As Seen On Demand: Cats Don't Dance

I was sitting in front of my television thinking I would review Bride Wars, when, to my dismay, I found that it was no longer available on demand (at least not where I could find it). What was I to do? How could I possibly review anything when that wonderfully horrible movie is no longer available on demand? Does this mean it won't be available on the higher channels anymore? How am I supposed to comment on a movie that people will have to download illegally or rent at the video store to see? Who wants to make that sort of effort?

Luckily, as I was looking under the Bs on HBO or Encore on demand, I came across the beginning of the Cs. And under the Cs, what did I find but one of my favorite non-Disney animated movie musicals of all time?

Now, to be fair, my love of 1997's Cats Don't Dance is largely a result of firmly placed nostalgia goggles. My sister and I loved this movie growing up. We'd sing the "Little Boat on the Sea" song in the car on long family road trips. She'd sing Darla's part, and I'd sing all of the animals. Now, she's studying voice at one of the top music conservatories in the country, and I'm an aspiring playwright who only sings occasionally at random coffee houses and with the revelers and wenches at the NJ Ren Faire.

Catcher in the Rye: "Digression!" Ok, to relate this to Cats Don't Dance...

The main reason I decided not to pursue acting or singing with my wonderful sister (who is extremely talented and deserves every decent gig or part she gets in the future) is that I don't take rejection well. Rather, I don't take constant rejection over things I can't change well. And as an actress with limited talent and even more limited appeal (read: the shy, fat girl), I don't have a prayer with community or student theater, let alone as a professional actress. With writing, at least, I won't be rejected based on my appearance. If I'm rejected as a writer, it's due to my crappy writing, and that's it. It can also be fixed.

In Cats Don't Dance, the lead characters have it even worse than I do. They can be fixed (*insert groans here*), but not in a way that would help them get parts in the harsh, cold, glitter-painted streets of Hollywood. They are animals- cats, hippos, turtles, goats, and penguins that can only get parts as unintelligent, non-speaking, animal extras.

Of course, this makes sense. In real (well, non-cartoon) life, animals don't talk. Elephants don't play the piano. Hippos don't sing. And, as the title states, cats don't dance. My very noisy cockatiel seems to protest (her name is Laurel, and she's watching this movie with me), but much of the human race and certainly the typecasting film market will never let animals get around this handicap. At least not in the world of live action.

Now, onto the film itself.

Cats Don't Dance follows Kokomo, Indiana native Danny, an orange, suspender and tie wearing cat with a passion for theater and an irrepressible urge to dance and sing on the silver screen. He takes a bus ride to Hollywood, which in his mind, is the place "where the streets are paved with gold, and the kitties never grow old."

The first number is mainly a series of animated cameos of real-life, human, classic movie stars who maintain caricatured faces and pause for paparazzi photos as Danny dances, sings, and causes chaos on his way to Mammoth Studios (known for casting animal extras and being a clear homage to MGM, right down to the roaring elephant in the company's opening credit sequence. On his way, he manages to mess with telephone wires, young gopher Pudge the Penguin (who, in retrospect, might be funnier if played by an actual gopher), and future love interest, secretary and former singer Sawyer, a beautiful persian cat that's probably every furry's wet dream.

Almost immediately after stepping through the door of Mammoth Studios, Danny gets cast in a musical version of the Noah's Ark story. The catch: he has one line towards the beginning. To no one's surprise, this one line is "meow."

From this point on, the movie becomes Danny's attempt to bring the animals out of their shells (metaphorical and literal, in the case of T.W. Turtle) and onto the list of famous Hollywood movie stars at Mammoth Studios.

Highlights of the film are the extremely catchy and memorable musical numbers and, possibly more so, child actress slash villain Shirley Temple...er, I mean Darla Dimple.

Darla Dimple is easily one of the greatest animated female villains, ever. Say what you like about Maleficent, Ursula, and Cruella De Ville (who, in her defence, may have hated animals as much as Darla Dimple), but at the ripe old age of five or six, Miss Dimple has mastered the art of manic demonization with a smile. Think Angelica from the Rugrats, with a better singing voice, at least seventeen times the level of malice, and one of the scariest monosyllabic henchmen/bodyguards ever to break through walls and throw cats off of tall buildings.

The songs...well, I saw this movie for the first time sometime back in the 90s. I hadn't seen it in years before today, and I can still get these songs stuck in my head. To this day, when I feel like singing and am trying to think of something to sing, my first thought is "I've got a song to sing, and if you don't like my song I'm gonna sing it anyhow." Just try to see this movie and get these ear-worms out of your head.

But does it hold up now, years later and once I remove my nostalgia goggles?

I'll have to say yes. The movie's pretty screwy and trippy with its bright colors, fast dialogue, and strange yet intentionally stereotypical characters, but the thing is, I think this as an adult. As a kid, it seemed completely natural to me. It's like several of the sites listed in Weird NJ- as an NJ native, I never really thought about Mary Ellis's grave behind Loews on Route 1 until the magazine mentioned it. I always knew it was there, but it just never registered. Maybe I was an especially tolerant and unjaded child, but I never saw any irony in this movie.

Years later, of course, I recognize the intelligence and satire involved in the writing, mainly in the portrayal of Hollywood, but as a kid, it was just a fun movie. And you know what? It still is. Say what you like about trippiness and mass appeal- I still love this movie, and I always will. And it's free on demand, so you should watch it and love it too. After all, as the singing, dancing animals tell us, "nothing's gonna stop us [them] now." Grade: A-