BY TODD GARBARINI
The
major question that I have about Douglas Heyes’s Kitten with a Whip,
which opened in New York on Wednesday, November 4, 1964 on a double bill with Lance
Comfort’s Sing and Swing (1963) with David Hemmings at some theaters, is
this: where is the titular whip? We have the kitten, as embodied by the overly
beautiful Ann-Margret as “bad girl” Jody Dvorak, but there is no whip to be
found. Perhaps the “whip” is her personality? There certainly is an argument to
be made for that. Jody has just made a break from a juvenile detention center
but not before seriously wounding the head of the place who becomes
hospitalized. Outwitting the police, she breaks into the semi-upscale home of David
Stratton (John Forsyth), a stuffy, by-the-book political candidate hopeful twenty-three
years her senior whose wife and daughter are conveniently away in a scenario
determined to make him look very creepy. David discovers Jody asleep in his
daughter’s bedroom and many questions ensue along with his disdain for her
presence. He knows full well that people will talk should they find out he is
harboring a fugitive dripping with sex appeal. Desperate to get rid of Jody, he
appears to be uneasy about his own unchecked desire for her which she readily
picks up on. A series of embarrassing situations that could reveal Jody’s
presence in David’s house to his friends and family bring out David’s true
nature, especially when Jody’s three friends (a 1960’s “tough girl” and
cinema’s two cleanest male “goons”) force their way in to crash his homelife in
a chain of events that lead them all to Mexico and a tragic ending.
Ann-Margret
had already made a name for herself appearing in Frank Capra’s Pocket Full
of Miracles (1961), José Ferrer’s State Fair (1962), and George
Sidney’s Bye Bye Birdie (1963) and his Viva Las Vegas (1964) by
the time she filmed this black-and-white outing. She sheds her ingenue persona
with sex kitten ferocity in a tale (or tail) that was based upon the 1959 novel
of the same name. Kitten is a showcase for her considerable talents in a
performance that goes from sublime and demur to that of a fighting and snarling
hellcat. The dialog dances around the issues of promiscuity and infidelity the
way that it had to at that time, coming on the heels of Elia Kazan’s 1958 Baby
Doll and Stanley Kubrick’s 1962 Lolita (in the novel Jody and David
have sex, however that would have been a big screen no-no in 1964 something
that Alfred Hitchcock knew all too well). Kitten comes just a little
later than it probably should have, but it allows its star to alternate
emotions in a performance that fluctuates from naïve innocence to verbally
threatening David should he call the police on her. While we are not talking
about anything so overtly sexual as the onscreen coupling of Marlon Brando and
Maria Schneider in Bernardo Bertolucci’s infamous Last Tango in Paris
(1972), the film no doubt raised some eyebrows at the time.
The movie is now available as a Region-Free Blu-ray from ViaVision Entertainment’s
fine Imprint video label, with a
brand new and beautiful high definition transfer.. The extras are as follows:
A very informative and entertaining audio commentary by film critics Alexandra
Heller-Nicholas,
author of the 2021 book The Giallo Canvas: Art, Excess and Horror Cinema,
and Josh
Nelson. They
discuss how Baltimore filmmaker John Waters considers Kitten to be a
failed art film, and there is a discussion of how the movie was seen as the low
point of Ann-Margret’s career and how she struggled and came back gloriously in
Carnal Knowledge (1971), earning her first Academy Award nomination for
Best Supporting Actress in 1972 (losing out to Cloris Leachman in The Last
Picture Show). Her second nomination was for Best Actress in Tommy
(1975) in 1976 (losing out to Louise Fletcher in One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s
Nest).
Faster,
Pussycat! Kill! Kill! is
the aptly titled piece narrated by Kat Ellinger that runs about 29 minutes and
is a commentary on how teenagers were not a force to be reckoned with until
they possessed their own spending power. Juvenile delinquency was looked upon
as an epidemic that required a response. Rock ‘n Roll and comic books were
considered catalysts for juvenile delinquency, along with trashy movies at the
drive-in that were filled with violence,
sex and songs. Think the Beach Party films, Rebel Without a Cause
(1955) and The Wild One (1957) as the type of fare desired by this new dollar-toting
demographic. The Blackboard Jungle (1955) dealt with inner city school
bullies and authority, while other films presented stories of redemption and
salvation – themes that permeate much of the later cinema of Martin Scorsese.
Ms. Ellinger also discusses Roger Corman’s 1957 outing Teenage Doll, a
film devoted to girls which was released during an era of exploitation films
featuring unknown actresses. Jack Hill’s Switchblade Sisters (1973) is
also discussed as a film wherein the women use their sexuality as a weapon of
aggression. She also mentions the Sukeban films of Japan, loosely translated to
“girl boss”, a sub-genre of cinema wherein women weaponize their sexuality to
get what they want. While this piece is very interesting, the music overshadows
the narrator at times. I wish that this was addressed prior to pressing of the
disc. There is also a look at the paperback books of the era, and Jody was at
one time going to be played by Brigitte Bardot. The film falls into the “Bad
Girl” subgenre of Juvenile Delinquent stories.
She
Reached for Evil: Dissecting Kitten with a Whip is a video essay that runs about 18
minutes on pulp author Wade Miller by author and film historian Andrew Nette
(2021).
There
is also a photo gallery of black and white stills from the film.
MST3000
rips on the film as a parody in 1994 and is a hoot to listen to.
Click Here to order from Amazon USA and ignore
Amazon’s caveat about regional encoding. This disc will play an any Blu-ray
player. Non-U.S. readers can order the film directly from Imprint by clicking here.