Review of The Curse of the Cat People (1944) by Dallas S — 27 Jul 2008

Luckily (I think?) I was warned long ago that this sequel had essentially nothing to do with the original Val Lewton Production Cat People. I was also warned it was not even remotely a horror picture--also good to know going in when RKO couldn't resist the idiotic billing of it as such. I was pleased to find that Lewton and company were clever enough to end up making it a true continuation of the story of the characters in Cat People even though it had nothing to do with it plot wise, seeming neither carelessly contrived from the original (being as it apparently didn't come from the original, I guess this isn't that surprising) nor like Irena, Oliver and Alice had been shoehorned into an otherwise pre-existing story.

Years after the events of Cat People, Oliver and Alice Reed (again Kent Smith and Jane Randolph respectively) are proud parents of Amy (Ann Carter) a little six-year-old-ish girl with curly golden locks--but first seen daydreaming while out with other children and slapping a boy for accidentally crushing a butterfly in his excitable desire to catch it for her. Reed, continuing his role as clueless schmuck from the first film, takes on parenting like he took on marriage--rushing in as a man who thinks he knows everything but in fact mistreats and neglects his theoretical loved ones. Alice redeems herself from husband-stealing jerk to become an admirable mother to Amy, trying consistently to hold back Oliver from his clumsy and stupid fathering. He's trapped in the fear that Amy's imagination is a sign that she is on the same path as Irena, his deceased first wife (see: Cat People), and will continue on until she, too, reaches superstition-induced madness and harms herself and/or others. In this, at least, we do know why he is making all these imbecilic decisions, but we still can't fathom how he can be so self-centered and brainless. Amy's teacher, Miss Callahan (Eve March) and her met-by-chance elderly friend Mrs. Farren (Julia Dean) are the more positive influences, as well as housekeeper Edward (...Sir Lancelot? Really? That's his name? Ah! Stage name...*), who spins tales of his youth in Jamaica. After a confusion over birthday invitations, Amy makes a wish for a friend, who she eventually identifies as, yes, gasp, Irena. Conflicting over Irena's existence, Oliver makes more stupid parenting decisions (leading to the one terrible and now slightly horrific line of dialogue where Miss Callahan stops Alice from interfering with Oliver's first spanking of Amy, calling it "too important an event"--brr!) and eventually leaves Amy distraught as to how to reconcile her jerk of a father and her friend.

Apparently used in some psychology classes, once again Lewton "fails" to make a horror movie on purpose. "Amy and her friend...I like the sound of that!" young Miss Carter says at one point, and I thought, "That sounds like it would be a good title for this." Apparently I was not silly to think this--it's the title Lewton originally intended, until the studio put their inept fingers into his work AGAIN and tried to ride the success of Cat People and gave it this title, though once again Lewton twisted within those constraints and put a brilliant little film together. Much like Cat People, I obviously have some issues with some of the characters. That is moot though, as the focus of the film is on Amy, and the young Ann Carter is definitely up to the task, perfectly exemplifying that early child actor method that is signified by constant head movement (typically nodding or shaking gently and subtly, usually not with any meaning related to the words spoken) and a way of holding the head that pulls the chin in and forces them to look up through their eyelashes. It at least maintains a more childlike presence even when the child is inordinately precocious or intelligent--unlike the perfectly exact replica of an adult used for *normal* children in modern film that doesn't ever come across correctly. Yes, children are and can be that smart, but on average they do not behave that way even when they are. Just because it actually happens doesn't mean it's believable in film.

Anyway, the only element remotely resembling horror hear is Mrs. Farren's rendition of the Legend of Sleepy Hollow (they happen to live near the infamous bridge) and the supernatural element of Irena's spirit. Or is it? Thankfully the studio did not interfere here and let Lewton leave this a mystery this time, no real definitive proof that this was or was not supernatural, leaving it either a fun and positive ghost story or an examination of the imagination of children and how they deal with loneliness. A smart little film, but, that's what we expect with Lewton behind it, don't we?

*I knew he looked familiar though, he apparently was a calypso musician, and I recall him being the soul who sang the song of exposition in I Walked with a Zombie, facts which fit together.