Cat Cam (2026) (Blu-ray Review)
DIRECTED BY: Sara Werner
STARRING: Cronin Cullen, Colleen Evanson, Bry Gallagher
RATED: UR/Region: O/2:35/1080P/NUMBER OF DISCS 1 (BDr)
AVAILABLE FROM X4 Pictures
There are two things you should never do in a horror movie:
Move into a new house.
And give your cat a camera.
Actually, the second one sounds pretty harmless. Until you watch Cat Cam, directed by Sara Werner, and suddenly you start wondering if your own cat has been behaving strangely because it has discovered something in your house that it would rather not explain.
The setup is wonderfully simple. Two cat owners install pet cameras in their new home before heading off on a trip, presumably because they want to check in on their beloved furry little psychopath while they’re gone.
You know, make sure the cat is eating.
Make sure it’s okay.
Make sure it hasn’t knocked the television over.
What they aren’t expecting to discover is why the cat has been acting so damn weird.
And honestly, if you’ve ever owned a cat, this premise isn’t nearly as far-fetched as it sounds.
Cats already spend half their lives staring at completely empty corners of rooms. You can call their name and they’ll ignore you, but let something invisible move six inches to the left and suddenly they’re locked onto it like they’ve just received classified military intelligence.
So when Cat Cam starts showing us the cat behaving strangely, the first question isn’t necessarily, “Is the house haunted?”
It’s:
“What the hell does the cat know that we don’t?”
That’s where the movie gets its mileage.
The pet cameras are a clever horror device because we’re basically watching the house through the same surveillance footage the owners are seeing. Every little movement becomes suspicious. A door opens? Uh-oh. The cat stares into darkness? Nope. Don’t like that. Something appears to move in the background?
Turn the fucking camera off.
Of course, they don’t.
Because if horror movies have taught us anything, it’s that the correct response to unexplained activity is to purchase additional cameras and document it in 4K.
The movie has a wonderfully paranoid quality to it. The simple idea of being able to remotely watch your home sounds comforting until you realize you’re also giving yourself the ability to sit miles away and watch things happen that you absolutely cannot do anything about.
It’s basically the world’s worst security system.
“Sir, your camera detected movement.”
“Can you see what it is?”
“Yes.”
“Is it dangerous?”
“Probably.”
“Can you do anything?”
“No.”
“Excellent. Why did I buy this thing?”
The cat itself is obviously the star of the show, and Cat Cam gets a lot of mileage out of the fact that animals can be creepy as hell without even trying. There’s something inherently unsettling about watching an animal react to something that you can’t see.
And let’s be honest, cats already behave like tiny supernatural entities.
They disappear into closets.
They knock objects off shelves while maintaining direct eye contact.
They sprint through the house at 3 a.m. for absolutely no reason.
They occasionally stare at you like they’re calculating how long it would take to eat your face if you died.
So the filmmakers really didn’t have to work that hard.
The supernatural elements give the movie some genuinely creepy moments, although the premise is stronger than some of the execution. There are stretches where the movie leans a little too heavily on repetition, and you can find yourself thinking, “Okay, we understand. The cat sees something. Show me the thing already.”
But there’s something charming about how simple the concept is.
Cat Cam doesn’t need a complicated mythology or a cast of twenty people. It takes an everyday piece of technology, something most people wouldn’t think twice about using, and turns it into a window into something you really don’t want to see.
It’s basically found footage for people who leave their pets alone during vacation.
And now I’m convinced every cat owner who watches this movie is going to spend the next week reviewing their pet-camera footage like they’re investigating the Zapruder film.
“Okay, at 2:14 a.m. Fluffy looked toward the hallway.”
“Anything else?”
“No.”
“Enhance it.”
“It’s a fucking cat.”
“ENHANCE IT.”
Cat Cam is a fun little horror premise that takes something completely ordinary and makes it unsettling. It’s creepy, occasionally funny, and definitely the kind of movie that will make you look at your pet a little differently afterward.
Of course, if your cat suddenly starts staring at an empty corner of your house after watching this movie…
Don’t investigate.
Don’t buy another camera.
Don’t call a paranormal investigator.
Just pack the cat, grab your wallet, and leave the house.
Because unlike your cat, you don’t have nine lives.
