Elephant

Rating:
Summary: Boring, Trite and Badly Acted.
Review: I was expecting and hoping for exactly the kind of film Gus has produced here, but I have to say that despite this I managed to find virtually no merit in his movie whatsoever (except the time-lapse bits...they were nice).
I'll start with the acting, which ranged from reasonable to awful; the woodeness of it all gave me splinters dude! And as this is a film where the kids have to do nothing but walk around looking bored and boring one has to wonder what went so horribly wrong. It was at this point that I came up with my motto for this review, 'BLAME THE MAN, BLAME VAN SANT!' For it can only be his guile-free direction that managed to coax such below par performances.
Right, now onto the issue of the lonnnnnnnnnng (did I mention long?) tracking shots that make up this film. Now I like a good tracking shot as much as the next man, but the amount of pointless time-fillers crammed into this 90 minutes is an insult. One scene has the camera pan down a sleeping boy over his floor and then down his sleeping friend on the couch. Why? No reason, that's why. But at least that scene is only about 20 seconds long, the one that follows some random jock from American Football practice, through the school grounds, through the school and into an office lasts a good 5 minutes and provides the viewer with nothing but the back of his head to look at and surrounding kids mucking about. Yes, you've managed to make the school seem functional Gus, but if I want to watch the goings on of a high-school I'll go to a high-school mate, how about some drama, some meaning, CHRIST ANYTHING to break up the horrible horrible monotony!!! 'BLAME THE MAN, BLAME VAN SANT!' And don't give me any nonsense about the point of the film being to establish a feeling of average-day normality, it doesn't wash with me, Gus.
I've rarely sat so slack-jawed at a director's temerity to shoot 60 minutes of a high-school and its dull as ditch-water inhabitants (You want bullying? Check! You want a geeky PE dodger? Check! You want endless tracking shots? Check! You want vaguely alternative types high-fiving? CHECK CHECK and thrice CHECK!!! Sod off Van Sant; your artiness is as hollow as the Geneva Convention flaunting tips on Yank bullets!) and try to pass it off as a movie. And don't get me wrong, I'm no action junky wishing he'd focused more on the shooting itself, the ending did nothing for me either.
Whose fault is this? I'll give you a clue, 'BLAME THE MAN, BLAME VAN SANT!'
The most unforgivable aspect of this film however is the crass heavy-handedness with which Gus deals with the important issues he takes on. The first things we see of the home-life of the murderers in this movie are (in order) German composers, violent video-games, Demonic drawings, Hitler and (out of nowhere!), for no other purpose than to shock, a gay clinch in the shower. For goodness sake Gus, could you have covered any more of the left-wing scare-mongering bases fella? Having one of the protagonists be a carbon-copy of Eminem was lazy too you big jessy. Just as lazy as me labelling you a hypocritical, war-dodging, cowardice inflicted frog with garlic breath. So what if I'm disregarding the fact that you were born in Kentucky? Hey, you started it buddy!
Now, I seem to have gone off the point to a degree but fear not 'BLAME THE MAN, BLAME VAN SANT!' for goading me into his lily-livered trap.
Back to the flick (yes I know it's hard, but let's try folks) and it seems that whilst he had me distracted old Gus has managed to pack in another shoddy piece of filmmaking. He claims this is a documentary, my cinema ticket claims that it's a dramatisation; but laughing in the face of both, we have a final 10-minutes of HORROR MOVIE CONVENTIONS! Darn right baby!!
Kids walking around high-school corridors as they burn instead of darting for the exits (there are just 2 of these murderous kids, avoiding them shouldn't be too hard), ignoring the blood smeared walls and dead bodies for the opportunity to walk around in a vest looking tough and to top it off, a shed-load of people who could have disarmed what amounts to a limp-wristed geek but instead choose to make themselves sitting ducks by turning and running.
Many a B-movie director has avoided falling into this trap, so why does this film fall into it? You know what time it is kids!! 'BLAME THE MAN, BLAME VAN SANT!'
The total lack of tension as the token black-kid gets blown away is insulting too. The guy just walks up to a fully-armed murderer without any apparent plan or attempt to thwart him. Stop insulting you audience please.
I can only shake my head and fear for what this worthless director is doing to Van Helsing as we speak'Heaven help us.

Rating:
Summary: Brilliant
Review: Being 16, myself I have never been so captivated by a teenage drama in my life. I love movies, I enjoy the thrill and irony it bestows upon it's audience. But never has any movie actually moved me the way Elephant did. No beautiful adjective could describe such a masterpiece. The score, the editing, even the camera angles were nothing short of perfection. Every frame that passed was hardly taken for granted and if I could be part of any movie ever made I would no doubt chose this one.

