The Curse of the Cat People (1944) on Netflix
Passed19441h 10mDramaHorrorMystery
Six-year-old Amy Reed has no friends in Tarrytown, and her father fears her daydreaming echoes his first wife, Irena. A wish on a ring brings her a companion he takes for imaginary.
- Netflix3.9/5
- IMDb6.7/107,989 votes
- Rotten Tomatoes88%
Trailer
Plot summary
After the death of his first wife, Irena, engineer Oliver Reed has married Alice Moore, and the two live with their six-year-old daughter, Amy, in Tarrytown, New York. Amy keeps to herself, lost in daydreams, and her behavior troubles Oliver, who is reminded of Irena. At her parents' urging she tries to befriend the neighborhood children, who turn her away. She stops before a large house that the other children say belongs to a witch, and an elderly woman calls to her from a second-floor window, dropping a handkerchief and a ring. Barbara Farren seizes the handkerchief. Edward, the family's butler, tells Amy the ring is a wishing ring, and she wishes for a friend. A wind circles her, and she plays in the garden with what Oliver and Edward take to be an imaginary friend.
Cast
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about The Curse of the Cat People (1944)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- Gunther von Fritsch fell behind schedule directing The Curse of the Cat People, getting only halfway through the screenplay in the 18 days allotted, so RKO handed the film to editor Robert Wise, whose first directing credit it became.
- RKO executives were disappointed by Val Lewton's first cut of The Curse of the Cat People and ordered extra scenes, including boys chasing a black cat in a park; re-editing to fit them in lost plot details.
- RKO insisted on the title The Curse of the Cat People to cash in on the success of Cat People, over producer Val Lewton's wish to call it Amy and Her Friend.
- Val Lewton put his own childhood into the film, down to party invitations "mailed" by placing them in a hollow tree, and he grew up not far from Tarrytown, where the story is set.
- The tight budgets of Val Lewton's films meant sets were reused from other RKO productions; this one used sets from Orson Welles' The Magnificent Ambersons, which had also supplied Cat People.
