Cat on a Hot Tin Roof

1958 movie

Rating: 16/20 (Jen: 16/20)

Plot: Big Daddy, a wealthy plantation owner, is the big birthday boy. He returns from a trip to enjoy some time with his two sons--firstborn Gooper and favorite Brick. Unfortunately for Big Daddy, somebody sent him the worst birthday present of all time--cancer. Before Big Daddy's return, Brick decides to try to impress the ghost of his late friend Skipper with whom he enjoyed a long homoerotic relationship, and he drunkenly breaks his leg while jumping over hurdles at a high school track. Everybody argues about various things. Maggie humps Brick's broken leg.

The first third of this movie is dominated by an argument between Brick and Maggie and it's got a lot of things working for it. First, the performers are good looking. People like to see good looking people. Second, the good looking people are Paul Newman and Elizabeth Taylor, and they're pretty good actors at the top of their game here. Third, the dialogue is crisp and caustic and dynamic and charged. I loved Brick's answer to his niece's question about why he's on the floor. "Cause I tried to kill your aunt Maggie." Finally (the "thing working for it" that I'm probably making up), I really like how the architecture and decor of the room is ingeniously used to visually represent this tension between the two, a tension that, since this all begins in medias res, the audience has no way of comprehending. I really dig how line, color contrasts, lighting, and mirrors are used to show the detachment between the husband and wife. It's great stuff. Overall, there's almost too much going on in this. The conflicts get as cluttered as Big Daddy's basement. Oh, and speaking of Big Daddy, out of all the strong performances in Cat, Burl Ives' performance as the patriarch is my favorite. And the guy just oozes sexuality! I sometimes have difficulty staying focused with play adaptations, but this dialogue-heavy movie is never boring. I don't like the title very much though. I would have called it My Leg Is Broken and My Nephew Has No Neck so Pass Me My Drink, Big Daddy or Gooper, Whoever Is the Closest to Said Drink. Maybe that's why I don't write plays.