documentary Nature | Wildlife THE RAT AMONG US - Interspot Film

documentary
Nature | Wildlife
THE RAT AMONG US
Feared, tormented and yet loved: the rat ranks first among
animals that humans encounter with utter repugnance, but
also first among those that humans owe considerable gratitude.
Medical progress is inconceivable without laboratory rats. Yet
for millennia, an interminable war has been raging between man
and rat. Human emotions towards rats range from irrational fear
to idolatrous veneration and love.
“The Rat Among Us” makes short shrift of all our prejudices
against rats.
AUSTRIA’S TOP FILM AND TV PRODUCERS OF WILDLIFE MOVIES
length
50 minutes
director
alfred vendl
year
1997
format
betadigital 16:9
version
english and german
completed

documentary
Nature | Wildlife
THE RAT AMONG US
Over centuries of living with and off humans, the rat has polarised us like no other animal.
At the start of the second millennium AD, the first wave of Asian rats flooded Europe:
rattus rattus, the black rat, arrived, bringing along one of the greatest disasters of humankind:
the plague, known as Black Death. For centuries people faulted the rats for the devastating
epidemic.
It was only comparatively recently that physicians realised that the plague was transmitted by
the flee carried on piggyback by the rat rather than the rat itself. But the deeply rooted fear
and loathing of the rat was already indelibly impressed on the human mind. In the 18th century,
a second wave of rats, this time rattus norvegicus, brown and similarly from Asia, again
invaded the rest of the world, conquering even the last hiding hole on earth…
Yet today, more and more people are changing their minds about the rat and its admirable
abilities, even keeping it as a beloved and pampered pet and defending it against
discrimination.
“The Rat Among Us” provides a glimpse of the fascinating world of rats. The documentary
accompanies a brown Norway rat on a night of adventures after arriving in a new town,
making side trips to offer an in-depth picture of the life of rats. In pursuing the rat through
the urban jungle, we see its impressive talents and extraordinary intelligence: it must overcome
extreme obstacles to get into a human household, assert itself against hostile humans
and animals and even cope with a flood in a sewer. Viewers are presented with an exciting
overview of the extraordinary feats and facets of rat life: how they live in the wild, building
nests, lovingly caring for their young; how they are venerated as deities in the temple of
Deshnok in India yet are exterminated in masses on that subcontinent.
The rat as a cherished pet, as a circus performer, but also as a laboratory animal for modern
medical experimenting. The rat as an astronaut. And the latest methods used in the human
war against this hated and often misunderstood neighbour which we constantly exploit for
our own benefit yet have been fighting for centuries – with singular lack of success.
For further information please contact
HEINRICH MAYER
Interspot Film-Ges.m.b.H
A-1230 Vienna
Walter-Jurmann-Gasse 4
phone: + 43 1 | 80 120-420
fax: + 43 1 | 80 120-222
e-mail: mayer@interspot.at
www.interspot.at
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