CAT PEOPLE
1942

Val Lewton/Jacques Tourneur

In 1942 RKO was suffering financially from the results of Citizen Kane’s running over budget and making very little money.

Film was shot in 22 days and ran under $150,000 and grossed over $4,000,000

Val Lewton and Jacques Tourneur

Horror films are often dealing, as a sub-text with the eruption of the repressed as something horrific. In this film we need to ask if this is the subtext. If so what is repressed and what happens when it ruptures forth.

Lewton and Touneur often interested in whether or not the horrorific element is real or not.. Since many people who go to see horror movies expect to see the horrorific, the studios wanted the frightening event to be visible so they insisted on the insertion of elements that Lewton and Tourneur preferred to leave up to the viewer.(The studios wanded to specularize the horrorific to satisfy the viewers scopophilia!)

Cat People is, like many Lewton/Tourneur films a low budget film and in part the lower budget motivated them into creative ways to deal with problems. Many artists set limits or “obstacles” within which they must work. Hitchcock often set such obstacles for himself

Horror films often have interesting sound designs and this one is no exception. Try to note the kinds of sounds that occur that mark the appearance of the supernatural. Listen also to the use of diagetic and non diagetic music in the film. How are they related?

AFTER THE FILM

Opening and closing quotations:

Dr. Judd
John Donne

The building of tension.

Transverse scene
Pool scene
Scene in office

In these three sequences, the validity of Irena's statements become stronger. In the scene in which Alice crosses the transverse in the park, we see nothing but trees move and hear the sound of shoes disappear. After the "bus" the first actual indication that there has been a change appears. The sheep paddock shows cat prints around the dead sheep, which when followed turn into shoe prints.
In the pool sequence, the shadow of something, perhaps the panther, appears and later the robe is found shredded by what appear to have been claws tearing at it.
In the sequence in the office the panther is actually visible for the first time and the religious symbolism (in the form of the T square becoming a cross) appears.
. In the scene with Dr. Judd at the end of the film, we ALMOST see the transformation as Irena moves forward and slides into darkness. A peculiar highlight appears in her eye just as she slips out of frame.

In the transverse scequence. Alice and Oliver leave light into darkness. Edge of frame almost always dark. There are parallel shots between Alice and Irena – suddenly Irena is gone.Contrast between clicking heels of Alice and softer almost padded sounds of Irena. The sequence climaxes with what sounds like the hiss of a cat but is in favt the arrival of the bus.

Pool

Use of shadow on stairs and in the pool and the reaction of the kitten. The audience has already been told that kittens respond badly to Irena. There is the reflection of light on the ceiling and the echoes of screaming
Question about torn robe.

Office

door closed mysterious, the T-square appears as a cross, and the panther is visible. Lighting comes from the desks below the actors so the shadow all go up rather than down.

Sounds

Footsteps echoing in the park on the walk through the transverse.
Sounds of cats. Irena likes these, but not those of the panther which is “like a woman",
The arrival of the bus. This is a very famous scene and has given rise to a term “a bus” in movies which refers to the idea that the audience is led to suspect one thing and then it turns out to be another, perfectly normal event.
Echoes in the pool.
The song which Irena sings is also used as background music during the film
The scene with the strange woman (described as “looking like a cat) at the wedding banquet has some strange lesbian-like overtones The two woman are clearly linked. Not only does the woman recognize Irena as “her sister” (both as a cat woman and perhaps with lesbian overtones), but her lines are clearly said by Simone Simon.

Symbols

Cats
Swords/crosse/keys=phallic symbols
Boundaries: Bars webs, hedges
Animals recognize supernatural
Disturbing cat images (pierced by swords) appear right from the start. Irena is drawing a cat – and more interestingly a skewered one! A cat on a sword also appears on the St. John stature in Irena’s room. There are also pictures of cats all around her house in the paintings and on screens.
Cats, especially the panther, are described as evil, hence there association with women/witches. The zoo keeper says that the panther is “like unto a leopard” as the bible says in Revelations.
House cats are frightened of Irena (and not of Alice) , as are many animals. The kitten she gets as a pet seems afraid of her. The pet shop animals go berserk when she enters. The bird she was given dies of fright when she tries to hold it. The implications are that she has a “cat” nature.
Swords appear in Irena’s drawing of the leopard. They are equated with crosses, T-squares and keys. In Irena’s dream the key from the panther’s cage replaces a sword.
Dr. Judd’s cane does not protect him, perhaps because it lacks a hilt which makes it appear like a cross. It is, however responsible for both Judd’s death and ultimately Irena’s.
Bars appear most overtly on cages both at the zoo and in Irena’s apartment. They frequently appear as shadows, most notably when Oliver goes to visit Irena for the first time. There are shadows from banisters, and many other objects.
Dirt (often associated with sex)

Cleaning woman flicks of ashes
Zoo keeper cleaning area by cages
Costuming

The "cat woman" in the restaurant slips into a fur wrap as she leaves (human transformed into animal).
Irena wears a fur wrap through much of the film
Irena and panther appear similar on the ground after they are both killed

Lighting

Much of the lighting is high contrast. There are great contrasts between dark and light and light forms pools surrounded by darkness. This is often called chiaroscuro, a kind of lighting used in paintings by Rembrandt among others. Here we can feel the darkness (which Irena likes and feels is comfortable)

Photographic techniques

Lewton frequently uses surprise. Bus scene, often things look like they are one thing but turn out to be another. Oliver arrives at the building where he works. The revolving door appears to turn on its own. There is something on all fours that turns out to be the cleaning woman. Lewton often did a few scenes where something appears to happen and doesn’t and the suddenly does one that is real.

Difference between shock and suspense is suddenness rather than using time to build tension. The build up of tension on the walk through the park transverse is a good example of building up tension. Lewton’s films often have “a walk” like this one in which he builds tension. The set of scenes that build up to the appearance of Irena in the pool similarly generates a good deal of tension

Irena’s perfume is defined as not plant like but warm and living (i.e. perhaps animal like)

What are the text and subtext of Cat People?

The film seems to be interested in alternate modes of explanation: science vs. metaphysical. Does Irena turn into a cat or not? Is it real or all in her mind?

The film also contrast rational and anti rational explanataions

Sexuality as a subtext in the film

Irena’s problems seem to revolve around her frigidity which manifests itself in her fear that she will turn into a cat and kill the person who releases her emotions. The idea of cats with their association with both witchcraft and the feminine make them good choices for the location of the fear. She manifests this in her dislike of the panther which screams like a woman. The phallic nature of the swords etc. lends more force to this analysis. The ultimate release is the jealousy with Alice. She can not respond to Oliver but is jealous of Alice who (probably) can.. The announcement of her frigidity at the wedding dinner is indicated visually by the snow storm which is shown before the dinner and in which Oliver and Irena stind when she makes the announcement to him about her fear of being a "real wife" to him.

There are also some xenophobic ideas in the film in that Irena is clearly a foreigner (Serbian) while Oliver is an American ("Americano" as he says). His American childhood was happy and he has never been unhappy; Irena on the other hand has a childhood filled with ghastly stories and "superstitions" about people turning into cats and so on. Oliver's dialog is often American popular sland ("You crazy kid") and he orders the very American apple pie at the restaurant. He is more American than Jane who has Bavarian Creme and Dr. Judd whose accent betrays his non American status and who has Roquefort cheese.