Cat People (1942)

[europe1]

shadow_hunter_x . . . I like that . . . I'll contact the mods to get my SN changed.

I am beyond exhaustion from my fotball session today. Mistakes abound.

And see, if you had actually watched Rashamon you would get the joke and be laughing right now!

 

[Guestx]

I am beyond exhaustion from my football session today. Mistakes abound.

Didn't you know you're not allowed to do anything but stay on Sherdog and discuss movies?

 

[europe1]

Didn't you know you're not allowed to do anything but stay on Sherdog and discuss movies?

Without the Blue-Named one around to police us I've become a decadent hedonist whom strays from his task.

 

[MusterX]

In before shadow_hunter_x writes about being confused about which character to feel sympathy for.

 

[chickenluver]

Not sure how this turned into a Rashomon thread, but I won't complain

@shadow_priest_x I don't think watching Seven Samurai first is a must. I would recommend this order for a Kurosawa appetizer: Rashomon, Seven Samurai, Throne of Blood, Yojimbo. Then proceed from there how you will.

 

[Sir Galahad]

Ha. Have you seen it?

Not the old version. Saw the one with Nastassja Kinski that was filmed in New Orleans.

 

[europe1]

Not sure how this turned into a Rashomon thread, but I won't complain

@shadow_priest_x I don't think watching Seven Samurai first is a must. I would recommend this order for a Kurosawa appetizer: Rashomon, Seven Samurai, Throne of Blood, Yojimbo. Then proceed from there how you will.

Are you trying to intone that Sanjuro isnt on the same level as those other 4 films?

 

[Guestx]

Not sure how this turned into a Rashomon thread, but I won't complain

@shadow_priest_x I don't think watching Seven Samurai first is a must. I would recommend this order for a Kurosawa appetizer: Rashomon, Seven Samurai, Throne of Blood, Yojimbo. Then proceed from there how you will.

All right, well maybe I'll do that then.

Okay @MusterX, here is my pledge: I will watch this film within a fortnight and we shall discuss it.

 

[europe1]

Okay @MusterX, here is my pledge: I will watch this film within a fortnight and we shall discuss it.

I was going to go and see my sick and dying mother but what the hell Kurisawa it is.

 

[Guestx]

I was going to go and see my sick and dying mother but what the hell Kurisawa it is.

Get on it.

 

[MusterX]

All right, well maybe I'll do that then.

Okay @MusterX, here is my pledge: I will watch this film within a fortnight and we shall discuss it.

Its a good film, I don't think you will regret it. So is Seven Samurai. Haven't seen Throne of Blood, Yojimbo, or Sanjuro.

 

[chickenluver]

Are you trying to intone that Sanjuro isnt on the same level as those other 4 films?

Certainly not. I just think those 4 make for a good introduction.

Haven't seen Throne of Blood, Yojimbo, or Sanjuro.

 

[Guestx]

Its a good film, I don't think you will regret it. So is Seven Samurai. Haven't seen Throne of Blood, Yojimbo, or Sanjuro.

Kurosawa is a director I've been meaning to watch for years, I just haven't done it yet. I'm sure I'll get into it.

BTW, as an aside, for whatever reason I have always thought that Seven Samurai was made in the 30s. I was pretty surprised to find out that it was actually made in the 50s.

 

[Guestx]

I watched the 1982 remake last night. If remake is the right word. Reimagining is probably more appropriate as it was VERY different from the original, though I enjoyed seeing Schrader's recreation of the pool scene.

All in all, I enjoyed it. It was a good example of a director taking an interesting premise and justifying his remake by doing something legitimately interesting and different and making the story his own. 8/10

 

[Bullitt68]

First a thread on the old school Dracula, now a thread on Cat People. What's with the classic movies @shadow_priest_x?

I remember when Martin Scorsese's documentary on Val Lewton premiered on Turner Classic Movies. I'd never heard of Lewton nor had I seen any of his movies, but as soon as I saw that documentary and the clips from his films, I knew I'd like his stuff. Pretty much everything from Cat People through Bedlam is just horror movie greatness, and it's all the more incredible considering he was literally inventing the horror genre as we know it. Before Lewton, there were monster movies and sci-fi movies, sure, but the actual narrative, cinematographic, and editorial mechanics that have been operative in horror filmmaking for the last half century, virtually all of it can be traced back to Lewton.