The plot it self follows different characters throughout what one would call a normal high school day. The way the characters are filmed and followed is extremely unique and couldn't have been done a better way. To me, I couldn't believe how much that movie was like school, the conversations and actions those kids had were almost too close to believe. Well, except for the whole shooting thing. That was what got me the most, the second I caught a glimpse at the two boys walking up to the school with all of their ammo and weapons I was fearfully hooked. I had no idea what to expect from the movie considering I knew absolutely nothing about it when I first walked in to see it, but at that moment I knew what was going to happen. A different prediction that hasn't happened with any other movie. The fear in the actors' eyes looked real, sitting there watching it I could feel it and hoped that no one would ever have to undergo such tragedy at school again. That's what the movie made me feel, as if I were standing in that hallway with the victims. For that last 45 minutes, I was briefly taken away from my reality and brought into an extremely scary world of misfortune. It was almost beautiful, the feeling of being taken away by just a movie, no other movie has ever made me leave myself in order to make it through. I could barely drive home afterwards.

Although my review sounds dark, this movie is definately one not to be missed. I wish every single high school, maybe even middle-school, student could witness this movie. Who knows, it might change so many horrible things even though that's what it's about, it's different seeing it from a different perspective. It's a truly amazingly made movie, it's so good it's practically scary. Watch it, and you'll understand completely.

Rating:
Summary: Challenging, but thought-provoking and intriguing
Review: In under ninety minues, a fluid, objective camera plunges into a normal Oregon high school on the brink of a violent "Columbine-style" shooting. We meet a number of students and hear their conversations, learn bits about their lives, see who goes to the bathroom to vomit up their lunch, find out what that shy girl in gym class is going through - and meet the shooters as they prepare and finally (pardon the expression) execute their plan.Elephant is by no means plot-driven - shots meander from behind students through hallways for minutes at a time. It also makes no attempts to prech or editorialize about the atrocity of school violence. Elephant is simply 'there,' as attentive during little moments of seemingly no consequence as it is during the graphic altercation that closes the film. I admired the strength and flow of Van Sant's film, but Elephant stands as a movie that can be admired but never really enjoyed. This is a bold, brave film, but also a very challenging one that offers no solutions but plenty of things to keep you awake at night. Something about Elephant really impacted me, though, and that was Van Sant's choice to not try and tie things up in any way - neatly or in a messy fashion. I believe that is because there is no easy solution or explanation for this school violence, and Elephant preys on our deepest fears that it can simply happen without much pretense. The film would have been less effective had the somewhat-improvised dialogue and performances of the teens been less real - every word coming from every mouth, and every gesture is organic. With such identifiable characters, the school shooting takes on a disturbing, morbid air with Van Sant's brilliant choice - it's not sensationalized one bit. The multiple murders have the same pace as the languid tracking of the first part of the film, and that is where it is obvious that Van Sant truly has something to say. It may take a while for it to become obvious, but with some patience and thought, Elephant can emerge as the most thoughtful exploration of random school violence yet produced. Aside from Andrew Jarecki's terrifying documentary, Capturing the Friedmans, Van Sant's Elephant could just be the most bizarre and thought-provoking cinematic experience of the year. Grade: B+

Rating:
Summary: Elephant in the Parlor
Review: Well, this is van Sant finally back to his most artful and creative since 'My Own Private Idaho,' another misunderstood gem of overlooked cinema.

The imagery is well put together, and the sound is arranged very rhythmically, emphasizing the particular mood of each scene--rarely is background "noise" so artfully employed. The pointless chatter between the characters and the swimming camera perspective may seem like mere stylized documentary, but I feel that these elements contribute more to the film being a poem than some sort of fictional expose.

A lot of people have simplistically written this off as pseudo-documentary because there is no obvious central perspective or storyline. I loved van Sant's use of non-linear narrative. My favorite example is a scene which takes place in a hallway, one character taking a picture of another character, while a girl in the background walks by. The scene is replayed three more times, each time with a different bit of the story exposed before we get back to the hallway, and each time from one of the three characters' different perpectives. This isn't just gimmicky repetition a la 'Memento'; 'Elephant' works the same event into many layers, where the layering gives meaning instead of a traditional A-B-C plot giving meaning.

And can we forget all this nonsense about "social messages" and "explaining a tragic event"? Film is an ART, not a casestudy science experiment. And who cares if van Sant can explain his work. Viewers should be more interested in bringing their own meaning to a film, not just expecting some tied-up-in-a-bow moral from a director. But I suppose it is part of our culture now to be passive and not think critically about much of anything anymore.

