Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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11 of 16 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
Terrible film, great DVD, 17 Sep 2003
I'm not opposed to the idea of remakes, although this film shows just why it's a better idea to remake bad films with unfulfilled potential than great ones that far exceeded theirs. Even ignoring comparisons with Val Lewton's classic, it's rare for a film to misfire on quite as many levels as this early Bruckheimer movie - and it's much more of a Bruckheimer movie than a Schrader one - but sadly, like all Bruckheimer movies, this promises much but then resolutely fails to deliver (after all, Bruckheimer is the guy who made a car chase movie and then forgot to include any car chases until the last reel). The sexual fantasies may be Schrader's, but the style is all Bruckheimer's - glossy visuals, marketable soundtrack, good-looking cast given little to work with, meandering script and a dogged refusal to make good on the hype.
However, even ignoring the fact that the producer is more interested in the marketing than the movies themselves, taken on its own merits, `Cat People' just doesn't work. For a film about a race of incestuous cat people, it's astonishingly boring. Nothing much happens in the most uninteresting way possible for 90 minutes until Kinski's character undergoes a sudden complete moral u-turn and the filmmakers try to wrap everything up in a hurry so they can get home before the pubs shut. As a film about sexuality, it has no insight. As a sex film, it has no sex or eroticism. As a thriller, it doesn't thrill. As a horror film, it has no atmosphere or menace. Worst of all, it's just so astonishingly dull. And don't expect much in the way of special effects or gore - most of what was shot hit the cutting room floor (and don't go looking for them on the DVD - no deleted scenes there).
The DVD itself is a good package - a new 25-minute interview with Schrader and a worrying one from 1982 where he's barely coherent and obviously under the influence; interview with make-up FX man Tom Burman; Robert Wise on Val Lewton; stills montage; trailer; and an audio commentary by Schrader. Absolutely none of which makes this film any better, but at least gives you some insight into how Schrader's admitted personal problems helped send it off the rails. Only a poor stereo mix lets the side down.
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14 of 23 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
It's very 80s..., 8 Oct 2003
Paul Schrader's remake of Jacques Tourneur's brilliant forties gothic-noir can never match the aura of the original- its look drifts between the High Art aesthetic of Bertolucci and the High Concept look of Don Simpson/Jerry Bruckheimer. The Moroder soundtrack grounds this film in the 80s, though I've always been partial to the Bowie/Moroder track Putting Out the Fire. Perhaps Cat People can be seen as the beginnings of Schrader's wilderness years- it is nowhere close to the screenplays of Taxi Driver/Raging Bull or to Schrader's initial films: Blue Collar, Hardcore, American Gigolo. In fact, following American Gigolo, Schrader would offer infrequent classics- Mishima:A Life in Four Chapters (1985), Light Sleeper (1991) & Affliction (1998). Cat People probably has more with the cocaine inflected creative redundancy noted in Peter Biskind's book Easy Riders, Raging Bulls... It looks very iconic, then again, so did that Peter Murphy/Maxell advert- it shares a look with Tony Scott's superior The Hunger (also 1982)- when films began to have the panache of adverts (call it high art, high concept, cinema du gaze...) Nastassja Kinski has a suitable boyish look, though this reduces the obvious aura of her beauty apparent in Tess, Paris Texas & Faraway So Close! The sex elements, suitably hinted at in the Hays-bound original, are magnified here- tying in with Schrader's frequent sexual themes- incest is a factor, & one that drifts toward the silly. Apart from Kinski, the cast is rather cheap & dull- Malcolm McDowell now a bit of a caricature compared to those great performances in If, A Clockwork Orange & O Lucky Man! (still, Blue Thunder would be worse...) Cat People is a twist in the sexual-horror film, it's certainly far from terrible- if you want an erotic exercise in panache, it probably does the business. Think Betty Blue with feline-metamorphosis and added incest- it also predicts the OTT film Trouble Every Day. The DVD extras are non-existent- perhaps it would have been more fun to put the Bowie/Moroder video on, or the original 1942 film to compare? Cat People is OK, Schrader has never made a truly terrible film (though Exorcist IV might be it...)- but this is far from such great films as Affliction, Blue Collar, Light Sleeper & Mishima.
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2 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Nastassja Kinski and Malcolm McDowell don't pussyfoot around, 30 Jul 2007
The thing that first strikes you as you see this for the first time is the Sound track [Cat People: Original Soundtrack] "Putting out the fire; Theme from Cat People" Music Written by Giorgio Moroder Lyrics Written and Performed by David Bowie.
Next in the midst of a great cast you notice Nastassja and wonder why you did not get the picture of her and the Python mounted over your fireplace. With her new eyes of green she almost overwhelms the story.
Malcolm is creepier than usual; the first time he hops up on all fours, you want to throw him a mouse. Among many other great performances he played H. G. Wells in [Time After Time (1979)]
The story plot follows the complicated lives of cat people as they cope with modern day Louisiana. Irena Gallier is coming of age and puberty hit her hard. She adds a new dimension to the term "running around."
You may want to watch the original movie; but do not waste you energy trying to compare them as they from two different eras and budgets.
You definitely want to see this film, as you may be a cat person and not know it.
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