Though it was originally supposed to arrive on Friday, the first trailer for musical adaptation Cats is clearly ready to compete with the likes of It: Chapter Two and Top Gun Maverick, arriving early like a stray rooting through the bins at night.
Adapted by Lee Hall and director Tom Hooper from Andrew Lloyd Webber's musical (itself drawn from TS Eliot's Old Possum's Book Of Practical Cats), the show's story – which the film will likely hew towards, but also play with – follows a tribe of cats called the Jellicles. who must decide yearly which one will ascend to the Heaviside Layer and come back to a new Jellicle life. Yup, that's what it's about.
Hooper, who last tackled a musical movie with Les Miserables, here brings one of the most famous stage productions to life in an intriguing way – humans playing cats, but with CG fur and, in keeping with the source material, giant props and sets. The cast includes the likes of Judi Dench, Idris Elba, Taylor Swift, James Corden, Ian McKellen, Rebel Wilson, and film newcomer Francesca Howard as Victoria the White Cat and it all looks... Well, judge for yourself.
Cats is scratching to be let into UK cinemas on 20 December