much like cats to be people and too much like people to be cats. What is happening?

In a theatre, where people are cats through costuming and posture and lighting, I can buy into the illusion. In the movie, where people are (mostly) cats because of nightmare CGI, I can't.

So maybe that's why the audience laughed. The theater was pretty full--impressive for a Tuesday night--and when the Universal logo appeared on the screen, a couple people laughed. And the laughing continued for most of the movie. When Idris Elba vanished in a puff of smoke while saying "Ineffable!" people cracked up. When Taylor Swift descended on a shiny moon to distribute to the assembled Jellicle Cats and someone in the audience said:

"Yaaaaaaaaaaaas bitch!

everyone laughed. During "Magical Mister Mistoffelees," we started clapping along with the song.

Which isn't to say that the direction is good. I brought up the Rocky Horror Picture Show comparison and britshlez said that was actually a good movie, and I wouldn't go that far, but it does have a plot and holds coherently together. Cats is a series of loosely-connected dance numbers, most of which have completely different moods. That works much better on a stage, where the norms of musical theatre allow for that kind of variation, but in a movie it's weird. It's weird to jump from song to song where the mood keeps changing and where so much bizarre imagery is happening in the background. At one point, I leaned over to arsduo and said:

"From the point of view of the mice, this is a horror movie."

The mice showed up mostly during Jennyanydots's segment, but there'd be periodic mice elsewhere. They had the faces of children, and every time they were among the cats they'd scream and beg for mercy and run for their lives. This among cats dancing around and singing about themselves. I'm just glad none of them ever got eaten. I mean, when Grizabella climbed into the chandelier-balloon and Mister Mistoffelees lit all the candles around her, I said, "Ah, yes, begin the ritual sacrifice," so it's not like there wasn't horror tones already. Cats is a bunch of cats going to Old Deuteronomy and saying "Choose me for execution! I want to die!"

I had some issues with the direction, too. Grizabella spent the whole time looking like someone was going to hit her, and occasionally some of the other cats looked like they were going to, so that made sense. But all I could see when she was singing were the giant amounts of snot coming out of her nose. Old Deuteronomy gets Thanos-snapped by Macavity ("Meow!") and ends up on a boat, and Mister Mistoffelees has to get her back with his magic. On that CD I mentioned, the performance is triumphant, all about how Mister Mistoffelees is magical and amazing and can totally save the day. "Oh! Well I never was there ever a cat so clever as magical mister Mistoffelees" is a boast of his genius. But in this movie, Mister Mistoffelees is a shrinking violet with no confidence in his magic at all, singing in a quavering voice and waving his wand to no effect. That same line is him trying to convince himself of his worth. When Old Deuteronomy does return, she's just suddenly behind everyone, with no actual magic and certainly not the overtly-magical dusting of Macavity. Mister Mistoffelees's whole big moment is totally undercut.

"The magic didn't work, she just walked back."
-hillel.wayne

On the other hand, I wish I loved my job as much as Skimbleshanks loves his.

Due to it being Tuesday night, tickets were $6, and I feel like that was an appropriate price. While britshlez felt like arsduo should have paid her to come, I disagree that it's boring--based on the audience reaction, I think that Cats will join the pantheon of late-night bad movies, maybe not at the heights of The Room, but the benefit is that Cats has a lot of easy sing-alongs and The Room does not. And you know? I might even go to one.

I have seen Cats , and I cannot go back.

"My friend said they were horrible and impressive beyond my most fevered imaginings; that what was thrown on a screen in the darkened room prophesied things none but Nyarlathotep dared prophesy, and that in the sputter of his sparks there was taken from men that which had never been taken before yet which shewed only in the eyes. And I heard it hinted abroad that those who knew Nyarlathotep looked on sights which others saw not."
-H.P. Lovecraft, "Nyarlathotep"

Comments

[symbioid]

I bet I'd enjoy cats better than I enjoyed Moulin Rouge. Maybe because Moulin Rouge feels like it's supposed to be good but the direction and constant MTV style moving camera just made me ill. At least seems to be shit, so maybe I could enjoy it for the cheese.

[dorchadas]

Moulin Rouge was ruined for me because one of my university roommates was in Glee Club and watched the first half-hour roughly a hundred times, trying to arrange the songs. I've never seen any other part of the movie, and after that, I don't think I want to.