Kitten With a Whip Review

Number eight on my list of Top Ten Ann-Margret Movies finds A-M is at her feral best as Jody, a crazy mixed-up kid who is mixed up with drugs, blackmail and murder in 1964's Kitten with a Whip, based on the Wade Miller novel of the same name.

Her character is an evil hellcat who has escaped from the juvenile detention facility, only to take refuge in the home of a local squarejohn with political aspirations. Naturally, when he discovers the young runaway, he doesn't call the cops, as he doesn't want a scandal to mess up his run for the State Senate or his engagement to a rich man's daughter. He then proceeds to make more very bad decisions, each one worst than the last. John Forsythe is perfect as the stuffed shirt who gets pushed to the brink by A-M and her JD pals. Sure, every decision he makes is bad, but that doesn't mean he won't make a heck of a State Senator.

You might have seen this one on season six of Mystery Science Theater 3000, where Mike and the robots got off some classic one-liners at the expense of the film, and made great sport of Ann-Margret's pouty, sex kitten-ish performance. Sure, she's a little over-the-top in the picture, but it works for me.

Although the black and white cinematography is fine, I think the movie should have been made in color, given A-M's performance, and especially for the scenes in Tijuana . While it was released on VHS in the early ‘90s, it is still unavailable on DVD. That's too bad, as it deserves a deluxe reissue.

Admittedly, four decades later, the film is best viewed as over-the-top camp comedy, and it succeeds on that level. In spades.