Cats movie review – Ludicrous, pointless and quite frankly – simply not good enough
I’M a firm believer in judging film and TV on their own merits.
I’ve never read the Game of Thrones books and it didn’t temper my enjoyment of the TV show in the slightest.
I thoroughly dislike the assumption that an audience is supposed to do some “homework” before seeing anything — what arrogance!
But going to see Cats “unarmed” was one of the most pointless exercises I’ve ever undertaken. I apologise to my learned friend from The Times who put up with my constant “Pssst… what the HELL is going on?” whispers. (Being from The Times, he’d read the poetry).
When the trailer got released, the reaction was frenzied. People laughed, hysterical at the oddness of the whole thing. Are they people dressed as cats? Cats dressed as people? Why are some cats wearing hats?
Is that a cat-sized fork it’s holding with its… human hand? Oh God the teeth!
Are all the cast being held hostage? Who thought this was a good way to spend $95million?
Reader, none of those questions get answered, including the most pressing — where are their bumholes? Why? Well, because absolutely jack all happens in this film.
It’s a load of cats just running about, singing. Constantly singing. Only one and a bit are any good — one about a magic cat and the one Elaine Paige sang in the 80s.
There are more songs than a Captain Beefheart Anthology.
A quick Wikipedia scrape tells me that: “Over the course of a single night, a tribe of cats called the Jellicles make what is known as “the Jellicle choice” and decide which cat will ascend to the Heaviside Layer and come back to a new life.”
That is what I watched apparently, which is surprising as due to the complete lack of script or exposition, my take on it was this: The creator of the Annoying Orange videos on YouTube won the lottery and hired a cast of people he’d like to see falter.
Building a set that makes no sense and spending approx 45 minutes on choreography for 97 numbers, they offered brief respite by occasionally throwing in someone you recognise.
Idris Elba being angry, or Taylor Swift singing then disappearing to fire her agent, for instance.
The rest of the film is full of people you have never seen before, but will swear on your life one is Daniel Bedingfield. None can stand still for a single second.
Whilst you sit there wondering when George Galloway and Rula Lenska are going to crop up for the sex scene (where are their bumholes?) the maker hopes you won’t notice that Rebel Wilson’s moggy actually unzips her fur to reveal a full dress underneath.
There is no comment from the other cats who have to wear cat-sized coats over their fur.