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THE
"WAR ON POVERTY" WORKS IN ENGLAND
 In
Ratcatcher, Scottish director Lynne Ramsay,
Jr., who also plays an acting role in the film, presents a
vivid picture of the working class slums in Glasgow with a
very different slant from Ken Loach's My
Name Is Joe (1999). Before World War II, sociologists
used to think that slumdwellers engaged in deviant behavior,
lived in a disorganized state, and were alienated. But then
sociologists never went to the poorer parts of town, with
all the garbage, rats, and other signs of squalor -- that
is, until sociologist William Foote Whyte's classic book Streetcorner
Society (1943) buried that conception after a year of
observation in the Italian working class part of Boston. Whyte
marveled at how well slum residents related to one another
in a communitarian manner. The social problem, in short, was
that mainstream society refused to deal with the "lower classes,"
and the implication was that "war on poverty" programs had
a chance of working. Ratcatcher makes the same
point about the resilience of the working classes in the face
of tremendous adversity -- deadly pollution, massive unemployment,
garbage allowed to pile up for weeks due to a strike, and
presumably governmental or societal indifference. Unlike My
Name Is Joe, the working class in Ratcatcher
does not resort to crime, drugs, or violence. When the film
begins, a boy falls into a polluted stream and dies, and later
in the film another boy nearly drowns as well. Rats abound,
and another boy makes a sport of catching them. But the focus
of the film is on James (played by Bill Eadie), a boy of about
twelve years of age, his Ma (played by Mandy Matthews), and
his Da (played by Tommy Flanagan), who is an occasional visitor
until he returns home, saves a boy from drowning, and gets
a medal from the Town Council.
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James copes with the uncertainties of everyday living by
refusing to show outward emotional commitment. His father
gives him soccer shoes, but he says that he hates soccer.
After four mid-teenage troublemakers throw the glasses of
James's girlfriend into the stream, James pretends that
he cannot find them, yet sleeps with the girl and only confesses
his "love" perfunctorily when she asks him to say so. He
accepts his mother's affection but clearly does not show
any need for it. His one dream is that the Social Services
Department will award the family a newly built townhome
alongside a field and freshwater pond. As the film ends,
the dream has come true, and his family is indeed moving
across town to the new home. Neighbors, demonstrating a
communitarian spirit, help by carrying the family's furniture
some distance to the new abode. In ecstasy, James plunges
into the beautiful pond by his new home, and the film ends.
MH
CONFERENCE
ON PRESIDENTS IN FILM CONVENES NOVEMBER 10
The
Film and History League opens a conference, "American Presidents
in Film: Hollywood Views the White House," at the Ronald
Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley, a suburb north
of Los Angeles, on the weekend of November 10-12. In addition
to panel presentations on all forty-one presidents, conference
attendees can visit the Reagan Library, dine with a prominent
guest speaker, and view films featuring presidents. Political
Film Society officers will be present to greet members at
the event. For those flying to Los Angeles for the conference,
the Westlake Hyatt offers special accommodations. The registration
fee for the conference is $175.00.
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