Editor’s note: shortly after filing this review of CatVideoFest, a compilation of cat videos screening in select cinemas, our critic-in-chief, Luke Buckmaster, was found convulsing on the floor, foam coming out of his mouth. After regaining consciousness, he continually repeated a word beginning with “m,” though speech analysts subsequently believe he might have just been saying “meow.” We wish him a speedy recovery.
I tawt I taw a puddy tat; I did, I did taw a puddy tat. Those words are cribbed of course from that famous canary bird of the Looney Tunes menagerie, whose proclivity for observing domestic felines was more than a catchy phrase; it was a method of survival. It’s fascinating to ponder what the bulbous-headed icon would make of CatVideoFest, one of the year’s most complex and distinguished motion pictures, suffice to say that he would surely have a visceral reaction, moved and disturbed in equal measure—eyes wide, mouth agape, feathers ruffled.
There are many vignettes in director Will Braden’s genre and form-bending film, which assumes an anthology-like structure, stringing together moments small and large, targeting aspects of human and cat psyches. Nary a minute has elapsed before we encounter our first profundity, propelled by the sight of a human finger scratching the chin of an adorable, good looking puddy tat, who is not smiling per se but projects a mirthful visage. Finger and chin connect, and in this gentle association something magical happens: one head becomes two; two eyes become four.
The surprise appearance of another cat, seemingly emerging from the furry chest of the first, comments on codependency, the duality of existence, the ancient need for physical connection, magnets of the heart and mind. And then, a hiss! The next vignette throws these notions of fellowship out the window—revealing a cantankerous Siamese cat, furious by the presence of a hand extending towards it, nothing but malice, all gummed up with rage and vitriol. And yet, and yet, and yet! The hand proffers a peace offering: some kind of biscuity nourriture.
The puddy tat’s renewed expression says everything. Its eyes transform into wide, bright, moony surfaces, of beautiful blacks and blues; it stares ahead, benumbed and humbled, computing this unprecedented turn of events, its sudden passage to Valhalla. Braden cuts away before we can ascertain much more, let alone find closure.
Many other moments in CatVideoFest are clipped in such a way: vivid in the moment, tantalising in the memory. One vignette, presented like many others in a vertical format, satirises the hegemony of the widescreen aspect ratio. A young cat ascends a soft material-covered wooden pillar, and upon reaching its zenith continues its journey, now making rightwards passage, across another pillar, running horizontally. When it stops, seemingly apropos of nothing, the camera pulls back to reveal what the cat is looking down at: a hexagon-shaped red and black trampoline. It jumps, jumps, jumps towards it, towards the springy shangri la.
One could pen an infinite array of words about this film and its incalcuable panoplies of meaning. I myself cannot continue for much longer, for the candle light by which I write this article is slowly dwindling, the wick inching towards the base, while the poison I drank this evening—arsenic, arsenic, the nectar of the damned!—courses through my veins, soon to signal the end of this bromidic existence, of which I harbor no regrets.
Move, we must, through this complex and delicate world, its rich properties evoked so beautifully throughout CatVideoFest, the final production upon which I hang my film reviewing hat. When my vision began to fade, I could feel the light behind my eyes dimming, and I tawt I taw a puddy tat; I did, I did tee a puddy tat; many many puddy tats, congregated before me, resplendently furry, united in their capacity for wonder.
