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Film Features

Why Tom Hooper Is the Defining Director of the 2010s

Love him or hate him, he is THE director of our generation.

Tom Hooper

Photo by Kristina Bumphrey/StarPix/Shutterstock

"Find you a man who can do both."

A bit of advice that began life as a meme, became general relationship advice, and finally settled in the culture as an identifier of any multi-talented individual. "A man who can do both" is what this generation demands of its lovers and heroes alike. It is the embodying cry of a generation that was forced via technology to adapt to multiple circumstances, to code-switch at will between professional and text speak, to lead a meaningful life in the midst of unavoidably-publicized global crises and catastrophe. We "do both" by necessity. We have built our culture around "doing both." This duality is what made Tom Hooper the perfect director for these times.

While Tom Hooper's name isn't exactly among household names like Steven Spielberg, Greta Gerwig, or Quentin Tarantino, he has been putting out critically and commercially acclaimed work for the last decade, enough to vault him into the same category as the aforementioned by any metric. His 2010 film, The King's Speech, cleaned up at the Oscars. Nominated for an astounding 12 awards, it won Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor (Colin Firth) and Best Screenplay. He followed that up in 2012 with the best version of Les Miserables ever put to film, an enormously expensive production in which the actors sung live during each take, something that was previously unheard of for a movie musical. He finished his winning streak with The Danish Girl in 2015, a tragically under-seen powerhouse film that showcased two little-known actors who would go on to win Oscars: Eddie Redmayne and Alicia Vikander, the latter of whom won for Danish Girl.

Hooper became known in film circles for the performances he drew from his actors, his sweeping wide shots, his careful shot construction, and his intensely-purposeful plotting. He became quickly associated with other contemporary masters like Paul Thomas Anderson and David Fincher. After three consecutive films that garnered rave critical reviews and made their budgets back at the box office (Les Miserables made almost $500 million worldwide), the world waited with bated breath to see what Tom Hooper's next move would be. If you still hadn't heard of him after Danish Girl came out, you can be forgiven for your ignorance, because Hooper went into hibernation for the next four years. He emerged after all that time for one final masterwork, the film he is now most famous for, and the one he will undoubtedly be remembered for:

Cats!

In an unbelievable turn of events, Tom Hooper, who a decade earlier owned the Oscars, tried his hand again at making musicals, adapting Andrew Lloyd Webber's surrealist broadway smash-hit for the screen. It did not turn out well.

Cats!, released just last December, was an expensive disaster for a multitude of reasons. It was critically panned. It lost $25 million dollars on an estimated $100 million-dollar budget, much of which was invested in special-effects like "Digital Fur Technology" (i.e. digitally covering every actor in fur so they appeared more convincingly like anthropomorphic cats than if they were to wear costumes). Dame Judi Dench and Sir Ian Mckellen, British thespians of the highest-degree, shared scenes with Jason Derulo and Taylor Swift. But weird sometimes works. It just didn't work here.

At least during its wide release, it didn't. Although still under a year old, Cats is gaining new life in a cult-film scene that includes movies such as The Rocky Horror Picture Show and The Room. There is a growing contingent of the population interested in watching and re-watching the objectively awful CatsCatsfor the sake of its unintended hilarity and for how well it mixes with drugs or alcohol. This is the great coup of Tom Hooper. This is why he embodies this generation's defining decade better than any other director: he can do both.

Tom Hooper spent the better part of the 2010s proving he was a director of the highest caliber, who could create compelling films with varied budgets, varied casts, and in varied genres. Tom Hooper also spent the final month of the 2010s proving he could screw up almost every part of a film and still find success in it. There is an unprecedented and exciting element in his career. While it's not at all uncommon for acclaimed directors to make career missteps, none of his caliber has ever made such an appalling dud of a film after such a profound string of successes. Regardless of where his movies will eventually settle in cinematographic academia or how they will age, you can't look away from them. What does it say about his work that Cats is probably his best known film? But watch any of his three earlier hits, and one can see they're obvious masterpieces, smart and funny and often heartbreaking, well-acted and well-shot and well-written.

Defining this decade of film is a really heartening endeavor. Careers like Greta Gerwig's (Lady Bird, Little Women) and Ari Aster's (Hereditary, Midsommar) and Damian Chazelle's (Whiplash, La La Land) thundered to life. The masters like Tarantino (Django Unchained, Once Upon a Time in Hollywood) and Alejandro González Iñárritu (Birdman, The Revenant) made some of their best work. Female directors were criminally under-utilized and under-recognized (only Gerwig was even nominated for Best Director this decade, joining only five women, ever), and perhaps that is the defining story of the decade.

But the defining director still must be decided, and Tom Hooper is the one with the most range, who created a classic Oscar darling, revolutionized movie-musicals, and crafted the next great midnight cult film. The defining director of the decade is the one who can and did do both. Tom Hooper may not be the best director, but his whiplashing career reflects the chaos of the 2010s, and the generation of millennials who claimed it as their own.

