El gato con botas (1961) User Reviews

Fun fairytale romp

[Leofwine_draca · 6/10 · 11 October 2021]

A Mexican retelling of the Puss 'n' Boots fairytale, this is handled quite reasonably with a sufficient budget to do the milieu justice. If you can get over the main character's costume then I don't think you'll have much problem with the rest of it. Plenty of colourful costumes, scheming characters and cheesy action scenes are the highlight here, with a random giant rooster thrown in for comedy value. Expect THE SINGING RINGING TREE-style quality and you'll "get" it.

prepare to experience sheer weirdness

[lee_eisenberg · 5/10 · 22 November 2015]

Whoa! I have seen some bizarre movies, but Roberto Rodríguez's adaptation of Charles Perrault's story is in a class all by itself! "El gato con botas" comes across as one giant acid trip. Exaggerated acting, sped-up scenes, and occasional singing make this one of the weirdest movies out there. While watching it I made a few comments like the characters on "Mystery Science Theater 3000" make; Mike and the 'bots would've had a field day with this movie.

I assume that the characters are supposed to represent the detachment between the social classes in Mexico - the royals and aristocracy are white while the peasants are swarthy - but seriously, the whole movie comes across as a joke. Nevertheless, they probably had fun filming it, and you'll probably enjoy making MST3K-style cracks at it. The challenge will be finding a copy.

K. Gordon Murray strikes again!

[rdh7182373 · 17 July 2000]

Like many Baby Boomers, I saw this picture in a Children's Matinee in the sixties. It was bad then, it's bad now. However, I enjoy it for the nostalgia of the times, namely my recollections of seeing family oriented movies on a large screen.

I did some research on K. Gordon Murray and a competing company, Childhood Productions run by Barry Yellin. Both men tried to corner the kiddie matinee venue in the sixties. As the market began to dry up, they both formed secondary companies that released X-rated porno films! Quite a product line, wasn't it? Murray got into serious tax troubles with the IRS in the seventies. They literally hounded him to death! He died of a heart attack while they were investigating him. The IRS seized his assets including the 35mm color dupe negatives he was using to strike the release prints. For all I know, they may still have them. AIP purchased syndication rights from both Murray and Yellin before they folded and distributed 16mm copies on television. The rights eventually returned to the foreign production companies.

Richard W. Haines, author "Technicolor Movies"

Kill me before I watch again

[JohnSeal · 2/10 · 30 November 2009]

Is there a more annoying film than the K. Gordon Murray version of Puss 'n Boots? I don't mean bad, I don't mean boring, I don't mean insulting to the intelligence: I mean ANNOYING, in caps. From the appalling opening song on, this film has the most grating English dubbing ever visited upon a foreign-language film, and that includes every crappy kung-fu movie I've ever watched. It's even worse than the dub attached to 1959's kiddie epic Santa Claus, which at least offers the distraction of the Devil battling Kris Kringle. All Puss 'n Boots has to offer is a midget in a ridiculous cat suit. The cat gets the majority of the film's dialogue, too, which consists primarily of him saying 'meow' in a full range of painful and unlistenable variations. To make matters worse, the same actor also provides the voice of an equally annoying rooster. You may want to gouge your eyes out and stick sharp objects in your ears before you watch Puss 'n Boots--neither I nor the estate of K. Gordon Murray will take responsibility should you lose your mind afterwards. This is one of those films best watched through an alcoholic haze, but sadly, I don't drink.

Underrated Satire

[Kabumpo · 9/10 · 4 March 1999]

Constantly bombarded at this film are turkey awards for bad costuming and poor dubbing. As we all know, poor dubbing is not the filmmaker's fault, because this film was made to be seen in Spanish. To find heavy fault with the costumes is to ignore the films strong merits as an excellent satire. I find this film reminiscent of Jean Renoir's _The Golden Coach_. This is because the film relocates the story from France to eighteenth-century Mexico, which is not merely a plot contrivance to fit with the setting, is an essential element to this version of the story, much like in Renoir's film, dealing with imperialism outside the main plot. The king is a very caucasian-looking Spanish lord, and the division between the wealthy Spaniards and the poor Mexicans is quite strong. To its credit, however, the film does not take sides, but rather makes mock-worthy characters on both sides, and allows the camera to linger on little details that develop the characters, extending most of the scenes slightly longer than they would be in a high concept American film. The film's ordeal with the talking chicken is a particularly notewothy hegemonic attack masquerading as a children's entertainment. New elements such as this, not created by Perrault, are skillfully integrated into the whole of the film, and it is quite a taut, comic masterpiece. If only they had spent more on the costuming, though the special effect of Puss running on sped-up film was a charming effect, even if it most likely was done to save money. A literate script, fine acting, lavish score, and effective camerawork allow me to forgive the shabby costumes. I only wish I had a subtitled version, so as not to contend with the atrociously inept dubbing, courtesy of kiddie exploitationer K. Gordon Murray. This is probably the film version of the story most worth seeing, because it innovates the story to its own agenda, rather than trying to be a literal adaptation of the story, of which there are plenty.

English version is horrid, avoid at all costs.

[StudentDriver · 26 September 1999]

There's a music store near my home that has a video-rental wall full of "Psychotronic" like films... the clerk told my wife and I that if we wanted something that really was screwed up, we should rent Puss 'n' Boots.

Welll... the guy was correct, but it wasn't what we were looking for. The dubbing is absolutely horrid; the voices are incredibly grating, and the whole experience is akin to psychological torture. My wife left the room about 30 minutes in, and I made it to the end, barely.

This movie really doesn't lend itself well to MST3K type drubbing, nor is it amusingly wacked-out. It's a horrible experience. There is no redeeming quality in it, and it's a sin that the person responsible for the dub attempted to foist this upon the children of America (granted, maybe the youth of America can stand this better than an adult, but there's no excuse for passing off cut-rate work just because the intended audience isn't conscious of quality yet.)

Note that my comments refer only to the English version- I have no experience with the original language version; it could be fantastic for all I know...

NOT THE MOVIE BUT THE LADY OF TIME

[enriquerebsamenbis · 10/10 · 20 January 2021]

A great movie but not by itself, just a godd memory of my grand grand mother playing the role of the Lady of time