Nine Lives Too Many
Hollywood superstars embarrass themselves in crazy cat costumes
Fuzzy computer-generated people with tails that twitch in mass-synchronization under a full moon. Musical numbers that carry a hazy plot to its fruition: a cat sent away in an extravagant hot air balloon to meet a new beginning in the sky. A choice based on musical talent and merit.
I went to the theater with low expectations. After hearing online reviews—and the rave response of a housemate who has loved “Cats” since she was a kid—I had to see for myself what this mess of a movie was all about.
In 1939, T.S. Eliot published a collection of poetry titled “Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats.” In 1981, Andrew Lloyd Weber’s infamous musical—based on Eliot’s feline-focused verses—premiered on Broadway. The story follows a fictional group of felines classified as “Jellicles,” who every year choose someone to cross to the “Heaviside Layer,” where a fresh start awaits.
The dancers are fantastically skilled. The music works. It’s maddeningly catchy. Most of the lyrics don’t make sense or have significant meaning because it’s not about a world we’re familiar with—that’s absolutely fine. I think we can all agree that nobody goes to see “Cats” in order to be wowed by thoughtfully profound realisms.
The musical skill pronounced throughout comes as no surprise, given another film brought to life by a star-studded cast. It’s like a trip to the Emmys: Jennifer Hudson, Jason Derulo, Judi Dench, Idris Elba, Robbie Fairchild, Taylor Swift, Rebel Wilson and James Corden each have their moment.
Hudson’s passionately emotive performance stuns—as Grizabella, she gives a masterful tear-streaked glimpse into the life of an outcast, and her goosebump-raising vocals shatter the space. Dench, who had to drop out of the original musical production in 1981 due to an injury, returns in her signature, queenly splendor.
Sadly, Hudson’s serious moments are overshadowed by the unerving, comical essence of the film itself, and it’s possible that those sentiments hindered the possibility of humanizing a suffering “other.” While it inspires some empathy, the perturbing aesthetics in particular also inspire laughter—and it’s worrying that an opportunity to uphold the dignity of an outcast may be unhinged and twisted by the nature of the film.
Rebel Wilson and James Corden deliver what’s expected—they’re comedians, and their presence certainly fuels the reception of this film as a self-proclaimed comedy, even though it’s not exactly supposed to be a comedy.
It’s very hard to believe, however, that the film’s team wasn’t self-aware while putting this together—the movie is much too uncanny to fully immerse oneself as an audience member.
“Cats” isn’t a storyline that you can fully invest in. That’s one of its major issues—or perhaps that’s simply its reality.
It almost seems like an experiment, like the goal of this lab was to test just how uncomfortable a general entertainment experience could become without completely losing its audience.
People pay to be terrified, and they love it. This was somewhere in between horror, drama and comedy, although to ascribe it a genre seems difficult.
It’s also very oddly sexual. This might come with stereotypically feline characteristics—the sleekness, the mystery, the snake-like flexibility. There’s a reason “catsuits” are sexualized women’s bodysuits. But in this film, the latent sexual tension is extremely unsettling.
I’ve tried to sit with this movie, to really analyze it from its soul, to do it justice without siding with the simple, condemning reaction.
I see how a musical this strange could work on the stage, where costume and oddity might function in a more digestible way. Remember, they’re not entirely cat—it’s a show about a very human-ish feline culture, told through human bodies.
When it’s done palpably, on stage, it rides on the line of the ridiculous and the comedic. The movie instead becomes eerie.
It nudges the side of us that loves the strange, the unexplainable, but that’s not the musical’s primary goal.
Instead of thrilling us, it tickles our panic response without full deployment. I heavily blame the CGI—directors made the catlike characters way too real. This deflates the story itself, which on its own would be enough to prod at our sense of wonder.
It seems like part of the delight of this show is that the characters are very obviously people in cat costumes. The film tried to make this fact just a little less obvious. This was a mistake.
Of course there’s nothing wrong with whimsical or absurd stories, with creative products that makes us uncomfortable.
I wouldn’t call the story a feat of genius, but after 38 years on the big stage as the fourth-longest running Broadway show, it clearly connects to some central point in the human heart.
The 2019 “Cats” motion picture will never make its way into any sort of respectable canon—but at least it’s thought-provoking.