![[up]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/smiles/arrow_up.png "[up]"){kind=icon}
. Honestly, I feel like the only way to really do this, would literally just to film a live production.
Edited by megaeliz on Dec 19th 2019 at 5:05:32 AM
where do I even start? Okay so, I was sitting on either side of two professional film critics, and all three of us spent at least 90% of the movie making this expression
I have also never seen so much clapping at a critic screening #Cats Movie
The Old Gumbie Cat sequence is genuinely one of the most horrifying things I’ve ever seen
I will never get enough of Jason Derulo yelling “MIIIIIILK”
Yes, the movie is every bit as horny as you have heard it is
it’s also shockingly literal? Like it makes me wonder if any of the creative heads have ever been in the same room with a cat before. Like most of the songs are jokes about the mercurial nature of cats?
I’m genuinely worried that Idris Elba may never work again
The only way they could find to give CATS, a thing that does not have a plot, a plot was through Macavity, and… Well
To be a fly on the wall of Tom Hooper directing Jennifer Hudson. I can imagine every take was just “no, more. No... MORE!!!”
Memory is almost just one unbroken closeup. I feel like studio interference is the only reason there are even a few cutaways.
“Magical Mr. Mistofelees” was such a banger that the audience clapped in rhythm as it reached its climax. Again, this was a screening for critics.
Was there ever a Victoria/Mistofelees ship? There is now.
Taylor Swift sings both parts of “Macavity”. That I didn’t like.
Also Gus, The Theater Cat sings his own song - didn’t like that either.
Therefore I cannot give this 10000/10 but a mere 9978/10.
But I loved it and I’m so excited for CATS the movie musical to become a midnight screenings darling.
Thank you, Tom Hooper, for reminding us why medium matters, and how some stage shows just should never be movies.
And thanks also for bringing cult movies back, bc hoo boy
Oh one other thing - the way they get the a-listers offscreen so they won’t have to pay them for more than three days of work while the dancers do all the real work is HILARIOUS
poor Idris Elba...
Although Derulo is there the whole time, which, MIIIIIIIIILK
A few other little reviews
Years from now, there will be late-night screenings of Cats, with pleasantly drunk moviegoers bellowing for milk alongside Jason Derulo's Rum Tum Tugger and imitating Hudson's melodramatic stylings. [2]
Edited by megaeliz on Dec 19th 2019 at 5:27:56 AM
The King Without a Kingdom
Yeah, this is definitely going to be the next Rocky Horror Picture Show.
It's been 3000 years…
Disasturbator
All part of the plan,negative press sells really well through word of mouth and across the internet
New theme music also a box
Professional Moldy Fig/Curmudgeon
The whole Cats thing was like a trainwreck that everyone knew was coming, and now it's here. Of course, the whole thing was built on shaky ground from the start (I don't think it'd be wrong to say that pretty much everything Lloyd-Webber wrote is shit and he is one of the many, many reasons why musical theater has turned into what it is today... and that's not a good thing).
But above all it could have worked... if the film was animated. Or, at the very least, done by someone who knew how to adapt the stage version to film. But we have this instead. What, exactly, possessed the people making this to make all the actors look like they're in a neverending furry convention - one that's been kicked out of every hotel that's tried to host it - or escapees from the island of Doctor Moreau (the Marlon Brando version, of course)? More than once I saw people making uncomfortable comparisons to Mike Myers as the Cat in the Hat - and he looked a hell of a lot better.
Evidently they turned out a real turd. I doubt it'll become another Rocky Horror. Perhaps it'll become another Repo The Genetic Opera, maybe. But never Rocky Horror. Or Shock Treatment. Or Phantom of the Paradise...
(Incidentally, if you want a good musical based around cats, the definitive feline musical is Shinbone Alley, which is also based on a series of poems but does it a hell of a lot better. And thankfully the film they made of it is animated. It was made in 1971 and is amazingly good. See it instead of Cats. You'll enjoy yourself more.)
"They say I'm old fashioned, and live in the past, but sometimes I think progress progresses too fast."
There's some screaming in this one.
SOME? It's not even a real review! ![[lol]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/lol2v12_4863.png "[lol]"){kind=small}
Edited by DS9guy on Dec 19th 2019 at 6:38:32 AM
Somebody linked io9's review already: I Have Seen Sights No Human Should See but I had to pull this quote.
Edited by alanh on Dec 19th 2019 at 6:33:31 AM
Oh, bother.
TBH the reviews seem a lot more entertaining than the movie.
