I saw Cats on Tuesday night. It sucks in a way that makes me want to add a bunch of extra letters when I spell it out. It suuuuuuuuucccccckkkkkkkssssss. I hate some of the cats more than others, but at some basic level, I hate each and every one of them. I hate their CGI-ed half-human faces, their genital-less bodies and that thing they do with their legs when they’re excited. They’re all needy, annoying and the absolute worst.
I also hate the basic structure of Cats, which I realize was taken from the musical. Some of my least favorite cats just vanish for long periods of time, and some of my other least favorite cats only show up to make stupid jellicle faces in the background. I think I went thirty minutes during one stretch without finding a single new reason to hate Rebel Wilson’s cat. Would it have been so hard to give her at least one awful cat pun every fifteen minutes? I’m not asking for much here.
And can we talk about how horny all these little monsters are? I hated that part too. As a conservative estimate, I’d say eighty percent of all the line deliveries in the entire movie are just dripping with sex. When they’re not ogling each other with their eyes, they’re nuzzling each other’s noses or licking each other’s jellicles, which made me deeply uncomfortable. You know that feeling you get in your stomach the first time an adult talks about sex with you in a direct way? On Tuesday, I learned I get that same feeling when watching two hours of cat foreplay.
And why was it only two hours? At some point, these cats and I became arch-nemeses, and conventional time ceased to exist. They dug deep and found new and exciting ways to piss me off, and my eyes darted back and forth on the screen, grasping for unanswered questions or strange background choices to stubbornly fixate on. Why are the object sizes so inconsistent? What’s the human involvement here? Who is the target audience for this?
And then it was just over. Suddenly the lights came up, the credits rolled and I was expected to what? Get in my car and drive home, as if I hadn’t just spent the last two hours in a life or death struggle with the hallucinations of an unhinged cat lady? No thank you. I won’t just move on, especially since I’m still on the wrong side of the Heaviside Layer.
What Do I Even Do After Cats?
I haven’t moved on. The hate is too strong. I’ve spent the past thirty-six hours listening to songs from Cats on YouTube. They’re all so dumb. None of them make any sense. None of them should be nominated for anything, but also, they’re kinda catchy and sometimes I do this thing now where there’s silence and I just shout “Jellicle Cats” to fill the space. My wife isn’t on board yet, but maybe if I keep trying long enough. I also started a Google doc called ‘Cats Questions’ and shared it with all my co-workers who have seen Cats so we can talk about all the ridiculous plot points and artistic choices we’re still confused about.
Long story short, my entire life now revolves around talking about Cats. With my deepest apologies to Little Women which I saw last night and is a really solid movie, Cats is the only thing I’m interested in talking about right now and may be the only thing I talk about moving forward. My hatred and utter confusion for it is so deep and intense that there’s no natural endpoint. And I just keep thinking about how hard everyone went for it. There's no apology in these cats. I’m worried my brain may one day mistake this obsession for love, and if that happens, Cats may turn into my favorite movie of all-time, which would be an alarming turn of events.
Real talk: there's a chance that may have already happened. How many hours can you spend listening to a soundtrack and talking about how bad it is before you have to admit that maybe you don't actually hate it anymore? Now I'm curious if this is why Cats ran for so many years on Broadway. Is it all people who despise it but then get fascinated in a morbid kind of way and then return over and over again until they just straight up like it? Because if so, I'm in deep trouble.
Anyway, Cats suuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuccccccckkkkkkssssss. Also, I’m thinking about hitting up a Saturday morning matinee. Anyone else in?
