Cat People (1942)

Today's film is Cat People.  There is a legend in Serbia of the Cat People, the descendants of the evil witches.  If one of these women falls in love with a man and kisses him, she will turn into a panther and eat him!

 

Irena has lived with the fear that she is a cat person all her life.  This stems from a childhood tragedy where her father was found dead and her mother was accused of being a cat person that killed him.  If her mother is a cat person, then she must be too, she is certain of it.

 

Irena falls in love with a man, Oliver (Ollie), and marries him despite believing that she will kill him.  So every night after that, she avoids him and sleeps in her own room.  Naturally, Ollie is bothered by this, since newlyweds should never sleep in different bedrooms.  Meanwhile, Ollie's beautiful coworker tells him that she's in love with him.

 

Ollie tells Irena that she needs to go see a psychiatrist.  She does, and after some time, she is no longer afraid of being intimate with her husband.  But, it's too late!  Her husband has fallen in love with the woman from work and wants to leave Irena.

 

Ollie wins the King Douchebag of the Year Award.  I can just hear his thought process: "I'm certain my wife has a mental illness, I'm going to divorce her sorry ass and go out with the hot chick from work."

 

That's his own bride he's thinking about!  What happened to his wedding vows, that he pledged "to love and honor... in sickness and in health"?  Did he just ignore this?  Mental illness can be just as devastating as physical illness.  It's her husband who should care most about her well-being.

Now the question is: Does she really turn into a panther?  Probably, I don't know.  It never actually shows her transforming.  I actually found this movie to be more depressing than scary.  I will give it a 6/10.