Cat City

Hungarian cartoons are worldwide famous, but this is a special one. First of all, I have to mention that not everyone will understand this humorous masterpiece, but everyone should watch it at least once! The characters are very funny, the story is for all ages, but you have to be at least 16 to understand all the jokes. This is the film of my childhood, but I saw it again a few days ago (I'm 19), and it was a real fun to see it again! If you are Hungarian, this movie is compulsory for you, if you are not, for you, too!

This movie is my favorite cartoon of my childhood. It is still my favorite, and is best viewed in it's original Hungarian version (if you speak the language, or course). It is basically a James Bond style cartoon, where the cats and mice are at war. It is up to Grabovszky and the help of his friends to stop the cats. This cartoon has many memorable characters, such as the musical Mexican bats, led by Maxipocak, the meddling gangster rats Pissy, Cookie, Buddy, and Billy, the bumbling police officer Lusta Dick, the evil Mr. Teufel and his meek assistant Safranek, and the "don" of the gangster cats, Mr. Gato. This cartoon is a classic. It should be on the Top 250. I have seen the English translation, and it isn't nearly as good as the original, but it is still great.

I've seen this movie as a small kid, yet I just can't believe it has been made in the 80's at the time of Hungarian Goulash communism. At this time communism was still present, but it was the most liberal regime of them all, thus movies/cartoons like this one were created. Because of this you can feel the atmosphere of that era throughout the movie.

The story is quite a grotesque one: On Planet X, occupied by mice and cats, there is year 100 A.M.M. (after Mickey Mouse), and the conflicts between the cats and mice are rising. However, there is one last hope in Pokyo, the success of which lies in the hands of an Intermouse secret agent Grabovsky...

I haven't seen the english version yet but i am sure that it will never reach the hungarian level of humor or the use of the tone of voice, simply because it was written in hungarian for hungarians who are able understand the password to the mouse base for that matter and appreciate the cleverness behind it, which goes like this: egy aprocska kalapocska, benne csacska macska mocska. roughly means: a tiny hat, in it the filth of a silly cat. See the difference?

There are lots of games with words in the original, like the password at the mouse hq, or almost every characters name... the names are playing with words in hungarian, english, and german, but you must know hungarian to understand those.... like the evil cat "Teufel", witch means 'devil' in german, but sounds almost like "sour cream" in hungarian... and everyone knows, cats like sour cream ;)

This was an amazing film that took me ages to remember the name of, but this comedic spoof of James Bond made me laugh all the way through. With the evil plot of the cats and the "Mr Burns" like assistant, it's definitley a great film for all ages!