Armed with catnip, claws, and eccentricity, 'Cats' movie trailer has us yowling

LOS ANGELES: The trailer of the star-laden movie version of hit stage musical Cats — armed with catnip, claws, and eccentricity — released its first trailer on Thursday but first impressions were far from cuddly.

To be released in December, the movie features Jennifer Hudson, Judi Dench, Ian McKellen, Idris Elba, and James Corden, as well as Taylor Swift, for whom Cats is her first film role.

Scroll down to watch the trailer of this utterly-bizarre movie

The film uses the actors’ faces and covers their bodies in computer-generated fur as they sing and dance on a larger-than-life set.

Forbes.com film critic Scott Mendelson tweeted that the trailer was “appropriately terrifying and insane, like a drug-induced nightmare. I can’t wait!”

The trailer racked up more than 100,000 views in the first hour and the #Cats hashtag quickly became the top trending item on Twitter.

The film, directed by Britain’s Tom Hooper, who won an Oscar for The King’s Speech, is the first movie adaptation of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s hit stage musical Cats.

The unlikely stage musical, based on poems by T.S. Eliot, opened in 1981 and became one of the longest-running shows on both Broadway and in London.

In a behind-the-scenes video, Oscar-winner Dench — one of Britain’s most admired actresses — called the film “an Alice in Wonderland experience”.

Swift, known for her love of cats, said cast members did extensive movement workshops to embody their feline characters.

“As a cat lover, and a cat owner, he (Hooper) told me I was going to get to go to cat school every day.

"For work! What?!,” the delighted singer said in a behind-the-scenes video.