CATS

CATS:  The long-running Andrew Lloyd Weber musical has made it to the big screen.   And it's not nearly as bad as some critics would have you believe.   In fact, I found it rather charming and weirdly whimsical .  With an all-star cast including Dame Judi Dench, Sir Ian McKellen, Jennifer Hudson, Taylor Swift, Idris Elba, James Corden and Rebel Wilson, their individual "moments" worked much better on film that it did in the stage production.   Star power has it's upside after all.  The choreography by Christophe Ross is imaginative and downright thrilling at times.  The book has been reworked from the stage production and all to the better, thanks to a wonderful dancer and actress, Francesca Hayward.  While this may not be everyone's taste and it takes a bit of getting used to cats with human faces, by the time Dench appears as old Deuteronomy, I was hooked.  (There was a bit of overkill early on with the introduction of singing mice and cockroaches, but they soon were a thing of the past.)  To sum it up, if you have an open mind and believe in the wonders of film,  I think you might be pleasantly surprised.  I know I was.