list/discuss/rate - your recently watched movies

1994’s “Felidae” is another animation in the top 3 most disturbing 'kids' movies ever made. This one unlike Watership Down and Plague Dogs, is a German animation and it just has a no holds barred approach to the material. Nothing is restrained, the language is obscene, the violence is prominent and bloody, there is a serial killer, and worst of all the sexual undertones are horrendous. So in other words a night of wholesome family entertainment. 

When one looks at the origin of the movie it is easy to see how this became the most misunderstood movie in the unholy trilogy of disturbing kids films. Like the others this was never meant for kids to consume, it is a humorous adults film with dark satire and crime fiction parody. The fact that it is animated was its Achilles heel, but it is really an allegory of Nazi atrocities, racial purity and a Film Noir detective genre pastiche. The animation is not even cute but the characters are ragged and scrawny with the foulest mouths surely in an animated flick (though I refuse to watch pseudo porn-animation ‘Fritz the Cat’).

There are famous scenes in this that made youtubers conversing for pages such as the nightmare scene, so chilling and yet so compelling, and the rape sequence with the femme fatale, quite hard to watch. The feline cat offers herself a couple of times willingly though they have just met, so no more than a prostitute. The first nightmare scene is an evil scientist dragging Francis into hell by chain. In a house we see over and over again on the wall explicit paintings of 2 humans in a karma sutra position uncensored! The second nightmare is a pit of thousands of rotting cat corpses and the ground erupts and morphs into a Catholic priest. With a maniacal grin he uses his hands as marionette handles and the strings lift up the decaying corpses and they are torn in two in a putrescent shower of dark blood. Later we see a mutilated cat victim who is decapitated and another scene features a mad scientist human experimenting on many cats, cutting them open and inserting liquids. After the first few are turned to gory mulch he continues to drink alcohol to numb the feelings and even cuts one up and removes its bowels. Then there is the final cat fight that rivals even “Watership Down” for a scratching biting gore feast, complete with full disembowelment. I am not making this stuff up.

The story entails Francis the main cat detective who checks out the grisly murders in his neighbourhood, thinks it may be a “can-opener”, that’s human, and conducts an investigation. His findings show that each victim was sexually aroused at the time of their death; “the killer is obviously a sex machine that doesn’t like the competition of others so decided to wipe them out, or else he has a general exception to fornication.” Other cats aid him in the investigation and they come across Felicity, who sees hellish visions, and they encounter a suicidal cult the Claundandus sect, and a psychotic gang leader bully Kong. They also come across nut job scientist who conducts evil experiments, drilling into cats craniums with delight, and other unsavoury types.  Kong says when he meets Bluebeard and Francis and accusing them of being gay; “He sure is a juicy number, you gonna show us some of the tricks he taught you?” I like the dark humour in this such as when Francis sees the sect members willingly walking into a plasma electric bolt suiciding in the name of their false deity. Francis quips; “what I was watching was not exactly a scene out of The Aristocats!” The dialogue is as intelligent as any Film Noir, and it has some very innovative creative animation.   

The overall vision is a labyrinthine puzzle that often comes across as a gorefest with ominous atmospheres and some unforgettable traumatic scenes. The nightmare scenes in particular will stay with some viewers. It has some endearing characters and is nothing short of intriguing but for adults. There are some extraordinary references to Nazi experimental butchery like Auschwitz angel of death. The references to cult worship are also heavy handed even down to Jim Jones references and a vision of a deity who offers retribution by suicide; “one little journey, what will we find when we arrive?” The spectres utter “everything that we’ve lost Francis.” After the first scene I had already made up my mind on that matter. However, I can recommend this if you are after a dark animation because it doesn’t get much darker than this.