Screenshot from Cats – Official Trailer (Universal Pictures) HD / Universal Pictures UK / YouTube.com

Every serious Broadway enthusiast knows two things: 1.) All of the lyrics to "The Confrontation" from Les Misérables (both Jean Valjean and Javert's parts) and 2.) The fact that movie adaptations of musicals will always, always, always be massive disappointments.

The latter was proven beyond a shadow of a doubt when Tom Hooper, the Academy Award-winning director behind The King's Speech, tackled Les Misérables, resulting in perhaps the worst musical movie adaptation ever made. From the absurd number of claustrophobic close-ups to Russell Crowe's butchering of Stars, Hooper, despite all his accolades, failed his source material with gusto. But now, seven years after his first musical movie disaster, Hooper is trying again. And this time he has Cats.

As a movie reviewer with integrity, it's important for me to reveal my biases when I believe they might have affected my reading of a material. So here it is: I've seen Cats three times on Broadway, and it is consistently awful. With the exception of "Memory" and "Mr. Mistoffelees," every song in Cats is borderline unlistenable. The plot is nonexistent, mistaking an endless series of character introductions for a narrative. The costumes are stupid, and when you see Cats live, you're basically watching a bunch of horny actors roll on a stage and sniff each other's genitals. In other words, I hate Cats the musical.

Also, I had seen the abomination of a trailer, so I entered my viewing of Cats the movie with the express intent to laugh at it. Also, I was drunk and continued to drink smuggled alcohol throughout the screening. I think that covers all my biases.

Anyways, I f*cking loved Cats the movie. I give it a perfect 100%, 10/10, standing ovation. No, I am not being facetious. Tom Hooper's Cats was genuinely one of the greatest movie viewing experiences of my life. Allow me to explain.

After years of seeking out the worst movies ever made, I've learned that there's a distinct gap between a filmmaker who creates something intended to be schlocky and a filmmaker who makes baffling choices because they are genuinely insane. If a director set out with the express intent to make the most egregious, horrifying adaptation of Cats imaginable, I don't think they could accomplish anything close to what Tom Hooper created. In fact, I am convinced that Tom Hooper is genuinely insane.

With every scene, every shot even, Cats shocked, surprised, and repulsed me in ways that I didn't even know were possible. I can't even begin to organize all of my disparate, frankly worrying notes that I wrote down about this movie, so here is a list of some of them, mostly verbatim:

-Why do the Cats have fully human faces except with whiskers? Shouldn't Tom Hooper have at least painted the Cats' noses like they do on Broadway? Why did Tom Hooper possibly think this design was okay, and why didn't anybody stop him?

-Why do the Cats have human hands?

-Why do the Cats have human feet?

-Why do these Cats have human breasts?

-It's no wonder that people in this universe put their Cats in bags and literally hurl them off bridges. These things are abominations.

-Am I attracted to these Cats?

-DEAR GOD, THEY GAVE RATS THE FACES OF HUMAN CHILDREN.

-THEY GAVE COCKROACHES HUMAN FACES TOO, AND NOW CAT REBEL WILSON IS EATING THEM.

-Cat Jason Derulo is almost grosser than real Jason Derulo.

-Why do these cats not have buttholes?

-The slow motion effect they used when that one cat jumped a short distance in the opening number and then never used again for the entire movie, was very jarring.

-Why do Victoria and Magical Mr. Mistoffelees keep coming so close to making out?

-Do Cats make out?

-No, of course not. Jesus Christ, this is sick.

-Why did Tom Hooper add a romantic relationship between Victoria and Magical Mr. Mistoffelees in the first place? Who possibly wanted that?



-Was Tom Hooper only interested in making Cats so he could self-insert Magical Mr. Mistoffelees fan-faction?

-That actually makes sense.

-How does Cat Idris Elba have both cat hair and human facial stubble? Could such an atrocity actually occur in nature?

-What even is the difference between human hair and cat hair? Is it just a matter of thickness? If I shaved the hair around my cat's face would the stubble look like Idris Elba's stubble? If I let my facial hair grow out enough, could I become a Cat?

-How does Cat Idris Elba have human pectoral muscles?

-Why are two Cats wearing shoes but the rest aren't?

-Who put that Cat in special Cat pants? What the f*ck is happening?

-HOW BIG ARE THESE F*CKING CATS? First they seem to be normal Cat size, but now there's like 80 of them on a single train track. Did nobody care about consistency?

-Sir Ian McKellen lapped milk out of a bowl and said, "Meow Meow Meow." This could be the last movie he ever does. Is this the world we want to live in?

-Cat Rebel Wilson can apparently unzip her fur to reveal a dress over more fur, and I actually don't want to think about this any further.

-Cat Rebel Wilson is actually kind of hot.

-Oh God, am I attracted to these Cats?