TBF, I was never really into the original musical either, except for "Memory".
Edited by M84 on Dec 19th 2019 at 10:41:32 PM
Disgusted, but not surprised
Funny review, I thought a portal to another dimension was about to open when reading it.
Oh, bother.
It does kind of read like something from Hellraiser.
Disgusted, but not surprised
I never knew Tom Hooper was capable of making a surrealist nightmare that would rival Jodorowsky, that could baffle David Lynch, that would prompt even the dark god Cthulhu to emit an impressed eldritch shriek of “nehehehehehe”
Watching CATS is like stumbling upon an unholy and heretofore unknown genre of porn. Every time these horny fur demons tongue a milk bowl and start moaning I was certain the FBI would raid the theater
Astonishing that Eddie Redmayne (can sing, has worked with Tom Hooper twice, is entirely willing to humiliate himself onscreen) is somehow not in CATS
For the entirety of CATS I bore the widened eyes, fearful countenance, and slack jaw of a woman just forced to accept a Peloton bike
The most daring thing about CATS is that they left all of Rebel Wilson and James Corden’s improvs in
[1]
One of the responses actually pointed out that if one single furry had been consulted, this entire disaster could have been avoided!
Edited by megaeliz on Dec 20th 2019 at 10:15:36 AM
And if anybody is wondering "Why didn't they film a stage production?" THEY DID.
I remember seeing this when it premired on I think PBS back in the day. And IMO it still looks 1000 times better than the new film.
Disasturbator
> Funny review, I thought a portal to another dimension was about to open when reading it.
you do NOT want to go to the cat dimension
Seems like this film reeks of What Do You Mean, It's for Kids?
Edited by DS9guy on Dec 20th 2019 at 12:35:37 PM
Re: the reviews mentioning incomplete effects. Some people on Twitter are saying that the studio sent out the wrong edit which wasn't complete, and that they'll be sending out a revised version today. I haven't been able to find a news source reporting it though.
(I keep wanting to call them "prints", even though they're digital.)
The King Without a Kingdom
I agree with you. The cats all look like terrifying naked humans with Barbie Doll Anatomy. And also a scene of vore, I almost forgot.
Edited by Weirdguy149 on Dec 21st 2019 at 11:37:47 AM
It's been 3000 years…
Here's a Twitter report about the updated version: https://twitter.com/mike_blacklist/status/1208139131391332352
And today I learned the new "print" is "DCP" (digital cinema package).
Meanwhile, BoJack Horseman didn't like the casting: https://twitter.com/BoJackHorseman/status/1208447792525348864
. This quote sums it up quite well I think
Edited by megaeliz on Dec 21st 2019 at 4:37:33 AM
Disasturbator
> I suspect it will result in the sexual awakenings of many adolescents who will go on to seek out the most troubling sort of pornography. Let's hope they stop there.
-clutches Pearls tightly-
WOULD SOMEONE PLEASE THINK OF TEH CHILDREN!
New theme music also a box
The Ice Queen
To answer the critic's question, the Victoria/Mr. Mistoffelees ship has been a thing for a while now. Just search for "Mistoria" on DA. It's literally the Cats fandoms's OTP.
Edited by Spottedleaf on Dec 21st 2019 at 4:56:40 AM
A procrastination in of itself
Just saw it, some mad fool seriously tried to give Cats a plot?!
The CGI was weird, they buggered a lot of it up by throwing in screwball comedy (seriously, far to many fat jokes) and I wasn’t totally sold on some of the changes, Rum Tum has a greatly reduced role and Mistoffelees having confidence issues kinda doesn’t work for me.
I liked the songs and I liked the dancing, but I kinda want a cut that throws out the plot stuff and just gives me the musical numbers.
Oh, and they got rid off the Battle of the Pekes and the Pollicles, which I consider madness!
“And the Bunny nails it!” ~ Gabrael “If the UN can get through a day without everyone strangling everyone else so can we.” ~ Cyran
I hear this movie is better than the new Star Wars movie.
Never trust anyone who uses "degenerate" as an insult.
I don't think anyone had high hopes for the film, not from the trailer and even the broadway musical has been mocked relentlessly (not as long-lasting as Barney the Dinosaur but I do recall 90's cartoons making fun of it, like Hey Arnold! had "Rats!"). Like some plays, I imagine the appeal is largely the audience engagement and seeing the large cast in extravagant costumes performing in crazy sets, something VERY difficult when translating to film and 1/4 of the shots are close-ups. Imagine The Lion King play translated back into film and you'd probably get a lot of the same problems.