Cat Sick Blues is a Kickstarter-funded film revolving around a serial killer who thinks he’s a cat. Just on that short summary alone, I was intrigued, especially when considering the Hotline Miami vibe the trailer gave off. Once the end credits rolled, though, I was just nauseated and confused.
The pitch for Cat Sick Blues is so simple that it’s little surprise that backers threw money at the Dave Jackson project. Man loves cat, cat dies, man goes on murderous misogynistic rampage to resurrect cat. Your typical love story, really. If Inside Llewyn Davis was turned up to a thousand with its cat adoration, Cat Sick Blues might be the deformed, bastard child that crawled out of its backside, covered in grime and reeking of ugly cynicism.
Ted (Matthew C. Vaughan), also known by his murderous alter-ego Cat Man, is a depraved man whose life we are all too privy to. Every detail of his perversion, whether it’s using a cat litter tray as toilet or using a cat penis dildo to murder women. He meets Claire (Shian Denovan) early on, a rape victim whose YouTube famous cat was killed by her assailant. Stop me if you think this is already sounding ridiculous.
The film doesn’t hold any punches (or scratches, as the case may be), even from its early moments. Within the first five minutes, a woman is decapitated with a shovel before her friend is garrotted. This is basically it for what seems like Cat Sick Blues‘ endless running time. Time drags from one scene to the next with each slow-motion sequence, which there are an abundance of, even for the most ordinary of situations. As well as blatantly taking some of its aesthetic cues from Drive, Cat Sick Blues also has an unhealthy obsession with replicating its slow-motion with half the panache. Refn knew to be sparing with it to not nullify its effectiveness, evidenced during the iconic elevator scene. Based on almost every gruesome encounter in Cat Sick Blues, Dave Jackson does not.
Interspersed between all the unnecessarily gross death scenes are lo-fi conversations that are often inaudible because all indie films apparently have to have dialogue spoken at a volume that only dogs could understand. Whether it’s straining to hear the mentally disturbed Ted talk to his victims or fiddling with the volume levels during his appearance at a grief session for pet owners, it’s an imbalanced mess in the audio department. However, the soundtrack is the one bright spot of the film. It’s eclectic and well-suited to what’s on-screen, going from discordant and creepy one second to club-stompingly upbeat the next.
Cat Sick Blues has its fair share of social commentary and you will be damned if you try to avoid any of it – the message is so cack-handed that it’s constantly being smeared in your face. It’s your standard lightweight stuff: social media is turning us all into arseholes. After the video of Claire’s rape is leaked online, the audience has to sit with her as she watches the reaction videos back. From the disingenuous sympathy of one viewer to the crass, unbelievable commentary of another, it’s obvious the message Cat Sick Blues is trying to send, but its lack of subtlety is a dealbreaker.
As the film progresses it becomes revolting to the point where it doesn’t even seem to try anymore, instead opting to throw weirdly orange blood and innovative ways of using weapons at the audience as a means of disturbed entertainment. A lingering sense of intrigue was the only thing that kept me watching, but then it reached its final quarter. Pointless nonsense that bloated an already unwieldy film tipped me over the edge from being mildly sickened to annoyed and bored.
Having sat through some truly disgusting films and barely being touched by them, I can easily say that Cat Sick Blues has accomplished something – making me feel like a Daily Mail commenter for wanting to stop watching and to beg us all to start thinking of the children. If this was the intention all along, well done to the filmmakers, you’ve created something seriously hideous.
Some of the coverage you find on Cultured Vultures contains affiliate links, which provide us with small commissions based on purchases made from visiting our site.
