Wonderful character development!

Pretty Good

It's the kind of movie you'll want to see a second time with someone who hasn't seen it yet, to remember what it was like to watch it for the first time.

The film may be flawed, but its message is not.

I really enjoyed the first film and when it turned up again, without thinking, or checking, I took a family of friends to see it. I was ashamed that I had enthused so much about it to them.Disney processed the original film just like the human body processes a delicious meal - takes in something good and turns out ... well, you know. And by having a dark-skinned person as the FBI man, the results of fingerprinting the informant were subdued.Taken as an isolated film, I suppose it is not too bad if one likes that weird sort of thing, but when one has read the book or seen the first film - horrible!

"That Darn Cat" is a makeover of the Disney film with Haley Mills. This time around, the world is darker, the main character is darker...and the cat is darker.Christina ("Addams Family," "Sleepy Hollow") Ricci is the main character for our story. She's a psychopathic, Gothic creature with black all around. She moves to a new town, finds a new cat, finds a new mystery, and solves it (I wasn't expecting that). Along the way is Thomas F. Wilson, better known as Biff from "Back to the Future," and Michael McKean--who does a bunch of nothing considering how funny the guy usually is."That Darn Cat" fails on a lot of levels. It's watchable, and probably should be seen once on TV, but I wouldn't go out of your way to see it.Christina Ricci is fine as the title character; but I found that the whole moody, Gothic thing was a bit overdone--whether it was on the script like that or not, it was overbearing. They kept stressing to the audience, "This girl is dark," but I think I got it the first time.Dean Jones, from the original "That Darn Cat," makes a few cameos in this flick. Whatever happened to him? The last I remember him in a film without being a cameo was "Beethoven"...Thomas F. Wilson does seem to prove he can act out characters other than Biff, Griff and Buford Tannen, but if I were him I wouldn't quit the day job just yet--a film like this isn't going to get him back in the acting arena.The film's gags don't exactly work all the time. Sometimes they work a little bit, but on the whole, this film is a pretty big mess that should only be seen on television when nothing good is on. 2/5 stars -John UlmerP.S.--Be on the lookout for cameos galore, including "Cheers" man John Ratzenburger.

This movie is not the best in the world, but it is cute. It could stand a lot of improvement, and Patty needs a new attitude, but the movie is watch-able and, at times, enjoyable. I give it a 5 out of 10.

I have an extremely open mind when it comes to Hollywood remaking, revisiting, creating a sequel to, or otherwise building upon an established film. Consider that mind slammed firmly shut!The original "Darn Cat" featured a precocious feline surrounded by a village of humans (some funny, some scary, some just plain annoying). But the cat always remained at the center of the story, and the cat's actions are what propelled the whole thing forward. But here, the focus is on Patty Randall (Christina Ricci) and her FBI-rookie pal, Zeke Kelso (Doug E. Doug).Apparently, the producers knew that they had an up-and-coming young starlet in their midst when they created this litter-box, because the focus is moved away from D.C. and onto Ricci's bratty and generally unlikeable Patty Randall. While no producer can be blamed for seeing talent and grabbing it (Two "Addams Family" films and "Casper the Friendly Ghost" had already gotten Ricci significant exposure!), they forgot that the film's title is "That Darn Cat"... not "That Darn Pat".And it shows. We still have a minor league all-star cast, and we still have the FBI agent, the young girl and her cat as the heroes of the piece, but we cannot even see the villains (who provided so much of the menace in the original) and we see entirely too much of the assortment of freaks, geeks and throwaway nutcases that populate this burg.I submit a challenge: Watch this one, then go back and watch the original. Then TRY to remember something significant that the cat in the new version did.See, you're learning!