June 4 - June 6, 2024 Lynne Ramsay: An American Cinematheque Retrospective Series | WE NEED TO TALK ABOUT KEVIN, YOU WERE NEVER REALLY HERE, RATCATCHER, MORVERN CALLAR
ABOUT THE SERIES: The American Cinematheque is proud to welcome esteemed Scottish auteur, Lynne Ramsay as part of ‘Bleak Week: Cinema of Despair – Year 3,’ for an in-person 4-film retrospective that will traverse the path of a career rife with haunting evocations of profound grief and the inherent complexities of human emotion. Ramsay’s seminal debut feature, RATCATCHER, immerses the viewer into the troubled upbringing of an impoverished young boy during Glasgow’s garbage strike in 1973. Her sophomore feature, MORVERN CALLAR, confronts the convolutions of sudden loss as the titular character copes with the immediate aftermath of her boyfriend’s suicide. WE NEED TO TALK ABOUT KEVIN, a nuanced reflection of a mother in mourning after her son commits a school massacre, and YOU WERE NEVER REALLY HERE, a hellish descent into a hired gun’s mission to save a politician’s daughter from a human trafficking ring, were both nominated for the Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival, with the latter winning the Best Screenplay award at the 2017 ceremony. Although the filmmaker dismisses the label of social realism in reference to her work, it cannot be denied that Ramsay’s four feature films invoke viscerally authentic depictions of the existential intricacies that being a human being consists of. Abundant in quiet despair, oppressive atmospheres, and visually poignant imagery, Lynne Ramsay’s sparse yet formidable filmography launches the audience into some of the most somber parts of humanity; in spite of this, her empathetic character studies display vast levels of tenacity in juxtaposition to the dire circumstances at hand.