US 73m Dir: Jacques Tourneur Key Cast: Simone Simon
Original Screenplay
Cat People has a very much B-movie feel to it but doesn't sit neatly into that categorisation. The budget was certainly much lower than the Universal horror films of the time yet much higher than the smaller studios could provide. It's modest budget isn't always entirely obvious either as many sets are reused from previous RKO Pictures films such as The Magnificent Ambersons. For me at least, it felt like it was constantly pivoting between being terrible and brilliant.
The plot sees Oliver Reed (Kent Smith) meet a woman called Irena Dubrovna (Simone Simon) who is sketching a black panther at the zoo. The pair form a relationship and marry but it is never consummated because Irena is convinced she is descended from a group of people who turned to witchcraft in her native Serbia and that if aroused she transform into a panther and attack her partner. Oliver tries his best but eventually leaves Irena and begins a relationship with a woman from his office called Alice (Jane Randolph) who starts to think she is being stalked...
There's a lot in the film that is undeniably not good. One of those is Simon's performance with ever the actor herself not being happy with it. She was quite a big star in France but seemed to have difficulty performing in English. The pacing is also atrocious with the second act lasting forever with out very much happening. It feels like the writers had a clear start and end point but had very little to join them up.
Despite this, there is something very watchable about the film. It creates a superb atmosphere, with characters often hanging out in dark corners. There's a huge amount of sexual tension, a feeling of sexual danger even, that never comes to anything but works really well. Director Jacques Tourneur knew the panther attack scene would work much better if you couldn't really see what was happening, a trick that so many directors have utilized since.
Part of the film sees Irena treated by a psychiatrist (Tom Conway) who rationalises her worries about turning into a panther. It has a similar vibe to The Wolf Man which inspired this film (including the curse element) and is a trope I think works really well in horror films. Cat People is often regarded as the first horror film to focus on 'normal people' so in this way it changed the genre, leading to later films like Rosemary's Baby- indeed, there is certainly quite a lot about that film which is similar to Cat People with it suggesting the character's fears are psychological. Rosemary's Baby does many similar things to Cat People but it does them a hundred times better with this 1942 film feeling like an early prototype to this type of film.
It's hard then to define how I feel about it. I think it has dodgy performances and a fairly weak script but the direction is superb and innovative for this time of film.
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