Cat People is an especially great example of Lewton's vision, as well as the magic that came from his collaborations with Jacques Tourneur. And you're absolutely right, Simone Simon is utterly intoxicating (you should also check out Jean Renoir's adaptation of The Human Beast with her and Jean Gabin).

If you enjoyed Cat People, I would highly recommend all of Lewton's other horror films. He and Tourneur also collaborated on I Walked With a Zombie (my personal favorite of all of Lewton's films) and The Leopard Man (the weakest of the bunch but it contains what is P4P one of the most disturbing sequences in all of horror, even including contemporary horror).

I also endorse The Seventh Victim (great movie about a creepy cult, plus a pre-Psycho shower scene that undoubtedly gave Hitchcock ideas), The Body Snatcher (the first and best of Lewton's three films starring Boris Karloff, who absolutely dominates this film; also the final of his many onscreen pairings with Bela Lugosi), Isle of the Dead (the weakest of the three Karloff movies but contains a scene near the end that still creeps me the fuck out), and Bedlam (close second for Karloff in terms of his performance and a phenomenal Poe-inspired ending).

The Ghost Ship is the only dud IMO, although it's not completely without merit. As for The Curse of the Cat People: Lewton originally conceived that film as separate from his horror projects. He wanted to make a personal, autobiographical film about a child with an active imagination. RKO saw nothing but dollar signs, though, so they pressured him into adding connections to Cat People so they could bill it as a sequel. The Cat People material does work (plus we get more Simone Simon ) but it's clearly more fantasy than horror. Despite Lewton's attempt to move away, at least a little bit, from his more familiar horror material, this is ironically enough one of the films that William Friedkin credits as a huge influence for him in approaching The Exorcist.

 

[Guestx]

First a thread on the old school Dracula, now a thread on Cat People. What's with the classic movies @shadow_priest_x?

I remember when Martin Scorsese's documentary on Val Lewton premiered on Turner Classic Movies. I'd never heard of Lewton nor had I seen any of his movies, but as soon as I saw that documentary and the clips from his films, I knew I'd like his stuff. Pretty much everything from Cat People through Bedlam is just horror movie greatness, and it's all the more incredible considering he was literally inventing the horror genre as we know it. Before Lewton, there were monster movies and sci-fi movies, sure, but the actual narrative, cinematographic, and editorial mechanics that have been operative in horror filmmaking for the last half century, virtually all of it can be traced back to Lewton.

Cat People is an especially great example of Lewton's vision, as well as the magic that came from his collaborations with Jacques Tourneur. And you're absolutely right, Simone Simon is utterly intoxicating (you should also check out Jean Renoir's adaptation of The Human Beast with her and Jean Gabin).

If you enjoyed Cat People, I would highly recommend all of Lewton's other horror films. He and Tourneur also collaborated on I Walked With a Zombie (my personal favorite of all of Lewton's films) and The Leopard Man (the weakest of the bunch but it contains what is P4P one of the most disturbing sequences in all of horror, even including contemporary horror).

I also endorse The Seventh Victim (great movie about a creepy cult, plus a pre-Psycho shower scene that undoubtedly gave Hitchcock ideas), The Body Snatcher (the first and best of Lewton's three films starring Boris Karloff, who absolutely dominates this film; also the final of his many onscreen pairings with Bela Lugosi), Isle of the Dead (the weakest of the three Karloff movies but contains a scene near the end that still creeps me the fuck out), and Bedlam (close second for Karloff in terms of his performance and a phenomenal Poe-inspired ending).

The Ghost Ship is the only dud IMO, although it's not completely without merit. As for The Curse of the Cat People: Lewton originally conceived that film as separate from his horror projects. He wanted to make a personal, autobiographical film about a child with an active imagination. RKO saw nothing but dollar signs, though, so they pressured him into adding connections to Cat People so they could bill it as a sequel. The Cat People material does work (plus we get more Simone Simon ) but it's clearly more fantasy than horror. Despite Lewton's attempt to move away, at least a little bit, from his more familiar horror material, this is ironically enough one of the films that William Friedkin credits as a huge influence for him in approaching The Exorcist.

