Simply Perfect

A lot of perfectly good film show their cards early, establish a unique premise and let the audience explore a topic at a leisurely pace, without much in terms of surprise. this film is not one of those films.

The film never slows down or bores, plunging from one harrowing sequence to the next.

While it doesn't offer any answers, it both thrills and makes you think.

A playboy aristocrat tries to romance several women around the town, yet when his advances are spurned, brings them back to his castle to feed to his basement filled with flesh-eating cats.Superb Mexican exploitation effort, filled with lots of nudity, some what-should-be arrogant speeches from the main guy about getting away with it all and just the general nature of the storyline, about the tactics he uses and the toys he plays with in order to do everything he does around the city, so despite the lack of real action since it's pretty slow-going, it's still a good bit of fun. The castle is again a grand Gothic masterpiece, filled with the cramped rooms, candle-lit walkways and brick architecture that's always featured in these films, and with the cats coming into play more in the second half, it adds an extra bit of spice into the proceedings what with them getting loose and chasing after the victims causing a suspenseful chase to get out. Needed a bit more action during the second half when he's trying to lure the women back, but it's not all that bad at all.Rated R: Full Nudity, Graphic Violence, Language and violence-against-animals

This is a strange and plot less movie about a psychopath (Hugo Stiglitz) who flies around Mexico City's poshest neighborhoods in his helicopter picking up sexy, bikini-clad women whom he then takes back to his castle where he has sex with them, murders them, pickles their heads, and feeds the remains to the titular "mil gatos" that he keeps in his basement.Director Rene Cardona Jr. never made what could really be considered a "good" movie in any sense of the word, and this one is especially inept. A serial killer isn't exactly going to be too inconspicuous flying around the ritzy suburbs in a helicopter. Hugo Stiglitz was probably a lot less irresistible to women than Cardona Jr. seemed to think he was in movies like this and "Tintorera". And if one wants to dispose of bodies, a few good-size hogs would do the job a lot more efficiently (and quietly) than 1,000 yowling cats. Also, I might point out that the action of this movie takes place over a lot more than a single night, in fact very little of the action even happens at night.Basically though faulting the movie's frequent lapses in logic is really missing the point. What Cardona Jr. seems to be trying to do is string together a lot of visually interesting scenes with the slenderest plot strands imaginable, making a movie that is about half avante-garde and half exploitative trash. Unfortunately, some of these scenes aren't too interesting to begin with (the helicopter footage) and some just go on too long (a strange interlude where the killer watches one leggy would-be victim doing a showgirl routine). Some scenes, however, are pretty interesting--especially the scenes with the cats. And as usual Cardona Jr. has lured a number of pretty European actresses (Anjanette Comer, Cristine Linder) to Mexico to swap bodily fluids with Stiglitz and become cat chow. I hope they at least got a nice Mexican vacation out of it!

The moment I saw "Night of 1000 Cats" in the bargain bin of my local Wal-mart, I was perplexed. Why was such a promising looking movie being sold in so degrading a fashion? Out of curiosity, I bought it on impulse, and let me tell you, "Cats" is worth every penny of its price, and more so.The plot follows a young playboy billionaire named Hugo, who flies around what may or may not be a Mexican city in his helicopter seducing beautiful women and the occasional little girl. Hugo is so charming, he can seduce women without even having a conversation with them, all he needs is his helicopter and his winning smile. But there's a catch, for Hugo is not truly a Casanova, he is more of a CATSanova, for he is the owner of 1000 bloodthirsty cats, and once he is satisfied with his women, he feeds them to these voracious felines.And now for my review. "Night of 1000 Cats" is truly a film masterpiece, and I am shocked at the low ratings this film has garnered on this otherwise esteemed site. Those who gave this a low rating should go back to watching the sellout, brain-dead pap that Hollywood normally pumps out. I suppose, however, that most people can not appreciate this movie as the pure work of art that it is. It is the Mona Lisa of film, and it distresses me that people's tastes have deteriorated so much.Hugo, or as I like to call him, the Catsanova (the reason I rated this as a 9 instead of a 10 was because I feel Rene Cardona Jr. really missed a great opportunity to use this brilliant play on words in the movie) is one of the most interesting characters in cinematic history. We never really know much about the character. He apparently has no job, and like all other characters in this movie, he rarely speaks (a brilliant minimalistic decision on the part of the director). We are led to assume his Catsanovic ways all began after his mute Mongolian butler killed one of his girlfriends. Tragically, he took the wrong path after this, and decided to buy 1000 cats so that he could feed women to them. This was truly a tragic, yet natural decision that I think many other men in his position would take, myself included admittedly. We can see the Catsanova's anger and internal anguish occasionally when he randomly tosses a nearby cat over a 12 foot tall cage wall and later when he drowns a cat in his swimming pool. A foolish viewer would claim these scenes were pointless and didn't make sense, but they would be dead wrong, much like the Catsanova's women friends.The direction in this movie is impeccable. You can really understand the movie's symbolism when, during a sex scene, the camera zooms in quickly, dramatically, and repeatedly into the faces of stuffed rabbits, bears, owls, and mooses the Catsanova keeps in his bedroom. This likely symbolizes the Catsanova's descent into the natural animal instinct to feed his sexual partners to cats. Another cool trick the director pulls is adjusting the focus until everything gets blurry. You can tell that Rene Cardona Jr. was very inventive, as no other director is talented enough to bring a shot from clearness into unfocused mystery. Another compliment I have to give Cardona is his reuse of footage. In the ten to twenty minute helicopter seduction sequence for example, Cardona demonstrates incredible efficiency by reusing the same few shots over and over. Overall, "Night of 1000 Cats" is a must see movie, and will change your life. The movie has a very important moral: "If you become rich, avoid the temptation to feed women to flesh- eating cats."9 out of 10

I watched the Trinity Home Entertainment DVD titled Night of a 1000 Cats, which mercifully was cheap because it was the 63 minutes long version. Frankly, that running time was probably arrived at by rounding up! The movie has its moments. A guy has a nice time swimming naked in a pool with an attractive woman and takes her by private helicopter to his home. There, he has a hunchbacked servant with a shaved head who dresses in a black robe. He shows the woman his private collection of heads immersed in liquid in clear square containers. She's alarmed when she sees there's one that's empty. Don't worry - they're wax, he lies, and promptly strangles her to death.He's also got a caged area full of cats. When one gets out during dinner, he flings it over the fence back into the cage. Later, he serves them some sort of ground meat that may be one of his girlfriends. However, bodies also appear to be disposed of by being wrapped up and pushed through a small door by his servant.A lot of the movie is spent by the guy flying around in his helicopter to try to spot attractive women and get them to come with him. It takes several fly-bys sometimes to accomplish that, but he usually does.There's an astonishingly small amount of dialogue. I wonder what the half-hour or more that was cut from the movie contains? Mildly recommended if you can see it on the cheap. I'd be curious to see the uncut version.