CAT PEOPLE (1942) **1/2 Succeeds to a large extent on its own terms in spite of sub-par performances by all three leads, including Oliver Reed and the ingeniously named Simone Simon. Jacques Tourneur gets more shades and shadows out of black and white than anyone but maybe Orson Welles, and the suspense generated is substantial for such a ridiculous plot. In many ways it's more dubious than a wolfman: chick from Serbia can't get hot or she turns into a black panther and eats people because of the lousy metaphysics of her ancestors. Beautiful, innocent, cursed-could have gone somewhere with an actress that made you care.
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