Great post, thanks!

I've loved movies since I was a kid but I've always had a huge gap in my knowledge when it comes to classic film. Growing up my parents didn't sit me down and make me watch a lot of stuff from bygone eras and for whatever reason I didn't have the desire to seek it out on my own. It's just been in the past couple of years when I started actively trying to fill this hole and in the past couple of weeks I've really been putting some extra effort in.

I live very close to the main downtown library and they have thousands of DVDs so I will just go over there and load up on stuff and then bring it back and chew through it as quickly as I can. Just in the past week and a half I've watched Dracula, Cat People, Lawrence of Arabia, Cleopatra and even some of the old Charlie Chan films for the first time. And right now, sitting over by my TV, I have The Maltese Falcon, Curse of the Cat People, Ben-Hur, I Walked With a Zombie, The Body Snatcher and Heaven's Gate. (Not sure if we're going to regard Heaven's Gate as a classic.) Those will all be first-time watches as well.

I've been doing a lot of research on film history so this kind of pattern is likely to continue for a while.

Thanks for all the suggestions. I'll definitely check those out.

 

[europe1]

I watched the 1982 remake last night. If remake is the right word. Reimagining is probably more appropriate as it was VERY different from the original, though I enjoyed seeing Schrader's recreation of the pool scene.

All in all, I enjoyed it. It was a good example of a director taking an interesting premise and justifying his remake by doing something legitimately interesting and different and making the story his own. 8/10

I would almost go so far as to say that in many matters, they are polar opposite.

1942 is restrictive sexually - 1982 is thoroughly erotic (and quite depraved too)

1942 is sparse on backstory - 1982 practically mythologizes the lore

1942 keeps the suspense until the last frame - while in the 1982 version it's established pretty clearly that they are Cat People and it's about the identity of being so


There is one detail I really liked about the remake. McDowell tells Kinski that her human lover is weak. Human's do not have the bravery to do what they must do when they really need to. His weakness will betrayl her. This is echoed in the ending. Kinski begs her lover to shoot her, to end the curse. Her lover is unable to do so. He is unable to do the "right" thing. Instead he has sex with her, giving in to his weakness. And Kinski is forced to live her life entrapped in a cage.

8/10

Does that mean that you like the remake more than the original?

You can PM me the answer if you're afraid of getting IP-Banned by Bullitt the Cat Person

 

[Guestx]

I would almost go so far as to say that in many matters, they are polar opposite.

1942 is restrictive sexually - 1982 is thoroughly erotic (and quite depraved too)

1942 is sparse on backstory - 1982 practically mythologizes the lore

1942 keeps the suspense until the last frame - while in the 1982 version it's established pretty clearly that they are Cat People and it's about the identity of being so


There is one detail I really liked about the remake. McDowell tells Kinski that her human lover is weak. Human's do not have the bravery to do what they must do when they really need to. His weakness will betrayl her. This is echoed in the ending. Kinski begs her lover to shoot her, to end the curse. Her lover is unable to do so. He is unable to do the "right" thing. Instead he has sex with her, giving in to his weakness. And Kinski is forced to live her life entrapped in a cage.

Interesting observations. I thought of it more as working with the same general premise but just taking things a few steps farther in nearly every regard. For instance, in '42 it's a kiss that transforms her, in '82 it's fucking. In '42 we get a little backstory, in '82 we get a lot more. In '42 eroticism is merely hinted at, in '82 it's splashed upon the screen in full force. And so on and so forth.

I agree on the ending though. That's really kind of a downer and I honestly didn't understand it. She says something along the lines of, "I want to go be among my own kind," so I figured he'd change her and then the next scene we'd see her off on the African savanna or something. But no, instead she's in a cage? The fuck? Honestly, the ending was my least favorite part of the film.

Does that mean that you like the remake more than the original?

You can PM me the answer if you're afraid of getting IP-Banned by Bullitt the Cat Person

LOL. I'd probably say I like both equally. The remake does in some ways feel like a "fuller" film and I loved the New Orleans setting and photography.

It's interesting that it was directed by Paul Schrader. That guy has kind of fallen off the map.