Capital Celluloid 2017 - Day 322: Tue Nov 21

The Curse of the Cat People (Wise/Von Fritsch, 1944): BFI Southbank, NFT3, 8.15pm


This 35mm screening, part of a double-bill with 'Cat People, is part of the Big Screen Classics season at BFI Southbank. Full details here.

Time Out review:
Though very different in purpose and tone to Cat People, Val Lewton's 'sequel' is far more closely tied to its predecessor than is commonly believed. For one thing, all the main characters remain very much the same as they were in the earlier film, to which there are many specific references; for another, both films concern the way that guilt, fear and fantasy can arise from isolation and misunderstanding. In this case, it's a small girl, lonely and repeatedly scolded by her parents and shunned by her friends for indulging in day-dreaming; when she populates her solitary world with the ghost of her father's dead first wife (Simon, heroine of Cat People), her imagination (or is it?) gets her into serious trouble. Far from being a horror film, it's a touching, perceptive and lyrical film about childhood, psychologically astute and occasionally disturbing as it focuses entirely on the child's-eye view of a sad, cruel world.
Geoff Andrew

Here (and above) is the trailer.

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