捕鼠者

这是一部非常耐看的电影，我也是看了三四遍才逐渐发现其中的魅力。这部电影非常赤裸地展示了琳恩曾经作为摄影师的扎实功底，大部分的场景都将运动的画面呈现出类似静止的状态，这就巧妙地通过对时间的攫取来使某个瞬间得以延长，这种近乎静止的时刻就非常容易让人们把握事物的存在，哪怕是暂时的。比如影片的最后James的笑容仿佛被定格在麦田中央，让人们能够抓住那一刻James“愿望实现”的幸福感。同时这种类似摄影的拍摄手法还能改变影片的叙事速率，从而带来一种创伤性重复的状况，那些近乎静止的场景就是在反映影片叙事中创伤反复中的暂时中断感。简单来说，James作为一个孩子，在瑞恩死了以后会一直处在负罪感之中，而这些几乎静止的画面就好比一个休息站、庇护所，让他能喘口气或是感受其他美好的情感，我觉得这种以拍摄手法的不同来切换叙事速率，从而给观众带来不同情感体验的方式真的非常巧妙。比如34:20这里James趴在Margaret-Ann身上的俯拍镜头，画面和人物都近乎静止，但总能感受到画面中散发的不掺杂质的单纯的幸福感，这大概就是James所渴望的庇护所吧，平静而舒心；42:23这个James站在麦田中央的中景镜头，满屏的暖色调溢出James来到梦幻之地的放松与舒心…这些不仅是James的休息站，也能让观众从压抑的情绪中得以喘息。虽然画面给人以静止的感觉，但里面的情感确实交织涌动，让人扎身于其中，随其波动。

以写实的手法刻画： 孤独、压抑、敏感的少年内心世界， 成长的自我。 更何况还有恐惧和内疚， 只好将好像永远消耗不完的精力发泄在荒诞与暴力。 他们既是捕鼠者，也是被捕的鼠。 有着自己的生活，自己的个性，自己的境遇的父辈们， 他们也有他们的程度，也有他们的难处， 成长的家庭。 肮脏的社区，混乱的街道，昏庸的政治， 成长的环境。 … 但是， 少年的内心深处其实是温暖和柔软的， 他们渴望被尊重和了解， 不只是吃饱喝足，更需要精神与心灵的关怀，与爱。 父辈们虽可以理解，但也可以做的更多。 … 那窗明几净，那蓝天白云，那金色稻田， 和那少年的笑容， 是最美好的期许！

This blog post will engage with the main themes in the popular reception of the film Ratcatcher (Ramsay, 1999), using as a sample 25 user reviews and comments from the Chinese review-aggregation website Douban, selected on the basis of their length and complexity.

One of the most frequently encountered opinions, 10 of the reviews that I examined interpreted the film from the perspective of teenagers. They think this film depicts the inner world of a depressed, lonely, and sensitive teenager in a realistic way, and reflects the poverty and unbearable life of working-class life in Britain through the vision of a child. In particular, users write of ‘the growing pains of a teenager at the bottom of the pile’. Most people are saddened by the desperate emotional rendering of the film – a story of a traumatized teenager's confusion and sadness in the face of society and the world. For viewers of Douban, the film has reaped the most accolades for its portrayal of British society. Similarly frequent are views about the director’s shooting technique and cinematography, with users often remarking on Ramsay’s solid work as a photographer, revelling in the close-ups and contrasts between the movements and stillness of the shots in the film’s scene.

The film does reflect the oppression and suffering of the British working class through the eyes of the child, James, and many social contradictions are further revealed through James’s interactions with his family and friends. Although Chinese audiences are immersed in an atmosphere of despair and sadness, in my viewpoint, there is still a sense of redemption and hope in some scenes.

In the Ratcatcher, the story is set in the 1970s during a general strike by rubbish workers in the Glasgow area, where the streets were littered with rubbish, houses were in disrepair and rivers were muddy. Like many films typified by the British Kitchen sink Drama, Ratcatcher exposes the grim characteristics of society. It focuses on the lives of poor communities and the impact of poverty on families, and shows the depression and powerlessness of working-class life (Williams,1977; Higson, 1984). But Ramsey largely rejects institutional context and history, abandoning traditional political drives in favour of a more symbolic, suggestive, obscure narrative (Carlota, 2016). Thus, the Ratcatcher can be seen as a film of poetic realism and viewers can feel its hints of hope and redemption in scenes of despair.

