The Cat
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Synopsis
Two robbers hold up a bank and its employees demanding 3 million marks for their ransom. The police plot to storm the bank but are unaware the robbers have an accomplice on the outside, anticipating their every move. Genre master Dominik Graf specialised in crime films and The Cat is one of his greatest. A heist film of the highest order, it grabs you from its opening scenes and doesn’t let go. Winner of Best Direction at the German Film Awards, The Cat is an undiscovered treasure and Radiance Films is proud to present it on Blu-ray for the first time outside Germany.
Picture 8/10
Radiance Films brings Dominik Graf’s heist thriller The Cat to Blu-ray, presenting the film in its original aspect ratio of 1.85:1 on a dual-layer disc with a 1080p/24hz high-definition encode.
Radiance doesn’t provide any specifics about the master or restoration—only noting that the high-def master was “supplied” to them—so I kept my expectations in check. But in the end, I thought it looked pretty great! The digital presentation is clean and film-like, with nicely rendered grain and an excellent encode that helps everything along. Some of the film's darker sequences, like the ones in the hotel hallways later in the film, can appear a bit noisier, but it’s a subtle shift. The restoration work has also cleaned things up exceptionally well; I didn’t notice any significant blemishes. It has a gritty look overall, but honestly, it could pass for a much more recent production.
The colors lean cooler and have a somewhat drained appearance, with the occasional flash of red or orange (like the super-red, very fake-looking blood or the flames from an explosion) popping up. Radiance’s notes mention they did some grading work, suggesting the colors needed to be “fixed,” but the end result feels appropriate for the film’s tone. Black levels are generally strong, looking fairly deep, though some shadow detail does get crushed at times. Still, despite a few minor issues, I thought the presentation looked surprisingly good overall.
Audio 8/10
The film includes two German-language soundtracks: a lossless stereo track and a DTS-HD MA 5.1 surround option. I watched the film with the 5.1 track and sampled the 2.0, and both sounded fine from what I heard. That said, the 5.1 mix has a bit more punch to it. Most of the activity is focused in the front channels, where it sounds sharp and well-directed, but some of the action, like gunfire, explosions, helicopters overhead, and street activity, spreads nicely into the surrounds. Range is fairly wide, and while the bass isn’t aggressive, it’s subtle and effective.
Extras 7/10
The disc comes with a number of new interviews, including a substantial 65-minute(!) one with director Dominik Graf, accompanied by a 13-minute select-scene commentary track. The scene-specific track covers three sequences from the film, allowing Graf to dive deeper into the technical aspects of those moments, as well as discuss how improvisation factored in, either through small on-the-spot choices or opportunities presented by their locations, like a mirrored hotel hallway that ends up playing a crucial role in the film.
Graf’s longer interview (after touching on his time in film school and early career) offers an all-encompassing look at the production, from adapting the novel (dropping a complicated flashback structure and replacing it with a sex scene over the opening credits) to filming on real locations without disturbing the surrounding businesses. He shares several stories and anecdotes (some pretty wild) about the shoot, making it sound like the production could fall apart at any moment—but somehow it all worked out. He also speaks at length about his influences, particularly ’70s Hollywood and director Robert Aldrich, who even visited his film school while he was a student.
Those two features alone offer a solid overview of the film’s production, but Radiance also includes a 32-minute interview with screenwriter Christoph Fromm. He talks about first working with Graf on the television film Treffer, and about adapting The Cat after author Uwe Erichsen submitted a less-than-stellar first draft. While Graf touches on this in his interview, Fromm goes into more detail about what they cut from the novel and the changes they made to the characters.
Producer George Fedl contributes a 32-minute interview as well, focusing on behind-the-scenes elements, especially the logistics of shooting in the film’s primary location. He also discusses lead actor Götz George and the concerns around transitioning him from TV star to big-screen presence. The disc wraps up with the film’s original trailer.
Unfortunately, there's nothing in the way of academic analysis beyond a booklet essay by Brandon Streussing, who draws comparisons to American films of the period and comments on the film’s fascination with then-cutting-edge technology—something Graf also touches on in his interviews.
Though the material is largely made up of talking-head interviews focused on the production itself, it's engaging enough throughout to make it well worth exploring.
Closing
A solid special edition featuring a surprisingly strong presentation and a wealth of production-focused extras.
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