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Gajski (Ivica Vidovic) is one of the many unemployed in his
impoverished Croatian village, and by and by, he loses everything, his
home, his books (he's a writer), his self-respect ... and before you know
it, he finds himself sleeping on a park bench. The park's watchman soon
enough wants to chase him away, but then has pity on the poor fellow and
grants him entrance to the local posh but sealed bank building. Weirdly
enough, there is a secret banquet at the sealed off bank that night, and
it seems all attendees are part of a conspirative movement hell-bent to
take over the city, led by the mysterious Savior. But first they
have to kill professor Boskovic (Fabijan Sovagovic) - who just happens to
be the father of Gajski's fiancée Sonja (Mirjana Majurec). When Gajski
rushes to warn them, he finds them gone, when he reports everything to the
police, they find no traces whatsoever of the banquet in the bank ... but
eventually, the professor gets in touch with Gajski and makes him his
assistant in inventing a powerful rat poison, powerful enough to kill the
Savior and his followers ... who are really rat people. With this
knowledge, Gajski runs into all kinds of troubles - but has an unexpected
ally in the mayor (Relja Basic). The whole situation soon becomes a bit
tit for tat. The Savior's men, the Rat People, kill the professor, but the
professor has apparently found the perfect rat poison just before his
death, and now Gajski uses it against the rat people at their next
banquet, killing a great many of them ... but then he runs into their
leader, the Savior, and he turns out to be the only man he trusted, the
mayor. The Mayor wants to make Gajski one of his own, a rat man, by having
him bitten by rats, who take over his DNA and become him - same process
has also been applied to Sonja, he mentions ... Gajski manages to
escape. He runs into Sonja and kills her, to arrive at the professor's
home to run into Sonja, the rat woman - apparently he has killed the wrong
Sonja. The mayor has followed Gajski to the professor's lab and destroy's
the equipment ... but among the professor's things, Gajski finds a
waterglass full of rat poison and pours it into the mayor's face,
effectively killing him and all his minions ... In writing, Rat
Savior might sound like your typical trashy sci fi fodder - but as a
movie, it is anything but, it's a surreal and clever parable on politics,
with thinly veiled jibes at the socialist system (or rather its
application in Yugoslavia). Subsequently, the film focusses less on action
and excitement but proper storytelling that also profits from a relaxed
pace and from putting atmosphere over effect. And add to that quite a hint
of irony paired with a predilection for the macabre, and you're left with
a very interesting genre movie - that doesn't feel like a genre movie at
all ...
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