Rating:
Summary: Perfect
Review: This movie is definately not for many if not most people. It is a thoughtful, slow-paced film based on school shootings. I would highly suggest that people research this movie before watching it so that they can know if its for them and/or be prepared for this type of movie. I loved the film because its the only movie that I have hitherto viewed that I felt couldn't have been made any better. Gus Van Sant achieves what he set out to do and does. Elephant is not a realistic movie. I mean this in the sense that characters are stereotyped and represent various groups; there are three ditsy girls that represent all the air-headed vain girls, a jock that represent all jocks, a loser that represents all losers/nerds, etc. This movie is supposed to be an archetype of how school is and how things can lead to tragic events such as school shootings. I admire Gus van Sant greatly and highly recommend this movie to those who want to see a unique movie. I also recommend another similar Gus Van Sant movie, Gerry, which has a similar monotony to it as Elephant does.

Rating:
Summary: Incredibly dissapointing and offensive.
Review: I went into this thinking that to make a movie about such a tragic event, the director must have had some great insight, i left wondering how anyone could possibly consider this worth making. The characters were shallow and were not at all believable, which makes the claim that this movie just shows reality without judging it laughable, and even if that were not the case, i don't buy the lack of a message being a message in itself nonsense. This is a case of someone who didn't have anything to say, and should have kept quiet.

Rating:
Summary: CLASSIC VAN SANT.........
Review: Van Sant once again takes you on a virtual reality tour of the minds of young adults. This film should NOT be taken as a documentary, but as a journey into the thought process of our young people. As he did in My Own Private Idaho, Van Sant lets us see into the mindset that our current culture is inflicting onto our youth. If you're 14 to 19 years old, you understood this film whereas most adults probably won't. Cheers again for Gus Van Sant.

Rating:
Summary: An empty documentary
Review: Gus Van Sant would like to give us a picture of modern adolescents by showing a clinical image of a deadly shooting on a campus.

The director has said that he wanted only to show the facts without psychological or social explanation. In other words, he shot a documentary, not a feature film, on a brutal event.
Fortunately for him, it is only a documentary, because it is badly played and badly shot.

If there is no social or psychological explanation, why did he shoot the following scenes: a drunken professor riding a car; a student who is bombarded with pastry by his fellow students and who looks afterwards in a mirror while cleaning his coat ... I could go on.

A lot of movies have been shot about adolescents. I shall only mention a recent one: 'Bully' by Larry Clark. It has the same theme, but what a difference in concept, playing and shooting!
For a documentary on a deadly shooting, this movie could be compared to 'Bloody Sunday' by Paul Greengrass. 'Elephant' doesn't reach its heels.
This movie is a monumental disappointment.

Rating:
Summary: What a waste of time.
Review: This is without a doubt the worst movie I have seen in the last 3 years or so. The story evolves around two gay teens who order guns over the internet and then go shoot the kids at their school. One of them plays piano and the other plays a fake FPS on his laptop as if to insinuate that that is the reason for their outlandish behavior. About 60 minutes of the movie is very weak character development that has no relevance to anything in the conclusion. There really was no point in making this movie at all, the actors were terrible and the script was bland. If you have an hour to waste I still wouldn't recommend seeing this film. On a similar level of comparison to.....Gigli?

Rating:
Summary: You be the judge...
Review: Gus van Zant's "Elephant" depicts a horrendous crime, the kind of real life event that sparks outrage and creates a need for everyone to express and vent their emotions about it. Perhaps because of this, it takes an approach not usually found with this type of subject matter. Instead of attempting to explain why events like this happen, the camera acts as a dispassionate observer, watching the events of one day unfold, following a group of students in a Portland, Or high school. Their conversations with each other are accurately banal and self-important, such as one where a student berates a friend for not spending enough time with her. There are hints of power structures in student interactions, and subtle hints of rage and self-hatred beneath the surface of the characters. The soundtrack is mainly silent, save for spare dialog and stretches of a Beethoven piano piece, played (we learn) by one of the homicidal students.

As viewers, we know that the story will end in a bloodbath, but tension is still created about when and how it will happen. For the first 20 minutes of the movie, it isn't even clear which of these students will be doing the shooting. All the 10 or so students depicted seem interchangable, and all seem capable of rage.

Early on, there is a scene which illustrates just how clueless we often are to the private thoughts of students, and how little you can tell about a person's inner life from their outward appearance. A teacher is leading a group of students in a discussion. Can they tell if a person is gay, the teacher asks the group. The camera swings around the classroom to hear glib responses from some students, and catches some signs of discomfort on other students faces. Can we tell from this scene which, if any, of the students in the room are gay? Nope. Is it any surprise that, in environments like this, people are blindsided by other people's behavior? The entire social network of high school seems tenuous and disconnected.

The cast, largely unknown to me, does terrific work. It would be easy to overact in this type of story but the actors hit just the right notes, bringing a bewildered humanity to the events that transpire. Many seem like shell shocked zombies, well before the crime, which is exactly what being a teenager is like for a lot of people. Whenever events like this occur, a common response is to wonder how things like this can happen. A movie like "Elephant" seems to wonder why events like this don't happen more often.