You think that you're prepared for Cats, but you're really not.
The adaptation of Andrew Lloyd Webber's musical certainly made an impression with its first trailer back in July, creating a stir and discussion around the movie that, for some, will have led to an odd fascination to watch it even if they weren't fans of the musical. Or indeed of musicals at all.
And, oh boy, it's every bit as baffling, weird and horrifying as you expected. It's certainly something that you've never seen before – but there's probably a very good reason for that.
The plot – if you can call it that – is taken straight from the musical and centres on a tribe of cats called the Jellicles.
Every year, their appointed leader Old Deuteronomy (Judi Dench) makes "the Jellicle choice", choosing which of the cats will ascend to the Heaviside Layer and start a new life (because cats have nine lives, obviously).
How does she choose? Well, through a series of musical performances, of course, meaning that Cats is essentially a feline talent show.
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Our journey through this bizarre world is viewed through the eyes of Victoria (Francesca Hayward), a cat who is abandoned at the start of the movie and welcomed into the Jellicle tribe.
Ballet dancer Hayward – in her first feature-length movie role – is excellent, and gets to do more than just dance like Victoria in the stage show (although she does a lot of that too, beautifully as well).
She even delivers the movie's emotional new song 'Beautiful Ghosts', but it's in these big musical numbers that the adaptation's biggest, most damaging issue arises.
Enter the CGI fur.
The "digital fur technology" that director Tom Hooper has used to tell Cats on the big screen is just the weirdest choice. It's Uncanny Valley: the feline edition, as there are just too many human features left on display. Hands, feet, mouth, teeth, eyebrows, noses... The whole works are there, and it's just incredibly distracting.
Given that so much of the characters remain defiantly human, why didn't Hooper just put all of his actors in cat suits like on the stage? Not only are we robbed of seeing the likes of Ian McKellen, Idris Elba and Judi Dench in cat make-up, but it would have made it less distracting.
What also doesn't help is that the CGI results are mixed. Hooper admitted this week that he's only just finished and, unfortunately, it shows. At times, it's like watching a big-screen version of a Snapchat filter, faces not quite matching up during fast movement.
It means that when you should be getting swept up in the emotion, you can't ever fully immerse yourself in it as there's something there to distract you.
That's even before you start to fold in the weirder aspects of Cats, such as Jennyanydots (Rebel Wilson) having an army of cockroaches and mice WITH HUMAN FACES, the fact that there's a milk bar – serving just milk – in a human world, and Ray Winstone's pirate captain Growltiger, who owns a barge on the River Thames.
But we can safely say that you haven't truly lived until you've seen Idris Elba – who at least appears to absolutely get into the camp spirit of the whole adventure – say "ineffable", before magically turning to dust.
There are good moments among the weirdness. Jennifer Hudson delivers a show-stopping 'Memory', and other tracks like 'Mr Mistoffelees' and 'Macavity: The Mystery Cat' – a duet between Taylor Swift and Idris Elba, a phrase we never thought we'd say – are so catchy that you can't help enjoying them.
You don't come to the cinema for a series of musical performances, though, and, even if it weren't for the CGI issues, there's just not enough of a plot to make Cats work on the big screen. Couple that with the style choices and, objectively speaking, Cats just does not work as a movie.
But it is an unforgettable experience. It just so happens that it's a five-star experience in a defiantly two-star movie.
Cats is in cinemas on December 20.
Director: Tom Hooper; Starring: Jennifer Hudson, Taylor Swift, Judi Dench, Ian McKellen, James Corden, Idris Elba, Jason Derulo, Francesca Hayward; Running time: 110 minutes; Certificate: U
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Movies Editor, Digital Spy Ian has more than 10 years of movies journalism experience as a writer and editor. Starting out as an intern at trade bible Screen International, he was promoted to report and analyse UK box-office results, as well as carving his own niche with horror movies, attending genre festivals around the world. After moving to Digital Spy, initially as a TV writer, he was nominated for New Digital Talent of the Year at the PPA Digital Awards. He became Movies Editor in 2019, in which role he has interviewed 100s of stars, including Chris Hemsworth, Florence Pugh, Keanu Reeves, Idris Elba and Olivia Colman, become a human encyclopedia for Marvel and appeared as an expert guest on BBC News and on-stage at MCM Comic-Con. Where he can, he continues to push his horror agenda – whether his editor likes it or not.
