B

There are thriller elements to Andrea Arnold’s Glasgow-based tale about Jackie (Kate Dickie), a surveillance guard watching over a dangerous neighborhood who takes an obsessive interest in a man (Tony Curran) she spies on her bank of closed-circuit television monitors. But in the final analysis “Red Road” is better thought of as an enigmatic character study of a person trapped by an unhappy past. Anyone expecting some big, surprising revelation at the close will probably be disappointed, but those willing to work their way through a woman’s halting effort to overcome grief will find it a sensitive and engrossing film, though not always an entirely plausible one.

Jackie first spies Clyde Henderson (Curran) at a long distance as he follows a woman into an alley, and suspects he’s planning to attack her; but it turns out she’s a prostitute and he’s purchased her services. When she zooms the camera onto his face, however, she recognizes him, and begins using the equipment to keep close tabs on him. Soon she’s gone beyond that, shadowing him as he goes about his daily business and even worming her way into his shabby apartment during a party, but abruptly fleeing his advances. And in time she has sex with him, only to use the encounter against him.

The reasons for Jackie’s anger and obsession are revealed in bits and pieces as the picture proceeds. Clyde, it quickly becomes clear, is an ex-con out on parole for some unspecified crime, while Jackie is a widow still grieving her loss, as a meeting with her erstwhile father-in-law (Andrew Armour) at the wedding of her sister-in-law shows. Further facts of their past lives are disclosed gradually, culminating in a final confrontation where the two express their pain and inch toward accommodation. Arnold doles out the details carefully, keeping us on edge throughout, uncertain when violence might suddenly break out, involving not only Jackie and Clyde but the handful of other characters, including Stevie (Martin Compston), a hot-tempered young ex-cellmate of Clyde’s, and his girlfriend April (Nathalie Press). And though the resolution has a touch of soap opera to it, it’s handled with sufficient grit to avoid a feeling of mawkishness.

The performances are strong across the board, with Dickie and Curran both creating affecting portraits of the walking wounded while never overlooking the darker sides of their characters. Compston, a veteran of work with Ken Loach (“Sweet Sixteen”), again makes a voluble, unpredictable young man, and Press cowers convincingly as his girlfriend; Armour makes the most of his few scenes, generating quiet sympathy. The film is visually natural and plain, as befitting a piece affiliated with the Lars von Trier school of no-frills cinema.

“Red Road” is, of course, in English, but the Scottish accents are so strong that subtitles are nevertheless provided, as Loach did with “Riff Raff” back in 1991. They’re not really necessary in this case, but it’s a thoughtful touch to a good film.

Grade: B

Uplifting stories about inner-city youth struggling to find a way out of their plight aren’t exactly thin on the ground, but this one sets itself apart by focusing on a distinctive escape route—one that’s often considered part of the problem rather than a solution. “The Hip Hop Project” records the success of a Brooklyn program created under Scott K. Rosenberg’s Art Start banner to recruit hopeful rappers from the neighborhood and encourage them to shift their creative energies from the gangsta cliches so prevalent in the culture to themes directly related to their own lives, in effect making their songs biographical, revealing and thus, in effect, therapeutic. The goal is broader, though: the project aims to culminate in the production of a CD showcasing the best work of the participants, as well as grooming students to take over the operation themselves while expanding it to other cities.

Of course the film by Matt Ruskin aims to document the program, a process that involves recording some of the group “composing” sessions and the donation of a recording studio by Bruce Willis so the kids can make their CD. But as part of that, it concentrates on several individuals. One is Chris “Kazi” Rolle, the director of the project—a young man who’d been abandoned by his mother in the Bahamas, was taken from an orphanage by a foster mother, and eventually made his way to New York City, where he lived on the streets until becoming part of the program. We learn a great deal about him in the course of the film, returning with him on a trip to the Bahamas, hearing the testimony of his foster mother, and even watching him meeting with his birth mother and trying to rebuild a relationship with her.

The picture also focuses on two of the youngsters participating in the program—particularly Diana “Princess” Lemon and Christopher “Cannon” Mapp, offering some nicely revealing footage of the problems they face in their home lives as well as their work on the songs. By skillfully entering into the lives of these three, “The Hip Hop Project” personalizes the undertaking as well as covering it.

Even if you don’t particularly care for rap, “The Hip Hop Project” may persuade you that there’s something to be said for it, after all.