CatVideoFest 2020

Ever wanted to see cat videos on the big screen? At St. Anthony Main Theatre, you can do just that

By Ian Knoll

The year is now 2020, and the last thing I expected to start off the decade with was cat videos. But, the time has come for this year’s national CatVideoFest, so here we are. 

Hosted locally at the gorgeous St. Anthony Main Theatre, CatVideoFest is a presentation featuring classic and up-and-coming cat educational films, animations, and—you guessed it—YouTube videos. Entrees ranged from classic series like “Henri, le Chat Noir” and “Simon’s Cat” to hidden gems like “An Engineer’s Guide to Cats,” to simple, short clips lifted straight from TikTok.

Each year, a portion of the proceeds from CatVideoFest go to local cat shelters or charities. This year, that was Feline Rescue, a local group who takes in foster, shelter, and stray cats and gives them the necessary care to be put up for adoption. It’s absolutely a worthy cause, and the audience seems eager to support it. But this brings me to my only major complaint: Why do only ten percent of the proceeds go to them? I’m admittedly no expert on the finances of film events, but even if licensing is a factor, I can’t imagine literally pulling videos off the internet is particularly expensive to do. 

Unsurprisingly, there’s something surreal about sitting in a crowded theater, the same place that’s shown modern classics like “Parasite” and “1917,” watching cats leap cabinet to cabinet on a fifteen foot screen. What was surprising  was the reception. Tickets to all six showings were sold out well in advance, and once the projector started rolling, not a second went by without a series of laughter or “aww” rolling through the eager crowd. I thought I was done with cat videos well over a decade ago, but even I found myself bursting with laughter. As odd as it is to say about an event called CatVideoFest, this kind of unrestrained and shared sense of enjoyment is something I often find lacking when I see a movie. All in all, a near purrfect experience.

You can find CatVideoFest at catvideofest.com, and support Feline Rescue directly at felinerescue.org