Behold…a cinematic adaptation of one of the most dizzyingly atrocious musicals of all time. Tremble…at the very famous people transformed, via some Cronenbergian VFX wizardry, into animals of the feline persuasion. Bear witness…to the horrors of the unnatural feline-people as they sing and dance for your entertainment. Vomit not…for you surely cannot afford a new MacBook in this economy. Yes, dear reader, the time has come: The first trailer for Cats, directed by Tom Hooper (of all people), has arrived, boasting performances (-ish?) from such well-paid actors as Idris Elba, Dame Judi Dench, Taylor Swift (because of fucking course), Ian McKellen, James Corden, and Jennifer Hudson.
The film’s renditions of the musical’s most iconic, overwrought songs are on display here, as are the giant chairs and utensils we were promised. Everyone’s trying to convey an agonizingly earnest air of profundity against the uncanny CGI fuckery and, Christ, it’s exactly what we expected. It’s fuckin’ Cats.
Cats will terrorize a theater near you on December 20. Here is the official synopsis, which is only slightly more coherent than the actual musical:
A tribe of cats called the Jellicles must decide yearly which one will ascend to the Heaviside Layer and come back to a new Jellicle life.