Rats in the Ranks

This is a great documentary covering a mayoral election in suburban Sydney where the incumbant mayor, Larry Hand, is seeking re-election in an internal council election. Larry needs 7 of the 12 Councillors' votes and we watch him attempt every ruse available to gain the support of his fellow councillors. We get a fly on the wall view of political manouvering and backroom machinations as Larry cajoles, flatters and threatens his fellow councillors into voting for him. While there are some instances where people refused to be filmed negotiating with Larry, generally we are present at Larry's side throughout his campaign.

Although we get to see first hand the duplicitous nature of Larry, we still sympathise with him and hope he defeats the evil Labor Party candidate (filmed in a very negative light) and retain his mayoral robes for another term. Rats in the Ranks features twists and turns befitting a thriller and is a great example of realpolitik.

Highly recommendable.

I can only agree with other comments that this documentary is so perfect it might have been scripted. It has everything you could want in a drama right down to a suspenseful climax.

One thing that hasn't been highlighted is the battle that some council members have with their own conscience - watching them agonise between their consciences and their party loyalty is funny and painful at the same time.

This film does for politics what Spinal; Tap did for rock music. Only difference is that this is a real documentary, not a mockumentary with scripted jokes. It has pretty much everything to recommend it. Some brilliant lines, some amazing twists in the events and a great ending. If everyone saw this film, politics would be far more popular. Larry Hand is the left-wing Mayor of Leichardt, a small township outside Sydney. Once a member of the Australian Labor Party (ALP), he was obviously expelled at some point but took that in his stride, saying "I've always felt you haven't really joined the ALP until you've been expelled from it." Now his term is up and it looks as if he won't be re-elected by the council as Labor runs a candidate against him. But he decides to fight to keep the job with a mix of charm and cheating. Absolutely compulsive whether or not you are interested in politics or Australia or neither.

If this wasn't a documentary, I would have to laugh and applaud the great casting and acting... and what a script! However, a documentary it is, and that is the saddest thing I have ever heard. I have never been gladder that I don't live in Sydney.

Anderson and Connolly filmed everything they could get their lenses on in the weeks leading up to a crucial Leichardt Council meeting. No doubt they were hoping for the occasional unguarded word to be caught on film - or perhaps a minor scandal might flit in front of the camera for a minute or two.

The result? Not only did they get all the juicy stuff they had hoped for, and more; they got a story so perfect and brilliantly proportioned that it could have been scripted - indeed, the `script' that resulted from Anderson and Connolly taking real events and snipping out the irrelevant bits is far more satisfying, clever and just plain entertaining than all but a handful of the scripts on which Hollywood is willing to squander millions of dollars. Anderson and Connolly's good fortune surpasses belief. I'm not saying they don't deserve this good fortune. But by gum, it IS good fortune. It's as if they'd planted a camera on the shores of Loch Ness just as the monster takes its first breath since 1450.

Their only problem must have been to fight the impulse to tap some of the councillors on the shoulder and tell them what some of the other councillors were planning to do. It's obvious they didn't, because ... oh, watch the film and find out.

P.S.: Having peeked behind the scenes, I have to say that I'd still be prepared to vote for Larry Hand (the mayor whose term is about to expire and may or may not be renewed). He's probably a decent enough mayor. Indeed, despite the unbelievable double-dealing that goes on, most of the councillors are almost innocent. The ones we DON'T see might be the Evil Politicians of popular fable, but the ones we do see really have no vices that weren't already present in the electorate, on election day.