There is an International Cat Day and it falls on 8 August annually. Twenty days later we waste precious hours of our one life on a film about felines and a man’s reincarnation as his neglected daughter’s pet cat.
Kevin Spacey is billionaire, Tom Brand, a builder of skyscrapers who has barely any time for his family, namely his second wife, Lara (Jennifer Garner), and young daughter, Rebecca (Malina Weissman). He is also dismissive of his son, David. Rebecca adores her father, so when he needs to buy a special present for her eleventh birthday, he decides he must get her the one thing she really wants, a cat, an animal Brand abhors.
A glitch in his GPS sends Brand to a pet store owned by a creepy man named Felix Perkins, played by Christopher Walken. Brand takes a scruffy cat called Mr Fuzzypants, but a car accident on the way home lands Brand’s body in a hospital bed and his spirit trapped inside Mr Fuzzypants.
Rebecca and Lara learn to care for Mr Fuzzypants even as they wait for news of Brand’s condition. As we see the cat tackling a fountain pen, or attempting to open a decanter of scotch and then lying hung-over in a corner, or punching a balloon in the air, you feel like you are watching a mash-up of the multitude of Youtube.com/ #catsofinstragram videos of pets and their antics.
While the essence of the film is Brand’s understanding of his shortcomings and need to be more compassionate, there is a side plot: Brand’s desire to build the tallest building in America and a ruthless and ambitious colleague’s betrayal.
Director Barry Sonnenfeld (Men In Black 3) can only do so much to find coherence in this absurd story, its messiness coming as no surprise when you note five writers sharing credit. As a dog person, I feel life is too short to be wasted on a catastrophe such as Nine Lives (and one puzzles over why Spacey made this choice). You might as well watch the Youtube home videos of cat tricks instead.
