Cats’ dirty little secret: it’s a horny feline romp | Catherine Shoard
The film version of the musical uses technology to meld human and animal forms – with deeply disturbing results
The first clue was the silence. Neither whoops of entertainment nor hoots of derision met the first press screening of Tom Hooper’s riotously anticipated Cats. Yet more ominously: there was no munching. The free popcorn went untouched as soon as the film began. This was not politesse. Food was the last thing anyone fancied.
The problem with the film version of Cats isn’t that it’s bad. Bad is no barrier to box office success. It can be a boon: cackling gangs might make a date of it, staggering in with supplies so they can neck a shot every time they hear a synth. The casually curious fork out just to check the critics were correct. Appealing to rubberneckers is now the distributor’s key strategy, billing Cats as “the must-see experience of the festive season”.