-Cat Dame Judy Dench wears a cat fur coat. At one point, her tail is coming out through a hole in the back. At another point, there is no hole in the back for her tail. Does this mean Cat Dame Judy Dench owns two cat fur coats? Where does she keep the spare?

-There is a lot of snot around Cat Jennifer Hudson's upper lip. Like, a lot.

-Is Cat Jennifer Hudson's snot real? It looks pretty real. Was it someone's job on set to maintain Cat Jennifer Hudson's snot from shot to shot?

-Jellicle Cats are a cult, and the Jellicle Ball is a death ritual. This has always been known, but never before has any performance of Cats been brave enough to launch Grizabella into the sun.

-Magical Mr. Mistoffelees really needs to stop licking his lips behind Cat Dame Judy Dench—this is really f*cking me up.

-I'm actually broken. This movie broke me.

Truly, Cats broke me. When I entered my packed Cats screening in New York City on its opening Friday, I worried that I was the only one there with less than genuine intent, stifling laughter to avoid ruining the experience for everyone around me. But as soon as the first Cat appeared onscreen, the audience started laughing. By the end of the first song, the laughter was uproarious. And by the time "Mr. Mistoffelees" rolled around, roughly half the audience was literally clapping along. The experience of watching Cats didn't just break me; it broke all of us.

As the credits rolled, a man in front of me turned around and said, "That was the worst thing I've ever seen." Another man in front of him chimed in to agree. So did the girl next to him. Here we were, total strangers, experiencing a moment of transcendent unity during one of the most troubling times in our nation's history––all thanks to Tom Hooper's utterly horrific Cats.

Currently, Tom Hooper is insisting that movie theaters adopt a new, edited version of the movie with "improved" visual effects. I don't know what these changes entail, but I am certain that they are a monumental mistake. Changing the grotesque visuals of Cats threatens the very thing that makes Cats so special, and so much more than its source material.

Tom Hooper's Cats led me to experience emotions I've rarely felt during movie screenings. I laughed. I cried (with laughter). I wretched. I looked up a Cat lady's nostrils. I clapped along with strangers. I wretched some more. I questioned my sexuality.

Maybe Cats is the secret to our humanity. Or perhaps we've really been Cats all along.
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FILM

"Cats" Is the Worst "Star Wars" Movie Yet

If you were hoping that Cats would be a great Star Wars movie, you're in for a disappointment. It's a bad one.

As a huge Star Wars fan, I've spent months looking forward to the latest entry in the saga: Cats.

I wish I could say that all the anticipation was worth it, but I honestly think it's the worst Star Wars movie yet—and yes, I'm including the prequels. While I understood the backlash to The Last Jedi, I didn't expect J.J. Abrams to so thoroughly retcon all of Rian Johnson's contributions to the Star Wars universe. It was like starting over from scratch.

Perhaps that's why he also felt the need to throw in such a huge cast of new characters we've never heard of before. New characters appear and are introduced so quickly that it's hard to know who we're supposed to care about, which really saps the energy out of all the intrigue and interpersonal drama. Leaving aside the introduction of new elements like the Heaviside Layer—which promises new life, erasing the stakes of mortal danger—I just didn't find myself invested in any member of the Jellicle tribe (who seem to be the new faction of the Resistance).

Early in the film it seemed that Rum Tum Tugger—a rebellious character with a lot of sex appeal, in the mold of Han Solo—was going to be central to the action now that Han himself has been killed off. But as things progressed, I was less and less sure. Was I supposed to be looking for some conflict to arise with the new Jabba the Hutt character—an imposing plutocrat named Bustopher Jones? Or is the true villain the kidnapper Macavity, played by Idris Elba, who steals away the sage, Obi-Wanesque Old Deuteronomy, as portrayed by Judi Dench?



And can we please talk about these new names? Star Wars has always had some weird ones—I'm not going to defend Jek Porkins—but Munkustrap? Skimbleshanks? Bombalurina? Do all the new characters have to have dumb names like this? Obviously I'll make an exception for the bright spot that is Mr. Mistoffelees—whose name is almost as cool as his mysterious new force powers.

Speaking of force powers, it's great that there are so many new force-users performing acrobatic Jedi moves, but does it have to be such a focus? The newest installment was so obsessed with showcasing these impressive abilities that it seemed to forget entirely about Star Wars staples. With very little in the way of training montages, characters seem to be able to perform superhuman feats the likes of which we've never seen before, but I don't think I saw a single light saber battle.

Speaking of Star Wars staples, did John Williams drop out of this one or something? The music in this one was fun at times, but it lacked the thrilling, epic scale of Williams' orchestral sound. And all the characters singing about themselves and each other didn't really help. I also thought it was a strange decision to make the switch back to CGI from the practical effects that have dominated in the sequels so far.

That said, replacing all the characters with sexy anthropomorphic cat people was a great call, and made me really excited for the future of Star Wars. Go see this one with your parents.