Figure 1: The city streets are full of rubbish

Kenny's Snowball seems to be an amalgamation of destruction and hope. James has to endure the violence of those older than him but also wants to protect this cute little mouse. In the next series of shots, which are James's fantasy, the mouse flies to the moon in a red balloon and joins other mouse companions. This fantasy is also James's longing, which also represents the innocence and hope of children. As Aitken (2011) points out, Ramsey's use of fantasy techniques belies some of the tones of realism and makes surprises to create a form of poetic realism. Because at this point, James hopes to find his true playmate, who will no longer have to endure violence and pain. Just like rats fleeing from the earth, he wants to escape this awful community. Thus, poetically, the Ratcatcher gives the audience a child's perspective of how the underclass grows from the rubbish and how James releases his guilt and pain in his fantasies. James' fantasies seem to escape the mire of life and this moment of innocent simplicity contrasts with the dreary tone of the film, which makes the audience realise that these underclass teenagers still harbour hope, only to slowly fade away in the struggle of reality.

Figure 2: James’ fantasy of Snowball flying to the moon

If the fantasy of a snowball flying to the moon represents the innocence and hope of a child, James in the wheat field has a sense of redemption in the film's desperate and heavy tone. The golden fields of wheat are a stark contrast to the dirty canals and rubbish-strewn city streets, where James can run freely through them without suffering violence or pain. In this poetic scene, James steps through the window and jumps into the wheat field. And at the same time, the cheerful and melodious music brings the audience to the romantic world of the child. Here he fantasizes about having a new house built in a field, which is also James' hope. The Ratcatcher seems to set up a 'paradise' in which the hope of society is rediscovered in the children’s vision.

Figure 3: James in the wheat field

Sadly, at the end of the film, James is unable to cope with the growing pains in a society of inequality and despair, and he chooses to die. However, the scenes immediately following add some imaginative warmth as he and his family arrive in the wheat field carrying belongings with the smile on their face, where their new home has been built. But they are still framed beyond the window, which seems to suggest their isolation from real life. After this scene, there is still a grey scene in which James sinks into the dirty river. This is a combination of landscape and narrative; thus, the dialectic of illusion and disillusionment is carried out, from the good mess into the bad mess (Trotter, 2008). Moreover, this tragic ending seems to hint at the disillusionment of James’s hope, but some pauses in the scenes, such as the pauses in the shot as James sinks and the pause in the running through the wheat field, still give the audience a powerful sense of redemption.

Figure 4: James’s fantasy of moving to a new house

Figure 5: James sinks into the canal

In sum, Ratcatcher is a poetic realist film that places individual confusion and social trauma in the scenes of despair and sadness through the eyes of children. However, the film leaves room for hope and redemption for the children, preserving them between fantasies and camera pauses.

Words: 1013

Reference list:

Aitken, S. C. (2007). Poetic child realism: Scottish film and the construction of childhood. Scottish Geographical Journal, 123 (1), 68-86.

Higson, A. (1984). Space, Place, Spectacle. Screen25 (4/5), 2-21.

Larrea, C. (2016). Ratcatcher. Senses of Cinema, 80, 1–5.

Ramsay, L. (Screenwriter/ Director). (1999). Ratcatcher[Motion picture]. France: Pathé Pictures International

Trotter, D. (2008). Lynne Ramsay’s “Ratcatcher”: Towards a Theory of Haptic Narrative. Paragraph, 31(2), 138–158.

Williams, R. (1977). A Lecture on Realism. Screen18 (1), pp.61-74

这不是一部闷片，而是一部直击心灵的影片。“无助、孤独、暴力、贫穷、性...”并不是每个人的童年都过的很美好，大多数人因为年少时做过错事而困扰一生，影片中一直用很平淡的社会手法拍摄，除了男主回来看一窝的老鼠以外，片中只有几处有背景音乐现在我还记得最深的是小男主坐在没有一人的公交车上望着车外，还有小男主在新房子里看着窗外好大一片草地在上面打滚，然后天快黑色一个人走在路上踢着空易拉罐回家，还有就是最后男主角选择自杀沉在河里幻想搬进新家的时候也是小男主全片唯一一次笑了的场景。 不仅是在国外，这种情况在中国有过很多，大人太忙或有自己重要的事情做而忽略了自己孩子，我也有过一个人太孤独的时候搭着公交坐在窗户边上一个人坐到终点站又坐回来，然而就像影片里的主要不是出现生命上的危险大人是不会管你的。“太阳和人心是我永远都不敢直视的。”