Lynne Ramsay may have not made many films (less than half a dozen in the past twenty years), but yet it has never been a question that she is one of our greatest living filmmakers, which is proof that some directors are the embodiment of choosing quality over quantity. It seems appropriate that she is so selective when it comes to choosing projects since the intensity of her work means that it would be quite difficult for audiences to spend too much time sampling from her ambitious artistry, and one can only imagine the impact it has on the director herself. However, her first feature-length film is often cited as one of her most influential, and throughout Ratcatcher, we see many of her most notable qualities emerging right from the start. Set in her native Glasgow, Ramsay carves the story of a young boy who is faced with many challenges after he begins to notice many of the people in his working-class neighbourhood leaving, which formed part of the city’s efforts to relocate its residents from the squalor of these outdated community properties and into more efficient, livable conditions that will hopefully give them a better quality of life. We follow our protagonist James as he negotiates his surroundings and tries to gain a better understanding of the world around him, which turns out to be quite a daunting process, especially for someone who has only known the feeling of loneliness and alienation, especially from his own family, who tend to be quite ambivalent to his journey. Beautifully poetic and driven by a sense of ethereal beauty, Ratcatcher is an incredible and poignant film that places a lot of its focus on the smallest details of everyday life, which is rendered in striking detail by a filmmaker with a penchant for pushing boundaries and going in search of deeper truths lurking beneath the surface of the human condition.

On the surface, we can see that Ramsay is drawing a lot of her inspiration with Ratcatcher from several different works, although it isn’t clear how many of these influences were intentional or just coincidental. There is quite a bit of Bill Douglass present in this film (particularly My Childhood, another astonishing work set within working-class Scotland, focusing on the life and times of a young man trying to overcome challenges), with touches of Bill Forsyth and Terence Davies, specifically in how they use a very specific kind of approach in telling such a story. One aspect that Ramsay does share with these directors, outside of her working-class upbringing, is the idea of reconfiguring the coming-of-age narrative as something much more than just a linear journey between milestone moments in the life of a young protagonist. These stories tend to have an immediate source of resonance in terms of how they focus on a younger character, which brings a sense of innocence and unbiased honesty to the proceedings, but these stories tend to blur together in ways that are not always easy to embrace, nor particularly effective once we realize there isn’t much beneath the surface. The challenge with Ratcatcher was finding new ways to tell a story we have all encountered many times before, and making it seem original and insightful, which was not a challenge for Ramsay, who develops on many of the major ideas without needing to resort to anything we have seen before. We accompany James (portrayed with heartbreaking honesty by William Eadie, who is brilliant in the role) as he explores the world and tries to make sense of his environment, not realizing that there are many challenges that are awaiting him on the other side of this journey, which makes for a moving but sometimes quite unsettling exploration of an unhappy childhood that he hopes will become easier, not realizing the obstacles that he will have to face as he grows older.

We can quite easily see that Ramsay started out in short subject filmmaking and moved over to longer projects, since Ratcatcher is essentially a series of vignettes, and we could take any section of the film and have it be a wonderfully complex, standalone short film. This is a credit to not only her unique method of storytelling but also her approach to constructing her films, which are extremely detailed and curated to the point of near-perfection, which is precisely why it feels like such a major achievement in terms of how it builds its narrative around more subtle ideas. There isn’t much of a story behind this film, in the sense that it isn’t driven by the screenplay (which in itself is quite beautiful, especially in how it captures the colourful and vibrant language of the population, one of the many reasons why filmmakers like Ramsay are so important, as they preserve entire cultures in their films) but rather by the atmosphere, which is dense and provocative, but also extremely engaging and deeply moving in ways that many may find to be quite surprising. More aligned with stream-of-consciousness storytelling, Ramsay weaves together several moments in the lives of these characters, giving us fascinating insights into their daily routine and how they overcome certain challenges, which is particularly resonant for a story that focuses so deeply on the trials and tribulations of a child protagonist, who is doing everything he can to understand the world around him, which becomes increasingly more difficult the further he integrates himself into his surroundings, which we come to realize represent a very uncanny version of a recognizable city, as seen by someone who has yet to fully comprehend the scope of reality.

Ramsay does exceptionally well in framing this film through the perspective of its young protagonist, and we find that Ratcatcher is as much about the story as it is the manner in which it is delivered, which is profoundly moving and certainly far from traditional. The entire purpose of the film was to be a haunting examination of childhood through the eyes of someone who has only started to realize there is more to life than he initially anticipated, and while the film is not too focused on the small details, these ideas do factor into the film in a way that is certainly quite surprising, even if it isn’t always as straightforward as we may hope. The film is seemingly formed under the discipline of magical realism, or at least was inspired by several of these works – a film like The Spirit of the Beehive or An Angel at My Table instantly come to mind in terms of being these quiet, meditative glimpses into childhood, which are delivered in an almost dreamlike state. It is obvious that Ramsay had her origins as a photographer since few filmmakers understand the impact of a still image quite like her, and Ratcatcher is filled to the brim with these details. There are several moments where we find her camera lingering on a particular frame for slightly longer than usual, and whether it is for us to splendour in the beauty of a given image, or feel the discomfort of seeing something quite disturbing, it serves a fascinating artistic purpose that gives the film an abundance of depth, and allows it to be even more enthralling and captivating, even at its most melancholic, which is not an easy achievement, nor one that we would expect from someone who had yet to direct a feature film before deciding to explore the concept of childhood through this engaging and deeply moving story.

While she has become one of the most acclaimed filmmakers of her generation, it is staggering to imagine a film like Ratcatcher could emerge from someone making their directorial debut. It is certainly not an easy film, and Ramsay proves that she possesses a penchant for complex characters and harrowing scenarios right from the very start. There isn’t a lot of joy in this film – if anything, it presents a more nightmarish vision of life in the working class, with the squalor of this community creating quite an unsettling atmosphere, and one that is certainly not helped by the individuals residing within it, since their apathy towards life, in general, begins to create quite a distinctly downbeat mood, which Ramsay uses as the starting point for our protagonist’s journey. It has an immense depth and a willingness to evoke emotions that we may have never encountered previously, which can lead to quite a harsh and unexpectedly disorienting experience. However, Ramsay anchors everything beautifully throughout this film, and we never feel lost while under her supervision, instead we are guided through this world, given the chance to explore it and make new encounters alongside our protagonist. There is a reason why Ratcatcher is considered one of the greatest debuts in film history, there aren’t many examples of a director emerging with an almost fully realised vision right from the start, let alone one that tackles some of the most challenging subjects that many of us face, all the while making it look and feel like such an authentic, complex experience. Deeply moving and profoundly captivating, and driven by a genuine sense of intrigue and honesty, Ratcatcher is an astonishing film and has proven to be the start of a fascinating career that has taken Ramsay to the very peak of contemporary cinema, which she continues to help define through her masterful and deeply compelling works.