There are dark vistas of this universe, forbidden plains where even the gods fear to tread. The sights…oh, reader, the sights are obscene, some beautiful, all beyond comprehension. The foul music is discordant and severe, the language made of words and letters unknown to any species that ever lived. Reader, I have been to this waystation between the stars, this howling void at the edge of infinity. I have learned its accursed language, and sung its damned melodies. I have seen Cats.
A lot of hay has been made about the horrific appearance of the title feline monstrosities, but I’m here to tell you: it’s worse. All the cats look like castoffs from the Island of Dr. Moreau, and these Cronenbergian body horrors never become easier to look at. These cats are not something your eyes acclimate to. Throughout Cats‘ nearly two-hour runtime, you get the sense that you are watching something you should not be seeing. Images from Cats will sear themselves into your brain in a way I’ve not experienced since Midsommar. I don’t say this for hyperbole. The design of the cats is way, way off, and does not come close to watchability. The human faces plastered onto feline bodies brings to mind the Dreamcast game Sea-Man, or those terrifying photos of birds with human mouths. Beyond that, the design is inconsistent. Some cats wear clothes, some don’t (at one point, Rebel Wilson’s character unzips her skin to reveal a second skin underneath, this one bedecked in a sequined vest). The male cats are as anatomically correct as a Ken doll, while the females all have prominent breasts, which leads me to my next point.
Cats is unforgivably horny. Horny beyond measure. To be clear, this isn’t something winkingly geared at Furries, who belong to a subculture that I don’t particularly understand. This is a movie for people who want to fuck cats. There are only so many times you can watch one cat make come-hither eyes to another before you look past the fact that these are supposed to be animals.
The plot, insofar as there is one, centers around Victoria (Francesca Hayward), a newly abandoned cat who finds home among a group of strays. They are all jellicle cats, waiting to go to the jellicle ball, so the leader of the jellicle cats can make her jellicle choice. Do you know what jellicle means? Well, neither do, and neither, I suspect, does Cats, because it never bothers to define an important word that the film uses approximately 500 times. Victoria meets a number of strangely-named cats, who all take the time to introduce themselves in songs that serve only that purpose.
What sticks with me about Cats is how annoying it is. Everything here is dialed up to 11, starting with the performances. Rebel Wilson and James Corden come out looking the worst. Both are theoretically capable performers (albeit definitely overused), but here are reduced to nothing but vectors for fat jokes. Make no mistake, Cats is laughing at them, not with them. As Jennyanydots, Wilson performs a mostly lifeless number, notable only for its inclusion of godless abominations, half-human half-cockroaches affronts to God. They are Jennyanydots’ backing dancers, as well as her food, and in scenes like this, Cats genuinely seems like a nightmare. Corden (as Bustopher Jones) tries to gain laughs by interrupting his song to say that he’s sensitive about his weight, never minding the fact that said song is about how Bustopher is fat and loves eating. At one point he sings through a full mouth.
There’s too much gobsmacking craziness to go through here. I could talk about this movie all day. Judi Dench (as Old Deuteronomy) is fine, but she mainly has to scuttle around like a humonculus. Ian McKellan (as Gus the Theater Cat) delivers a genuinely sad performance, although probably not in the way the movie intended. Watching one of our finest living actors lap water from a saucer is depressing in some primal way I can’t articulate. Jason Derulo (as Rum Tum Tugger) probably comes out looking the best; at least he has some idea of what kind of movie he’s in, although it’s nearly impossible to make out anything he’s saying (something about being a curious cat). Others don’t fare so well, namely Laurie Davidson as Mr. Mistoffelees, whose only dance move seems to consist of doffing and donning his hat. Idris Elba (as Macavity) becomes harder and harder to watch. As the villain, he magically whisks away all of his competition at the Jellicle Ball; at one point, while doing so, he yells “Macavityyyyy!” It wasn’t the first time I laughed in the theater, but it was definitely the loudest. Taylor Swift (as Bombalurina) has little more than a glorified cameo, but it becomes hilarious when you realize that she’s basically playing the Silver Surfer to Macavity’s Galactus (she sprinkles the crowd of cats with catnip, which causes them to freak out, and I kid you not, it is more harrowing that Climax, which has a similar setup).
Lousy plotting would be somewhat forgivable if it were in the service of great songs. Cats has none. The songs are repetitive, and go on for far too long. They are earworms that slide off your brain the moment they end. I saw this movie an hour ago, and the only song I can remember is “Memory,” which is a song I knew going in. Speaking of that song, Jennifer Hudson (as Grizzabella) gets the dubious honor of performing it, but her weepy, one-note performance only enhances the song’s treacle. In an attempt to give Victoria more agency (and, let’s face it, get a nomination for Best Original Song), Hayward gets to sing “Beautiful Ghosts,” which is just an unmemorable as the rest of the soundtrack. At least it gives her something to do; most of Victoria’s time on screen is spent gazing dreamily at the other cats. (The movie also tries to sell on a budding romance between her and Mr. Mistoffelees, which never gets off the ground.)
Nine years ago, Tom Hooper directed a movie that would be on to win Best Picture. Now, he has directed one of the worst movies of all time. This is so, so wrong, from the ground up. Hooper tried to make another prestige musical, like his solid version of Les Miserables. Instead, he has made something more akin to The Room. This is a ridiculous, stupid, unbearable movie that you truly need to see to believe.
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