Overview

Across walls, fences, and alleys, rats not only expose our boundaries of separation but make homes in them. Rat Film is a feature-length documentary that uses the rat to explore the history of Baltimore.

• Review

  Rat Film focuses on issues in the special background of Baltimore rats. Through rats, the film depicts the relations between the city, humans, and class. Producer Theo Anthony plays with fiction and nonfiction, records and research. The film is introduced with a rat which is fighting to escape a trash bin. It includes dry metaphors such as ‘On average, rats can jump over 32 inches’ ‘The height of Baltimore trash bins are 34 inches.’ Rat Film contains innovative use of poetic images, scientific observation, and straightforward research. The film also becomes a documentary about class, as the records of infection in Baltimore are revealed and the underlying class issues raised. The monotonous narration is reminiscent of Werner Herzog, but the unique style is closer to the essays of Harun Farocki and Chris Marker. [JANG Byungwon]

• Credit

  Director	Theo ANTHONY
  Screenplay	Theo ANTHONY
  Producer	Riel ROCH-DECTER, Sebastian PARDO
  Cinematography	Theo ANTHONY
  Editor	Theo ANTHONY
  Sound	Narration: Maureen JONES
  Music	Dan DEACON

Director

Theo ANTHONY

Theo Anthony was born in 1989. He is a writer, photographer and filmmaker currently based in Baltimore. Peace In The Absence Of War(2016), Chop My Money(2014) is his representative works. His films have been premiered at Toronto IFF, Locarno IFF, Rotterdam IFF, and Anthology Film Archives. In 2015, he was named one of Filmmaker Magazine’s ´25 New Faces of Independent Film´.