Macavity: The Dumbest Song in Cats 

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Just because jellicles do and jellices can doesn't mean that jellicles should

*shuffles some papers* The Aristocats would like to rescind their statement that ‘Everybody wants to be a cat’...

I want the spinoff about Macavity running a MLM scheme.

I think the movie is supposed to be in the 30's or even 20's because of the car Victoria was in in the beginning. Also the song is only dumb in the movie, since in the musical we haven't seen Macavity before. So they tell us his story to create expectation about him. So the problem I'd say it's not the song, but how the character was introduced (way before his actual introduction). I would even say a big problem is how "americanized" the whole thing was. But Skimbleshanks (and I'd say the dance sequence of the Jellical ball) it's what the whole movie should have been treated like. You have the magic of cinema! Make the characters do more than just kinda-sing or kinda-dance and fully commit to the fantasy. And get more actual singers to sing!! Doesn't make sense to make a musical and not have your characters to actually sing. It's as if almost everyone seemed to be afraid to do so or just not great at. They should have kept going with the idea of making it into a 2D animated movie.

(Spoilers for the stage musical!!) I think A lot of the reviews and explanations of Cats (2019) seem to forget that this was a ridiculously successful stage production for around 40 years and is basically an entirely different experience than the movie. Like, Macavity doesn’t even kidnap anybody other than Old Deuteronomy. He’s onstage for like 5-ish minutes. He comes on after “Macavity”, short circuits everything, and kidnaps Deuteronomy (and maybe dies? depends on how you see it). That’s it. He only comes back for the final number.

My mother used to read me this poem. Even as a child, I knew it was a joke. Why Cats was not conceived of as a comedy show for kids is beyond me.

Macavity: the Mystery Cat is a poem by TS Elliot and the only thing the "lyrics" mean for the musical is that Lloyd Webber decided to set the poem to music.

Came for finding out how Macavity is a war criminal, stayed for Skimbleshanks apologism

This is the exact content the Internet was invented for

Growltiger and Griddlebone are often cut from the stage musical as well because of the racism. The movie added a teeny, tiny touch of Growltiger as played by the wonderful Ray Winstone. I feel like there are two ways to take Cats (both the musical and the movie) either you can take it as if these cats are wise and completely intelligent of all human goings-on without humans knowing completely how much cats have an impact on our lives, or you can take it as if they are just cats and these are their silly cat thoughts. For example, Skimbleshanks' song (because we all love Skimble)... The first bit is everyone looking for Skimble so the train can leave and when he's found he "gives one flash of his glass-green eyes" and the signal goes all clear. Skimble sings his song as if he actually runs this train. It was cut from the movie, I believe, but we're told he can summon the police if there are issues. You can decide to imagine he actually has this kind of authority or you can decide that he's a cat that gets out of the train and sometimes gets petted by a cop. Remember, we are watching these things happen from a cat's point of view. What does a cat think is going on?

Thank you for clarifying that Moriarty, the Sherlock Holmes character, is not a cat Also I can’t believe that the punchline of this entire video is “the Cats director doesn’t know what a cat is”

skimbleshanks’ back really must be hurting from carrying the whole movie on his back

Nice Thor impression 😂

Please note the lyrics are the actual poem by TS Elliot from his book of poems Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats from which the musical is adapted from.

"He's broken every human law, he breaks the laws of gravity" - and in those lyrics, they described PRETTY MUCH EVERY CAT EVER.

I love the song Macavity, but I don't mind admitting its lyrics are absolutely ridiculous, and even more so in the context of this movie.

Honestly that Thor impression is the best way anyone could have explained the plot of Cats. 🤣

Explain like you're Lebowski Thor > Explain like I'm 5

Cats instantly joined the list of movies that should never have been green lit beside the emoji movie

I don't know why i'm laughting like a crazy. This very serious analysis for the dumbest Cats song is beatiful.

not only has Macavity operated a motor vehicle, he has done so above the speed limit in a school zone.

True confession: I was obsessed with the Original Broadway Cast recording of Cats as a child and I always loved “Macavity.” Mainly for the delivery, not the lyrics. Later, my favorite became “Gus, the Theatre Cat,” and the fact that the film adaptation removed/revised the Jellylorum verses actually annoys me because to me the point of the song was always the contrast between someone giving the more realistic version of Gus’ history followed by Gus’ braggadocio version.

Huh. I learned Converse has ACTUALLY been around since the 20s. Nando v Movies: Entertaining AND Educational!

"I need moneys to buy nutrients" - me to Nando, me too...

Your comment about learning that cats have paws just made my wife laugh for like 5 minutes straight. Congrats.

