After its muted debut at Sundance, star-studded Cat Person seemed to fade quickly. Despite offers from Netflix and other studios including Bleecker Street, the film somehow ended up streaming on Hoopla, a service free to anyone with a library card. Despite its puzzling journey to audience accessibility, this romance/thriller still remained on my must-see list, riding on the pedigree of BAFTA-nominated Emilia Jones at its center. Cat Person attempts a strange horror-tinged commentary on the modern dating landscape, stuffed with great performances and puzzling cringe-comedy in equal measure.
Bored theater concessions worker Margot (Jones, CODA, Netflix’s Locke & Key) encounters all types of interesting personalities at her job. Dark and brooding Robert (Nicholas Braun, Succession, The Watch) begins to frequent the theater, always ordering Red Vines and a popcorn. After a few visits, he asks for Margot’s number. The two quickly engage in a text-a-thon despite obvious protest from Margot’s best friend, subredditor Taylor (Geraldine Viswanathan, 7 Days, The Beanie Bubble). As directed by Susanna Fogel, these exchanges lack the energy of onscreen text bubbles, or an even more creative outlet to portray the progression of their flirtation.
Margot imagines Robert in different jobs and leaps to horrific conclusions on the back of her own reservations as well as the constant ideas from Taylor that he may be no good. At age thirty-three, Robert is probably also far too old for twenty-year-old Margot. Margot’s delusions are often more entertaining than the reality. Much of Robert remains shrouded in mystery as the film progresses through its lengthy, nearly two-hour runtime. Based on the New Yorker short story, Cat Person stretches itself thinner and thinner as it builds towards an underwhelming climax.
Unfortunately, much of Cat Person feels simply cobbled together. Actors I love in other projects—including Isaac Powell (American Horror Story: NYC, Susie Searches), Josh Andres Rivera (West Side Story, The Hunger Games: Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes), and Isabella Rossellini (Death Becomes Her, Blue Velvet)—pop up for a throwaway scene or two with little relevance to the plot. Even Viswanathan’s Taylor seems one-note, barely there to serve as a voice of doubt to Margot’s self-destructive behavior. The bones of a compelling horror/thriller are left barely intact. Glimmers of the greater movie underneath show up fleetingly, especially in Margot’s imagined moments and a super-awkward out-of-body sexual experience.
Emilia Jones delivers a worthy performance with a character whose motivations are a little baffling throughout. Waiting for twists or meta-commentary to arrive is an exercise in futility. Cat Person’s narrative instead straightforwardly delves into a wayward romance that only grows more upsetting the longer we sit with it. Braun plays Robert as a laidback nerd who rarely reveals how he truly feels, but it is only a matter of time before the real Robert rises to the surface. Cat Person needed a few more passes at the screenplay to strengthen its characters, let alone excising the extraneous details that only pad out the runtime unnecessarily. Susanna Fogel’s direction unearths the real emotions behind eerie dating no-nos more often than not. Tonally confused and unable to pick a lane, Cat Person disappoints almost as frequently as it churns out bizarre yet effective moments.
Regardless of animal preference, Cat Person is now streaming on Hoopla.
