And Now, My Thoughts Upon ‘Cats,’ the Film
Spoiler alert, I guess? But also, does it matter?
Okay, here it is: I think Cats the movie might be Good.
I KNOW. I know the critics (PEOPLE OF WIDELY ESTABLISHED WRONGNESS, SO IDK WHY YOU LISTENED TO THEM) all told you it was bad, and had a field day doing so. BUT. What if, actually, Cats is… Good?
Hear me out. Let us discuss some of the things that happen in Cats, which is itself mostly a succession of cats saying “let us discuss some of the things that happen involving cats.” In keeping with the spirit of Cats, there will be no real order to these thoughts, nor any significant connective tissue, and I will not stop to ask if anything I’m saying makes sense. (Keep in mind, dear reader, that I have no previous experience of Cats the musical prior to Cats the movie.)
When the trailer came out, everyone freaked out over how the CGI cats looked like unholy hellbeasts from our darkest nightmares. I did too. But I have to tell you, at no point over the course of this entire film did I find myself thinking, “Wow, the craziest thing that is happening now is that the cats look weird.” No, there is so much more insanity to this film that the unsettling carpeted-Barbie look of the cats themselves rarely ever crosses the mind.
It is hard to discuss Cats without discussing the film I saw immediately after, The Rise of Skywalker, because of the stark contrast between them. While there are a wide range of opinions on the new Star Wars, I think all can agree that the creators gave significant consideration to the question, “What does the audience want to see?” The most fascinating thing about Cats, for better or for worse, is how no one involved apparently gave the slightest thought to what an audience might want. They just… they just made this… thing, this thing that is Cats, the movie. And it is wonderful.
In what follows (and indeed, what has already been said), there will be many comments that you may construe as negative or detractful. But let me be clear: these are not complaints. They are merely observations, offered from a position of awe and majestic stupor, bathed in the all-seeing light of the film Cats. My only real nitpick is the far too many jarring cuts to comic asides, all of which were unnecessary, as all comedy required for this film was supplied entirely by the viewer’s imagination.
Cats is a movie about a street-living suicide cult who gather for a celebration that is heavily implied to be an orgy, during which an arbitrary set of cats sing songs about their lives; based on these performances, one cat is chosen to ride the comet Hale-Bopp to Heaven’s Gate. This is frankly one of the greatest premises I have ever heard of, and could only be better if (a) the rest of the songs were long-winded explanations of what a cat is and (b) all the cats had completely ridiculous names. I think you see where I’m headed with this.
Critics [Wikipedia superscript: SOURCES???] would have you believe that Cats the movie is some kind of disastrous mess, but where they are wrong is that it is actually nearly perfect. My theory about why many disliked it is that the worst number in this version comes very early on, performed by a Rebel Wilson caricature whom we are all quite tired of. I believe many critics quit on the film mentally and emotionally at this point, when if they had kept with it they would have discovered the troubling mice with the faces of human children were merely a brief blip on an otherwise wild ride.
Here are some hard truths, haters: “Jellicle Songs for Jellicle Cats” is utter nonsense and it completely rules. “Bustopher Jones, the Cat About Town” seems to fatshame a very annoying James Corden and yet — and yet — could be an outtake from a Gabriel-era Genesis album, and I enjoyed it as such. “Mungojerrie and Rumpelteazer” is likely the best movie musical number I have ever seen about a brother and sister inviting a stranger to a threesome. “Memory,” when you think about it, makes absolutely no sense and still slaps.
The cast (an anagram, interestingly, of Cats) is of the highest pedigree; Ian McKellen in particular gives a truly astonishing performance. The moment he appears onscreen, you feel it, that unshakable realization that this man, is no longer man but, a cat. His thespian equal, Judi Dench, delivers with gusto a very short song that does not seem to contain an entire complete thought and which I am still puzzling over three days later. The far less famous Robbie Fairchild, playing a cat whose name is apparently “Munkustrap,” is more committed to his role as a cat than most actors are to playing real characters; he is able to keep a straight face while reciting the part about how humans typically give cats names like “Jonathan” and “Victor.”
I am also extremely pleased to tell you that everything about Taylor Swift’s participation in this movie is absolutely glorious. Her number “Macavity” is a sensational highlight, because Taylor is a gifted performer. And because she is an even more gifted writer, the added song “Beautiful Ghosts” does more to advance the plot than any of the previously existing songs. Long live our queen!
Because I have never seen Cats the musical, I cannot fully speak to whatever other material they added to create a semblance of plot in this movie. But the things that felt like they must have been added were generally solid. I was never sure if Victoria (the main cat) was supposed to have a romantic throughline, given that — and truly I cannot stress this enough — every cat clearly wants to bone every other cat. But when she sang to Mr. Mistoffelees the (I presume) added line, “Was there ever a cat so clever as you?” and he sang back “As me!” I was legitimately moved and delighted by the arc of their relationship. And then they both almost kissed Judi Dench?
But we’ve barely cat-scratched the surface of the thrills that await you on this mindbending journey. Skimbleshanks, whom I understand to be the Railway Cat, has the movie’s best number (yet somehow not even the best Andrew Lloyd Webber song about trains). All the instrumental dance sequences are weird enough to be exciting, yet peppered inexplicably with cutaways to modern party dances performed by ensemble cats we don’t know if we’re supposed to care about. Idris Elba keeps Thanos-snapping all the other cats so he can be something called “the Jellicle Choice,” which is a comically ridiculous phrase for a concept that I could spend the rest of my life trying to explain. Jason Derulo shouts “MIIIIIIIIILK!” The cats are constantly almost kissing each other, in every possible combination.
And then it ends with the second-best ending of a movie musical ever. After Jennifer Hudson rides a hot air balloon into the sky (to her death???), Judi Dench — Dame Judi Dench herself — turns to the camera and addresses the audience for what I believe to be the final hour of the film (which, again, is Cats). The song that she sings, called “The Ad-Dressing of Cats,” is a lengthy explanation of what cats are, which makes the perfect finale to a musical made up entirely of songs explaining what cats are. I say it is the second-best ending of a movie musical because the best possible ending is, well, still this song, only they cut to credits immediately after the entire cast sings, in majestic choral harmony and with complete earnestness and sincerity, the lines “So first your memory I’ll jog, and say a cat is not a dog.”
But here’s where the magic happens. It is “The Ad-Dressing of Cats,” you see, but in breaking the fourth wall, it is the cats… Cats?… addressing you. We, the audience, are the cats. This, is what is known as, “Theater.” Before the movie began, you were merely you; the other five or six people in your showing, merely strangers. But when the movie ends, you have become something more, bound by what together you have endured. ’Twas curiosity brought you here, and we all know what that did to the cat — took it up, up, up to the Heaviside Layer. You are now part of a community, a fellowship, a lineage of cats — of Cats. Is the movie good? Is it bad? Concern yourself not with such trifles. It is Cats, and Cats is you and we are Cats and Cats is all of us, now and forever.
