Masters of Horror: Black Cat, The
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Man, if you like cats then this episode of Masters of Horror is not for you. The Black Cat tells the tale of Edgar Allen Poe. An alchoholic with a sick wife, he is struggling for money and also finds himself with a writer's block. With no stories written he cannot pay for the doctors to help his wife. At the same time most of the money is used to drink away his sorrows. With his wife's life slipping Poe turns his attention to his wife's cat. Why? Well, I guess because he is mentally slipping. His battle with the cat continues throughout the film until the very end for one of them. Then the movie hits you with a lame ending.

I summed up the story very briefly for a couple reasons.

1. There are moments of dialogue and style that fill in the rest, but the above is pretty much the jist of it.

2. I was not a fan of this episode.

Why was I not a fan of this episode? Was it the acting? Not at all. I found Jeffrey Combs in top form playing the literary giant Edgar Allen Poe. Elyse Levesque was also sweet and innocent as his wife. No, the acting wasn't the problem.

Gore maybe? Not really. There was gore in this, including a hilariously bloody axe to the head moment.

One thing that bothered me was the cruelty against animals. I'll tell you one thing folks; this was the disturbing part of the movie. Seeeing a cat strung up and hearing it's gurgled cries was on the cringe worthy side. I'm from the school of pet protection in films. Kill all the people you like in a movie. It doesn't faze me in the least. Now, kill a dog or cat and I have a problem. Needless to say, Old Yeller is not a movie in my collection. These scenes of cat torture just seemed out of place becuase I never felt that the cat was anything but a simple cat.

Was it evil? I didn't think so. If a cat goes after a fish swimming in a bowl that doesn't make it the Devil's Pussy, it just makes it a cat. With the cat just really doing only what cats do, then it became not a horror movie between Poe and a demonic cat, but Poe against his own psyche. In other words, not very frightening.

That was my overall take from this episode. It just wasn't very frightening. It was a period piece that centered on the destructive mind of a horror writing legend, however I could not chalk this up to horror. Take away a moment of gore and you would have yourself a PBS Masterpiece Theater episode, but not a Masters of Horror film.

Overall the movie was not bad. It was boring at times and overall lacking in my fright meter, however it wasn't bad. With all that said though, it was not good.

Added:  Wednesday, July 18, 2007
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