I thought you were going to talk about how it makes no sense for him to break any HUMAN law in a movie that doesn't have any humans.

The opening really made me reflect how much you’ve opened up in your personality in these videos. Proud and entertained

Mcavity failed to pay child support

Just to be fair: these are not lyrics. These are all just silly kid's poetry about cats written by T.S. Elliot for his grandchildren. The problem with trying to apply adult logic to children's poems is that kid's don't need the same level of logic or rational. Jellicle doesn't need to mean anything the same way Lewis Carrol's first stanza of the Jabberwock doesn't need to mean anything: kids are satisfied with the sounds and using their own imagination to imbue meaning. Trying to parse and make sense of this poem in an adult and narrative context will always be bizarre and return baffling results. It's as though someone would take a random selection of Where the Sidewalk Ends and try to create a coherent narrative aimed at an adult audience. I loved this movie and I love Andrew Lloyd Webber's music, and I loved Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats. But it's all silly and should be accepted as such. (I also have been a lifelong cat owner and all these poems make absolutely perfect sense to me)

Making Cats into a motion picture is the dumbest move Hollywood has done.

How can there be a dumbest part of a movie that's infinity dumb?

@7:37 - "That's the sort of thing that warrants some curiosity." I am shocked, sir- shocked, that you would suggest this. Perhaps you haven't heard what curiosity does for cats...?

The clinical way Nando goes off the rails keeps me coming back

There is so much research put into this, Jesus

ive seen cats (2019) five times and i appreciate this so much. most people are dismissive when it comes to this cinematic mistake, but im glad some of us can love it enough to give it attention. cats (2019) is an enthralling catastrophe, to be savoured like a sour cheese

Macavity doesn’t pay his child support

Are you telling me Bojack Horseman hit us with a Cats reference in it's first season before the movie was even announced?

When I saw the Twins dancing, they're wearing shoes, but your shot of them in this video shows them with feet

Skimbleshanks: The Railway Cat is INCREDIBLE! I JUST listened to it and WOOOOOOW!

I would watch a video that was just you doing that Thor Impression and summarizing movies.

The music from cats were originally from POEMS by T.S. Elliot, they were not songs. They later were composed into song by Andrew Lloyd Webber for his on stage musical Cats. You have to remember the cats were inspired by poems and that before the 2019 Cats there was a musical.

I love Derulo’s accent. As a british person, I find the cockney accent extremely convincing. Taylor’s however sounds like a great effort but still clearly phoney

Not to "nitpick myself" (not unlike your podcast, Mostly Nitpicking, sorry for the plug) but when you talked about this in the podcast (mostly nitpicking, sorry for the plug) i should have known a video about this was coming.

About halfway through this I started laughing at almost every sentence and couldn't stop. Excellent (and extremely important!!) work sir.

It's insane how this movie released in late 2019 and we all thought this was the worst thing that could ever happen to the planet.

Bruh, this is 30 minute long...

I just find it so funny that you went through the effort to attempt to date the movie purely just to figure out what crimes existed at that point

Look at the Car the lady was driving when she kicked Vickie to the curb. That thing looked like something out of the 30's.

Nando, I had a dream in which you were a supporting character. You oddly had a beard, looked tired and acted puzzled. I then went on to help you pack your books into your bag because apparently you were a professor in my dream and when you saw me doing that you looked confused, because I was packing your bag but I just said that I was helping you out as you looked a little tired. That's it basically but I felt like telling you. Thank you for appearing in my subconscious.

I love when directors are paid to make movies that either they don't want to make or lack the critical information on some of the main topics/themes of said movie

thankyou for acknowledging the superior stage version of Mungojerrie and Rumpleteazer

This is an entire new level of weird. Tom Hooper read English at University College Oxford. It would have been impossible that he would not have learned about TS Eliot and his tendency to make references to other texts in his poems. English language English people worship Eliot. What your reading is Eliot on easy mode. It would have been simple enough to take the references in the poem and put re reference them in the movie. Hooper decided not to. Without those references, intertextuality as the cool kids say, McCavity makes less sense. Fleshing out a character by pointing the audience to another text where the character has already been developed is such a 21 century short cut that when Hooper has it handed to him on a plate and he ignores it it’s almost as if he wants Cats to fail.

I know that it’s supposed to be funny, but as fan of the original, it’s just frustrating to see so many people who know nothing about the musical just trash it. It’s easy content that everyone does, and I’m tiered of every youtuber I like doing it:(

Not till hearing you read the list of his descriptions , it occurs to me they could've just had the ensemble share all those lines creating a hearsay misinformation situation.

