Film: Red Road
Director: Andrea Arnold
Country: UK
Released: May 2006
Runtime: 113 minutes
Genre: Thriller
Studio: Sigma Films, Zentropa
Influenced: Shane Meadows, Clio Barnard, Ben Drew, Charlotte Wells, Charlotte Regan
Conceived as part of the Advance Party project, an initiative kickstarted by several directors including Lars von Trier and Lone Scherfig, Red Road was intended to be part of a trilogy of films overseen by three different up-and-coming directors who casted and used the same nine characters and actors. Overseeing the project were the production companies Sigma Films (Glasgow) and Zentropa (Denmark), with Andrea Arnold brought in for the first movie, followed by Morag McKinnon for Donkeys (2010); however, the third was never made. Arnold created Red Road under similar conditions to the Dogme movement (location shooting, natural lighting, handheld camerawork, etc), but it also takes its inspiration from classic films about surveillance and voyeurism, such as Hitchcock's Rear Window (1954) and Coppola's The Conversation (1974). Red Road can also be seen as a companion piece to Haneke's Caché (2005).
Shot in five weeks, the film tells the story of Jackie Morrison (Kate Dickie), who works as a CCTV operator in Glasgow. While monitoring the city through surveillance cameras, she spots a man from her past, Clyde Henderson (Tony Curran). Intrigued and disturbed by his presence, Jackie starts to play a dangerous game of following him, and interacting with him, even sometimes at the expense of doing her job properly. Arnold withholds the reason for Jackie’s actions from us until very late in the film, not only to create suspense, but also to subvert narrative norms and to emphasise that Jackie is a self-contained character who has been scarred by experience. Outside of her work, all we know about her is that she is having a sordid and unfulfilling affair with a married man, Avery (Paul Higgins), and that she still has an extended family, including her father-in-law, Alfred (Andrew Armour), who she speaks to at her sister-in-law’s wedding.
Arnold's approach with Red Road involved keeping certain details of the plot hidden from the actors until they were filming, to create genuine reactions. The film had a minimalist script, with much of the dialogue improvised by the actors, contributing to the authentic and naturalistic feel of the performances. Part of Arnold's intent with the movie is to show that, despite the city's troubles – at the time, Glasgow was dubbed the "murder capital of Europe" – there remained a strong sense of solidarity in working-class communities across the Scottish capital. The film was shot on location around Saracen Street in Possilpark, and is now a time capsule to that northeastern corner of the city and its iconic Red Road towers, which were demolished in 2015. The film features several stunning shots, such as one of Jackie in the foreground looking tiny in comparison to the towering Red Road housing block.
Red Road premiered at Cannes in 2006 and won the Jury Prize, as well as several BAFTAs and the Sutherland Trophy at the London Film Festival, awarded to "the director of the most original and imaginative first feature film". Kate Dickie also received a BAFTA Scotland Award for Best Actress for her compelling performance. Dickie starred in Red Road along side her former drama school mate Tony Curran, and for both the film would be a springboard for a successful career in TV & film. Their sex scene together is one of the most graphic and realistic I've ever seen on screen. Red Road also benefits from a small but strong supporting cast, including Paul Higgins and Martin Compston, both now perhaps best known for their roles in one of the most successful British TV crime dramas of the modern era, Line of Duty (2012-21). Arnold would also go from strength to strength, starting with Fish Tank (2009), set on a council estate in her native London, followed by successful American productions both on film, including American Honey (2016), and on TV, notably Big Little Lies (2019).
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