Friday, October 12, 2012

The Great Scenes # 41: Cat People (1942)

Directed by Jacques Tourneur

In celebration of Halloween, all the films on my "Great Scenes" ("Great Films" for that matter) will be horror movies. The first one is classic Val Lewton-produced classic Cat People directed by Jacques Tourneur. In this film, Simone Simon plays a woman cursed with a terrible secret: She belongs to a tribe of people who transform into a vicious large cat every time they feel a strong emotion (sexual arousal, anger, jealousy, etc.). In this famous scene from the film, she sees the man she desires talking to another woman. The woman goes off on her own in a dimly lit street and she feels someone or someTHING stalking her. This scene is a perfect example of how atmosphere, imagination and sound effects can really be a far more effective in producing scares than cheap gore and CGI monsters. 

2 comments:

Adam said...

it's kinda funny, they referenced this movie on an episode Sgt. Frog that I watched today.

Outcast said...

Wow this is incredible man. I'd never heard this movie before and the premise is so good I'd have worried that it would have came across as another low budget, rubbish classic horror film, I'm so glad to be proven wrong.