Very very predictable, including the post credit scene !!!

One of my all time favorites.

Pretty good movie overall. First half was nothing special but it got better as it went along.

When a movie has you begging for it to end not even half way through it's pure crap. We've all seen this movie and this characters millions of times, nothing new in it. Don't waste your time.

Paul Shrader is far better known as a writer (Taxi Driver, Raging Bull) but he has also directed a few films and Cat People is one of them. A remake of a 1942 film it tells of an old, ancient time when big cats(leopards to be specific) roamed the lands and humans sent their daughters as sacrifice to mate with them(it is shown more poetically than how I wrote). One such union results in the birth of siblings whom we follow in present day New Orleans. This is a strange film in that it can be classified as fantasy-erotic horror. The atmosphere is supreme and the early scenes in the ancient times are reminiscent of David Lynch's Dune. The acting by everyone from the gorgeous Natasha Kinski to the always sublimely crazy Malcolm Mcdowell to John Heard as the sole "normal "human being is good. This is a good, distinctive horror film.

Growing up in the 80s, Paul Schrader's Cat People was (in)famous, mostly for its reported violence and sexual content. As a pubescent cinephile obsessed with horror movies, this film was a mainstay in my must-watch list. Sadly, it wasn't so until 2018. I have many cherished memories of wanting to watch Cat People: the awesome Giorgio Moroder soundtrack, the divided and heated reviews, the haunting poster and the much talked-about sexual content of the film. I am sure that if I had discovered the film during the 80s, my appreciation of Paul Schrader's film would have been quite different to my current opinion. I have the greatest respect for Paul Schrader's body of work whether it is his scriptwriting or directing; the titles simply speak for themselves: Taxi Driver, The Last Temptation of Christ, Raging Bull, ... to name a few Scorsese pictures. One thing is sure about Mr Schrader, his scriptwriting is absolute genius. So what went wrong with Cat People? Please don't misunderstand me. Cat People is perfectly watchable from beginning to end and I do recommend the film. The source material, Jacques Tourneur's Cat People, is an established RKO classic from the early 40's, where it was all about oppressive atmosphere with extremely efficient cinematic expressionism. Stepping away from the traditional horror mould, Paul Schrader explores the themes of sexual frustration and emancipation pointing towards perversity, masochism and desperation doing so without holding back on nudity, violence and taboos. Again, the film is fine but, halfway through, I was getting that niggling feeling that it could have been so much more: bolder, more dreamlike or more nightmarish, more morally violent and more engaging (Lucio Fulci did it with The Beyond and Ken Russell with Altered States). Sadly, the film ends up being a sleazy piece of entertainment with just a few moments of genius. As an open-minded cinephile, I tend to forgive plot holes based on how gaping they are. Be warned, Cat People has its fair share. Once controversial upon its release, Cat People is tame to today's standards while still interesting in its exploration in sexual liberation.

Tenuously based on the same DeWitt Bodeen story as the classic Val Lewton/Jacques Tourneur movie but very different indeed in its treatment, it's development and in the story itself. In fact for most of its running time all this has in common with the earlier movie is the title, (though it does keep the swimming pool sequence). The plot may be silly, (the plots of most horror films usually are), but director Paul Schrader embues it with considerable atmosphere and, with its New Orleans setting, it looks terrific, (once again Ferdinando Scarfiotti is credited as 'visual consultant').Here Nastassja Kinski is the young woman who turns into a black panther, Malcom McDowell is her brother who does the same with very nasty results and John Heard is the zoo-keeper who falls for Kinski. Being Schrader this is much more concerned with sexuality of one kind or another than the original but it is hardly convincing and the performances are mostly terrible. Still, it rattles along in its crazy way and remains, perhaps, one of the most underrated films in the Schrader canon.

I'd forgotten what a dirty, kinky movie this was! Nastassja Kinski plays a young woman reconnecting with her priest brother, the perennially off-kilter Malcolm McDowell. Without spoiling too much of the plot, after the two reconnect, McDowell meets a prostitute in a hotel room, only for her to instead get mauled and killed by a black panther. Kinski awakens the next day to find her brother missing and while visiting the zoo finds herself strangely connected to the new panther exhibit. Kinski then meets zoologist John Heard and the two being a romantic affair, which leads to a sexual awakening for Kinski, filled with love making, bondage, and incest. The film is a wild ride and one that I think only gets better with age. Back when I first saw this film, I remember seeing it as slick filmmaking, but rewatching it years later I can see how director Paul Schrader's was influenced by the film of Jean Cocteau in it's dreamlike nature. Schrader brings a hypnotic surreality to his erotic horror film that like many a nightmare, cannot be shaken off easily. "Cat People" also benefits from a strong supporting cast that includes Annette O'Toole, Ruby Dee, Ed Begley Jr., John Larroquette, Frankie Faison, Scott Paulin, and Ray Wise. And in rewatching the film now, the film gets a lot of mileage from 80s nostalgia, featuring a great Davie Bowie theme song, a terrific synthesizer score from Giorgio Moroder, wonderfully slick blood red cinematography by John Bailey, and also Nastassja Kinski's super cute Human League short haircut. Overall, "Cat People" is a unique horror film experience, but it's a very dark and twisted one that will not appeal to most audiences, riding that fine line between art-house and grindhouse, where it's likely too arty for horror fans and too bloody and dirty for the art-house intelligencia, leaving a narrow band of folks who enjoy what it has to offer.