Ratcatcher (2021)

A lot of fun.

This story has more twists and turns than a second-rate soap opera.

It's funny, it's tense, it features two great performances from two actors and the director expertly creates a web of odd tension where you actually don't know what is happening for the majority of the run time.

The movie really just wants to entertain people.

Director Lynne Ramsey creates a very haunting drama taking place in Scotland's largest city, Glasgow. It is a hot summer and the trash men are on strike; the garbage bags littering sidewalk breeding grounds for rats. It is 1973, and young teen James(William Eadie)lives in a rundown flat with his Da(Tommy Flanagan), Ma(Mandy Matthews)and sisters eagerly waiting in anticipation of the housing council's permission to move to a newer flat. It is a very depressing time and James watches a friend drown in a fetid canal while play-fighting. His neighbor Kenny(John Miller), who loves gathering rats to put in his make believe circus, is angry blaming James for the death of their school mate. James will spend time and befriend a slightly-older Margaret Anne(Lynne Ramsey Jr.), who is constantly raped by neighborhood hooligans. This is a stark and depressing character driven drama. It is as if the stain of humanity will never fade away. James seems to catch most of his drunken da's anger, as if it is his fault the striking trash collectors are without a job. Two bright spots for the jug-eared lad is his dream of moving out of squaller and his budding love for Margaret Anne. Music by the likes of Eddy Cochrane, The Chordettes and Tom Jones move the story along. Other players: Michelle Stewart, Craig Boner, Mick Maharg and Andrew McKenna.

I saw Ratcatcher on screen at a film festival in Japan. It was the most personal film I had ever seen - I grew up in Glasgow, I was the same age as the protagonist when the dustbin men went on strike, I climbed among the same mountains of rubbish bags, I could see that canal from my living-room window, I played on the foundations of a new estate being built near my home on the way back from school, and my first love was an older neighbour. When the film finished, I was speechless; I felt like Lynne Ramsay had stolen my soul. She came on stage at that festival and I found out she was my age and grew up down the street from me in Maryhill. That explained the intimacy of the film; however, the most telling comment that evening came from a Japanese member of the audience. He said to Ramsay: "Your film took me back to my childhood. Thank you." The only objectivity I have on Ratcatcher is that man's comment - which was applauded by the rest of the Japanese audience. If he is to believed, this is not just another gritty portrayal of survival in the brutal back streets of Glasgow, it is a universal tale of childhood longing, confusion, loss and redemption. I think you should believe him. I bought another compendium of British short films just to get hold of the director's 'Gasman,' which is as perfect a short film as you will ever see. It is included in some DVD editions, and is worth looking out for.

This film about growing up urban in Scotland is masterful in its depiction of life as an unstoppable downward spiral of degradation, social entropy and anomie ending in slime, criminality and despair. Every step of this short and brutal downfall is lovingly illustrated with scenes of filth, coarseness, profanity, idiocy, moral turpitude, ignorance, poverty, intoxication and vermin. It's quite a ride, even though it rather shamelessly borrows a Carl Orff theme that was already made famous by its use in Terrence Malick's "Badlands" for its score and reproduces Mike Leigh's naturalistic atmospheres without the humour and a single glimmer of hope. Should the viewer feel like cleansing his palate after this ordeal, may I recommend two films on the same subject, the poetry and terrors of childhood? They are just as rewarding but without the vomit-inducing sadism and body fluids. They are:(1) "The Steamroller and The Violin"/"Katok i skripka", 1960, URSS, a 42-minute student film by Andrei Tarkovsky, one of the loveliest films ever put together on planet Earth (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0053987/), and(2) "The Children Are Watching Us"/"Bambini ci guardano", Vittorio DeSica's first collaboration with neo-realist screenwriter Cesare Zavattini, 1943, an almost forgotten classic, finally on Criterion DVD (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0034493/).

This is more of a 7.5/10 Lynn Ramsay made a promising debut with this feature. It is the typical first feature. They make an above average movie where they can later improve on their techniques to create a "great" film.I have minor faults with this film. The score at the beginning is too sentimental for such an unsentimental film but later improves itself greatly with the music. I thought the first scene of the accidental death was not documented enough and it leaves you pretty confused. Some of the characters' problems go in and out of the movie and I just wished there was more insight. A few of Ramsay's techniques got a little tiresome.Ahhhhhhhh. Great Imagery. I am such a sucker for good cinematography. There are three beautifully poetic scenes in the film you will not forget(the pasture, the trip to the moon, and the wonderfully ambiguous end that reminded me of My Own Private Idaho)The film gets good performances all around. The protagonist James is interesting but very mysterious because Ramsay keeps most of her characters at a distance. The protagonist's father is also a standout. It never let me get bored and was interesting. There are some very well done scenes involving the protagonist's father. In the latter part of the film, the score is used very effectively.