In the first scene of "The Ratcatcher", nine- or ten-year-old James (William Eadie) accidentally drowns his friend Ryan as they play in a canal. From then on, there's about an hour of grim shots of Glasgow covered in garbage and vermin before the story resumes. We meet James' friends and family--his loving mother; his spiteful, alcoholic father; his sisters; a gang of neighborhood bullies; his friend Margaret Anne, an older girl who lets him see her naked and touch her privates; and his friend Kenny, who is mildly retarded and collects animals for his private zoo.
What we don't see is much of a point to all this until the final act. Some viewers may not find it worthwhile to watch all this unremitting gloom for a final payoff. I personally thought that even though there were few unnecessary scenes, they could have been paced a little better.
Another problem I had was with the subtitles. These people are speaking English, and for the most part they speak it clearly. As a person of Scottish heritage, I was insulted.
Nonetheless, I do recommend this film. In the scenes where the story moves forward, it attains a powerful urgency, and the acting is uniformly great.
This is a grim, slow, but fairly good film. 7 out of 10.
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