11:40 you seem to have forgotten his extensive record of war crimes up to and including mass genocide

The part of this movie (and I guess musical) that bothered me is that the songs don't match the plot. Like, this is just a bunch of poems about various kinds of cats. Like, cats that steal stuff, cats that hang out at train stations, cats that like to eat. These aren't supposed to be about the cats in the musical, and the musical does almost nothing to bridge that gap.

When I saw you reaching for the infinity gauntlet I thought you wanted to snap your fingers and erase this movie from existence, but then I saw the bottle and I realized:"Oh, I forgot, this is the only weapon we have in this world against a cat-astrophe like this."

We stan Skimbleshanks in this house.

Griddlebone is the Cat in the beret sprinkling Catnip with Mungo and Rumple..

They should make a show in the vain of phineas and ferb about macavity only he doesn’t build a machine but he breaks a new law everyday

COME ON THIS IS MY FAVORITE SONG FROM THE MUSICAL

More like the NaPAWleon of Crime, amirite?!?!

I always thought the musical takes place in victorian England, and therefore there are way less crimes than listed here he committed

I’m so glad you did this video. I loved your podcast about Cats. (I also saw the original cut of Cats.)

Can you pls do a video like this for every song about why it’s bad, and then a video about why Skimbleshanks was a masterpiece!

"He's the master criminal who can defy the law" every 60 seconds in Africa a minute passes

I love the sheer amount of Skimble appreciation in this video!!!

Are you ever going to do a rewrite on Ang Lee's Hulk?

New favourite video: Nando nitpicking a song about a talking, magical cat criminal.

I actually love this movie, This is the room levels of madness.

The drunken Thor recap was amazing.

Skimbleshanks has done more for the American economy than any president ever, no debate.

Cinema Sins for a TS Elliot poem

This is so in-depth and thorough and ridiculous and I’m here for it.

I definitely need Thor to actually explain the plot of Cats now, for my life to be complete. Somebody contact Hemsworth!!!

Honestly the song makes more sense when you think of it as propaganda put out by Macavity. A series of claims that become less accurate and more exaggerated as the song goes. I've sung this one at auditions and revues as Macavity and it just works better that way. It's just him creating fear, trying to craft an urban legend around himself.

That lead in to the ad was better than many whole videos on RU-vid.

SKIIIIIMBLESHANKS THEEEEE RAAAAILWAY CAAAAAT 🐱🚂 THE CAT OF THE RAAILWAAAY TRAAAAIN 🐱🚂

Analysis starts at 4:44

1:51 Well nando, I don't care so I'm gonna say it. Skimbleshanks was the Best song in cats

Jackson left out the Scouring of the Shire because he didn't understand the story he was telling.

This whole time... in the countless times I’ve listened to the 2019 AND 1998 version, I thought it was “another pigs been stifled,” still violent, but not quite as distressing as a pekinese

My subconscious protected me from captain marvel, and the last Jedi. I seriously do not remember those movies and I’ve seen them both multiple times

I try to watch all your videos, but I can't make myself watch this

lol, I'm singing this song for my school's winter showcase with my friend Annabelle.

I like to imagine all the police in Scotland Yard just sitting around and thinking "How do we catch that fucking cat?"

not to defend Cats (2019) but... are you familiar with figurative language...

Just because others say it doesn't mean it's true, it could be an unreliable narrator, untrue gossip, exaggeration, speculation etc

What a rollercoaster that intro is

I want to know which genocide is Macavity's making.

Late to viewing this one but I'm glad Nando and I have the same opinion of Skimbleshanks.

19:22 - 19:25i-sh in the scene you see another cat with the twins so may that’s grittle bone.

It’s worth noting that in the musical this song is a duet.

The word "Jellicle" means "My Little Cat". 🐈 😺

You know a movie is bad when even Nando can't save it with a single small change.

A note about Growltiger's Last Stand. The album song takes up 10 minutes, but Andrew Lloyd Webber himself really hates the songs. He actually cuts out the song from all productions of Cats now. I don't know why he does, (It's my favorite song in Cats), but he's rich so he can do what he wants.

The lyrics are a poem by T.S. Eliot written for kids. The poems were originally included in letters to his godchildren. Macavity was never intended to serve as lyrics for a stage musical or a zillion dollar Hollywood nightmare. The lyrics aren't dumb, the movie's use of them is.

Going by the actual lyrics of the song/poem, I'd say Macavity does not exist. Like, straight up. Macavity is Captain Tuttle, or whatever your frame of reference is. He's a Not Me, something to take the responsibility and the blame for anything. Any time the milk is spilled? It wasnt me, it was Macavity. Killed the dog? Not Me, it was Macavity.

When are you going to do the rise of skywalker??!! We must know how to fix it!!!