by Linda Kay
Original Title: Más negro que la noche
Also Known As: Blacker than the Night
Directed by: Carlos Enrique Taboada
This review contains a Kitty Carnage Warning!
Cat Out of the Bag Alert! This review contains some spoilers for this film!
Synopsis: Ofelia (Claudia Islas) is a young woman who inherits the estate of her rich aunt with the strong suggestion that she also care for the woman’s pet cat, Bécquer. Ofelia’s girlfriends move into the home with her and strange things begin to happen to all of them, leading to horror and death.
Featured Feline: The film opens with Ofelia’s Aunt Susana (Tamara Garina) (represented only by her hands on screen) spending time with her longhair black cat Bécquer (named after the Spanish romantic poet Gustavo Adolfo Bécquer). She shows Bécquer her new hat then laughs when the cat shows no interest.
The frame freezes on the cat’s face and then posterizes into bright colors as the credits begin. This happens in all the opening scenes with the Aunt and the cat.
Next Aunt Susana is in her garden with Bécquer.
Then she gives Bécquer a cup full of milk.
Finally Susana sits down to do some knitting as Bécquer plays with the yarn. It is clear the pair are very happy together.
But tragedy strikes when Susana suddenly dies while knitting. Bécquer reacts violently, arching his back and hissing.
Ofelia moves into the house with her friends Aurora (Susana Dosamantes), Marta (Lucía Méndez) and Pilar (Helena Rojo). Bécquer is notably absent when they first arrive, but the housekeeper Sofia (Alicia Palacios) does not seem alarmed. Pilar volunteers to sleep in Aunt Susana’s old room but is startled when she sees the woman’s rocking chair moving at night. She actually screams when she approaches the chair and finds the cat sitting there.
The other girls come running and Ofelia is happy to finally meet Bécquer. But the other girls are not as thrilled; Aurora actively hates cats and Pilar doesn’t want Bécquer in her room, even when Sofia explains the cat has always slept in that chair. Bécquer refuses to move as Pilar tries to shoo the poor cat away.
Later the girls discover trunks full of Susana’s old clothes and start playing dress up. They are about to open one old, large trunk when Bécquer jumps onto the top of the chest (or is rather catapulted on top of it) and won’t let them approach, even scratching Marta when she tries to make him move. As it turns out the trunk contains Aunt Susana’s wedding dress and Ofelia takes it to her room.
Aurora has brought her treasured pet canary to the house and Bécquer is fascinated, watching the bird in its cage. Sofia catches Bécquer and takes him away from the bird.
Late that night an old woman sneaks into Ofelia’s room and pets Bécquer before taking the wedding dress away with her. Bécquer follows the woman out of the room.
Kitty Carnage Warning! Aurora is heartbroken to find her canary dead, killed by Bécquer. Shortly afterward Bécquer disappears. His body later turns up in the cellar. It is assumed that he got locked in by accident and starved to death.
Not long after this Marte is shocked to find Bécquer’s body upstairs in one of the common rooms. She is quick to blame Sofia, who takes the blame even though she knows supernatural things are occuring. It is not clear in these scenes if the cat actor was drugged or a fake cat was utilized, although it appears to be a real cat in these scenes.
Ofelia’s girlfriends all experience scary happenings in the house and even elsewhere. Pilar hears Bécquer cry and sees his silhouette in the window one night.
Eventually Aurora and Pilar die in mysterious ways. Terrified for her life, Marte confesses to Ofelia what really happened. We see the events via flashback in the same posterized style as the opening credits. When Aurora found her canary had been killed by the cat, she grabbed a shovel from the fireplace and ran upstairs and started beating Bécquer. The cat fought back and Pilar and Marte ran into the room and grabbed the shovel and a candlestick and beat Bécquer to death. It is clear that Susana haunts the girls and is responsible for their deaths, exacting revenge upon them for the death of her beloved cat.
Bécquer is seen only once more as Marta finally meets her fate at the hands of the enraged ghost.
Several times throughout the movie the color of the cat is referenced as being “blacker than the night”, hence the title of the film when translated.
The posterized scenes are one of the movie’s trademarks. It seems to have come in particularly handy during the scene in which Bécquer attacks Aurora and is then killed. As in other similar movie scenes the cat actor is hardly attacking and without these effects and the addition of slow motion the scene might have come across as silly instead of serious.
When the slow motion action is sped up and the effects are reversed we can see the attack on the cat, as well as the cat’s attack on the actress, were actually very mild actions when filmed. The cat actor even seems to be playing with the shovel!
As would be expected a cat was featured on posters and artwork for the film.
Final Mewsings: What cat lover wouldn’t avenge their kitty’s death from beyond the grave?
Many thanks to Mark Murton and Wahrhaftig for letting us know about the cat in this film.
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