Cat People

This afternoon #2 Son and I watched Cat People. This was his first time to see this eerie movie, which is a much more subtle and nuanced effort than the graphic violence-filled special-effects-happy 1982 remake. It could be called psychological thriller rather than horror, since horror these days seems to mean shock and slasher films. Simone Simon was perfect as Irena Dubrovna, a young Serbian immigrant who falls in love with an all-American architect but fears that she is doomed by her evil ancestry. Simon died in 2005 at the age of 93. The film was directed by Jacques Tourneur and produced by Val Lewton.

You can watch it online at this link. Here's a trailer:

Roger Ebert considered it a Great Movie. Filmsite has an article.

8/17/2008:
Only the Cinema has a review which concludes,

Cat People is an incredibly effective piece of psychological horror, rising far above its low-budget genre origins and creating an enduring work of psycho-sexual exploration.