Cat People (1942)

CAT PEOPLE (1942) Four stars
Russian-American producer Val Lewton (1904-51) made his mark on horror movies and cinematic history in general with a series of low-budget thrillers for RKO beginning with CAT PEOPLE and continuing through I WALKED WITH A ZOMBIE, THE LEOPARD MAN, THE SEVENTH VICTIM, THE GHOST SHIP, THE CURSE OF THE CAT PEOPLE, THE BODY SNATCHER, ISLE OF THE DEAD, and BEDLAM.

That’s a fertile period of films (1942 through 1946) that deserves to be mentioned in the same breath as Universal Studios’ horror movies of the 1930s.

Lewton’s influence can be seen on the vast majority of horror movies of the last almost 80 years, unfortunately though in just one way.

Horror movies often rely on jump scares, and “Lewton Bus” is film industry shorthand for a scene that slowly builds tension and then jolts the viewer at the most tense moment with a sudden scare from something that turns out to be completely harmless, like a cat or a dog or that damn stupid friend who loves to play tricks on their friends at the most inopportune times. The audience supposedly “jumps” en masse on cue. This technique gets the name from a scene in CAT PEOPLE, where we think a character will be attacked and killed by a panther and the hissing sounds turn out instead to be an incoming bus pulling up.

Slasher films especially utilize scenes like that, beyond the point of banality after being used in thousands of movies. Occasionally, a film like HALLOWEEN or PHANTASM will succeed using “Lewton Bus” scenes, just to make it clear that I don’t hate jump scares per se, but a stockpile of these scenes in a film often point to lazy filmmakers who just want to generate cheap thrills. Seasoned movie viewers can sniff out a cheap jump scare from a mile away.

Fortunately, Lewton’s productions are far more than jump scares and cheap thrills, right from the start with CAT PEOPLE, directed by Jacques Tourneur.

Necessity becomes the mother of invention, and it’s true for CAT PEOPLE and the other Lewton productions with their low budgets and subsequent high creativity.

The plot centers around Irena (Simone Simon), a fashion designer originally from Serbia, and her romance and marriage with Oliver (Kent Smith). Their marriage remains unconsummated because of Irena’s paralyzing fear that she will turn into a large cat upon consummation. Irene doesn’t even kiss Oliver. Oliver, a most understanding husband all things considered, begins to confide in his assistant at work, Alice (Jane Randolph), and Irena’s anger and jealousy trigger her Serbian curse. Oliver also gets Irena to visit Dr. Louis Judd (Tom Conway) upon Alice’s recommendation; Judd, of course, develops his own designs for Irena.

Unlike the Universal monster movies, CAT PEOPLE does not show the monster and instead relies upon shadows and sound effects. This suggestive approach allows viewers to use our imaginations and we can invent some disturbing scenes on the widescreen of our minds, like what exactly happens to Dr. Judd in his death scene.

“We tossed away the horror formula right from the beginning,” Lewton said in the Los Angeles Times. “No grisly stuff for us. No mask-like faces hardly human, with gnashing teeth and hair standing on end. No creaky physical manifestations. No horror piled on horror.”

CAT PEOPLE (made for $134,000) became a big hit for the last few days of 1942 and then into 1943 after its 1942 Christmas release date and RKO, of course, sold it through a series of sensationalistic taglines:

“She knew strange, fierce pleasures that no other woman could ever feel!”

“LOVELY WOMAN … GIANT KILLER-CAT … THE SAME “PERSON”! … IT’S SUPER-SENSATIONAL!” (1954 re-release)

“The exciting story of a woman who kills the thing she loves!”

“The strangest story you ever tried to get out of your dreams!”

“A Kiss Could Change Her Into a Monstrous Fang-and-Claw Killer!’

“She Was Marked With The Curse Of Those Who Slink And Court And Kill By Night!”

“To Kiss Her Meant Death By Her Own Fangs and Claws!”

“Kiss me and I’ll claw you to death!”

“The most terrifying menace of them all!”

Oliver, Alice, and Irena return in THE CURSE OF THE CAT PEOPLE (1944), one of the first sequels to throw off a general public (and publicists) expecting more of the same. TCM.com starts its entry, “The RKO publicists must have been using mind-altering drugs when they masterminded the ad campaign behind THE CURSE OF THE CAT PEOPLE (1944), a poetic fantasy about a lonely young girl who invents an imaginary playmate.”

Poetic is one word to describe the Lewton CAT PEOPLE films, and how many horror movies have ever been deserving of that compliment?