Violence, beauty and devastating claustrophobia: the genius of ‘Ratcatcher’ and its opening scene
A boy with layers of lace curtains wrapped around his head, spinning slowly in a harshly lit room. It’s a simple image that creates a uniquely hypnotic effect, with the footage slowed down so that the boy turns in a jagged and abrupt way, trapped and twitching beneath something so delicate. Ever since the opening shot of her debut feature, Ratcatcher, Lynne Ramsay has proved herself to be one of the most exciting and captivating directors working today, with a masterful command over the medium as she bends images to adopt new meaning and life.
In films like You Were Never Really Here, Morvern Callar, and We Need To Talk About Kevin, there is a gradual buildup of moments that are all in service of a much deeper undercurrent, adding nuance to places and things that are often overlooked. The simple image of a lace curtain becomes provocative and uncomfortable, sharply contrasting stunning visuals with a gritty subtext, creating dissonance through ugly subject matter and its beautiful viscerality.
Like many artists, Ramsay’s work has a strong thematic strand, often focusing on characters who are isolated and ‘othered’ by the people around them, either because of their age, socio-economic background, lack of conformity to gender roles or past experiences. This often manifests in a style that thrives on the clash between the immediate violence/danger surrounding the characters and the restrained way that Ramsay paints this.
For example, there is a scene in Ratcatcher in which the Father is walking home and is attacked by a group of kids. Just as we see the blade of a knife move towards his face, Ramsay cuts to the image of an ice cream as a blob of raspberry sauce drips down its side. The red colour of the jam is obviously an allusion to the blood on his face, and while we don’t see the blade making contact with his skin, the sound of it paired with this sickly sweet image is almost more violent, making light of the incident and portraying it as another everyday moment that marks life in this particular Glaswegian neighbourhood.
Ramsay is less interested in crafting clear-cut narratives, but by working as a visual poet, she builds an evocative exploration of the in-between spaces and emotional grey areas occupied by her characters. Through each image, she carefully opens up another thematic pocket that is ripe with meaning, doing so in a way that never feels obvious but slowly invites you into the inner sanctum of her beloved outcasts, immersing you in their perspective and peeling back their layers until you are left with a pure distillation of who they are. Her films thrive on ambiguity and a sense of surrealist realism, creating a haunted effect that suffocates us in their reality.
But while some filmmakers take years to hone their own personal palette and tone, Ramsay seemingly mastered this from the opening sequence of her first feature film. She engineered a sequence that took my breath away and remains one of the most disturbingly beautiful images I have ever seen.
Ratcatcher is the story of a young boy called James, who lives in a neglected part of Glasgow with his family. Their estate has not had their rubbish collected in a long time, with the kids playing amongst bags of decaying food and rats that live off of their scraps. Like Ramsay’s later films, Ratcatcher has a subtle social commentary that runs underneath the loosely structured story, highlighting a side of working-class Glasgow and people who are disregarded and forgotten, trying to make the most of the little that they have.
There’s a harsh contrast between the naivety and innocence of the children on the estate and the bleakness of their surroundings, living in a world that barely has enough space for them, coping through the nostalgic haze of childhood alongside the pains and worries of their parents. It’s an unforgiving landscape, the kind where any semblance of hope is quickly destroyed, with everything posing a threat to the fragility of their few comforts.
This is all something that Ramsay captures in the film’s opening scene, which shows James standing in front of a window with lace curtains wrapped around his head. The material is pulled tightly over his mouth, and as he breathes, we see it gently move with him. He slowly spins round and round, further entangling himself in the curtains, becoming trapped and tethered to the view behind the window. It is a hypnotic and entirely jarring sequence, with nothing but complete silence playing as we watch this little boy lose himself in a simple act of fun.
This moment tells us everything we need to know about James’ circumstances: capturing the beauty yet devastating claustrophobia and suffocation of his environment, slowly spinning out of control and stifled by the view around him, the sight of Glasgow and the place he both loves and hates. There’s a wonderful contradiction within this community, showing people who will both offer you a brand new pair of shoes because they have no other purpose for them yet will knife you on the street for the mere crime of being in the wrong place at the wrong time.
It’s a place where a little boy will fiercely defend his pet mouse from the kids in his building yet will also kill his beloved pet for the chance to be accepted by his peers. These glaring yet beautiful contradictions are all there from the start: a clash between freedom and captivity, innocence and evil, community and stifling loneliness. It’s a world that both embraces kindness and spits on its neck, where innocence is dangerous, leaving this boy scrambling on the river bank for one good deed.
