Lynne Ramsay's Ratcatcher: Towards a Theory of Haptic Narrative

Abstract

The aim of this essay is to extend and refine the concept of ‘haptic visuality’ which has taken decisive shape in film studies so that it can be used to describe narrative form. In recent theory, the haptic has on the whole been set in opposition to narrative. Should narrative cinema then be understood in and through its neglect or disavowal of haptic visuality? Or might certain feature films in fact incorporate haptic imagery, without thereby ceasing to narrate? These are questions urgently provoked by Lynne Ramsay's brilliant first feature film, Ratcatcher (1999). The answer proposed here takes its bearings from the history of literary and filmic Naturalism, and from the understanding of narrative process Siegfried Kracauer develops in his Theory of Film.