Review of Polytechnique (2009) by David G — 03 Dec 2011

Imagine if Gus Van Sant's Elephant was shot in French and in black-and-white. If that sounds like a fucking awesome film, which of course it does, then I introduce to you Polytechnique. I'm going to keep comparing it to Elephant (the 2003 Palme d'Or winner also about a school shooting) because they are very similar: both films are short and to the point, they make no attempt to try and understand or explain a topic which cannot be reasonably explained (clearly disturbed people murdering a large group of people in their schools), and merely objectively, accurately (and yet BEAUTIFULLY) showing the events that happened on that day.

It's difficult to associate the word beautiful with a true story of people getting killed, but really it's a beautiful piece of art that had me transfixed (and in tears).