Even Andrew Lloyd Webber thought the 'Cats' movie was 'ridiculous'

The English composer has slammed Tom Hooper's movie take of his famous stage musical

Andrew Lloyd Webber's musical 'Cats' is adapted from TS Eliot's collection of poems 'Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats'. EPA 

Last year, the movie version of Andrew Lloyd Webber's stage musical Cats was released. To say that the film received a frosty reception is an understatement.

It has a rating of 2.7 out of 10 on IMDb, and 20 per cent on Rotten Tomatoes, with one critic branding it "baffling". A second said: "This is like doing too much catnip and falling asleep to the soundtrack, just surreal."

And it seems it wasn't only critics and audiences who were unimpressed by the cinematic adaption. English composer Lloyd Webber has slammed the movie version of his stage show.

"The problem with the film was that [director] Tom Hooper decided that he didn't want anybody involved in it who was involved in the original show," Lloyd Webber told The Sunday Times. "The whole thing was ridiculous."

Lloyd Webber adapted TS Eliot's 1939 poetry collection Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats to write the musical. It has been performed on stages around the world since 1981.

The movie version has an all-star cast, with Taylor Swift, Judi Dench, Idris Elba, Jennifer Hudson, Rebel Wilson, Ian McKellen and Jason Derulo all channelling their inner felines in the musical film. It is estimated that it lost Universal $113 million (Dh415m).

This isn't the first time Lloyd Webber has criticised the film. English actor and TV host James Corden plays the character Bustopher Jones and, in May this year, Lloyd Webber said of his take on the role and the song named after him: "I cannot tell you how absolutely un-Eliot it all was ... This song is about wit, not coarse jokes."

Corden himself has admitted that he hasn't watched the "terrible" film.

"I haven’t seen it, but I’ve heard it’s terrible," he told BBC Radio 2 host, Zoe Ball. "I'll catch it one day, I imagine."