Highly Overrated But Still Good

Did you people see the same film I saw?

This is one of the few movies I've ever seen where the whole audience broke into spontaneous, loud applause a third of the way in.

A clunky actioner with a handful of cool moments.

I really like Cat People (1942)and was curious for its sequel even though I knew beforehand that Curse would be no horror at all. Indeed this is more of a drama with fantasy elements. However not as good as its predecessor I think it's a wonderful movie in its own right. It was nice to see the 3 main characters from Cat People again. I think it was very nice to make Irena return as ghost. It makes sense, Irena was a cat person and cats are said to have nine lives. However here she really isn't a cat person more of a good fairy. Her scenes with little Alice are splendid. Kudos to very young Ann Carter to make the movie pretty much hers. Her befriending an old lady from which she got a gift eventually provides us with a dramatic back story that unfortunately doesn't get elaborated on enough. That's a pity because it could have made the movie even better.

Robert Wise directed this sequel to "Cat People", set several years later. Oliver Reed(played by Kent Smith) and Alice(played by Jane Randolph) are now married with a six-year old daughter named Amy(played by Ann Carter). Amy is a lonely child who has a hard time making friends, and seems to prefer living in her fantasy world, visited by the ghost of Irina(played by Simone Simon) Irina looks after Amy, but Oliver wants nothing to do with this, insisting that Amy must be socialized. Amy does befriend an elderly woman in her "haunted" house, though her daughter(played by Elizabeth Russell, though not as her cat lady character from the first) is resentful. Amy will later run away from home, becoming lost, though she is far from being alone... Unique and thoughtful sequel builds on the story from Part I, rather than repeating it, and result is most satisfying. (No third film was made however!)

This mostly unrelated sequel to "Cat People" (1942) has Amy, the young daughter of Oliver and Alice Reed. Amy is a very imaginative child who has trouble differentiating fantasy from reality, and has no friends her own age as a result.The most notable thing about this film is that it was Robert Wise's directorial debut. This also happens to be produced by Val Lewton and the key cast members reprise their roles, so it is not exactly the "mostly unrelated" sequel the plot says above (though the film does go in a radically different direction than the original and the cat aspects are played down).Also, I love the child slap! This girl may be lonely and in need of a friend, but she sure knows how to slap a kid hard in the face.

In Tarrytown, New York, lonely preteen Ann Carter (as Amy) relates to butterflies rather than other children, which worries father Kent Smith (as Oliver "Ollie" Reed). The girl is also befriended by aging actress Julia Dean (as Julia Farren), who inhabits the neighborhood's "haunted" house. Next, young Carter announces her best friend is Mr. Smith's deceased first wife, ghostly beauty Simone Simon (as Irena) from "Cat People" (1942). Smith and pretty second wife Jane Randolph (as Alice) hope their daughter isn't afflicted with the horrific curse that killed Ms. Simon in the earlier story...This sequel strikes a completely different tone than the original, but it works beautifully. Key to "The Curse of the Cat People" is the fact that Simon left no descendants, so producer Val Lewton and his team went in a different direction; this story amounts to Simon's redemption. In the lead role, Carter is captivating. The blending of her loneliness with the stories involving Simon and Ms. Dean are satisfyingly intertwined. Dean revels in her role as a washed up actress likely stricken with Alzheimer's; oddly, she received no "Supporting Actress" consideration. Of course, the title and promotion cheat.******** The Curse of the Cat People (3/2/44) Gunther von Fritsch, Robert Wise ~ Ann Carter, Kent Smith, Julia Dean, Simone Simon