Review of Elephant (1993) by David M — 10 May 2012

It's not been until recently that I've realized how similar that Gus Van Sant and Steven Soderberg are artistically. Both are capable of directing mainstream box office successes, oscar bait, and are drawn to the same independent low-budget films with nonprofessional actors that wander a line somewhere between existential pretension and deconstructive non-narrative banalizations. David Foster Wallace once wrote that our avoidance of boredom is our greatest obstacle to happiness. If we would just sit there, be bored, and get past it, we'd find what we're looking for. I think this is applicable to these experiments like Elephant.

No, there is not one word of meaningful dialogue spoken. Nothing develops a character, raises a social issue, or seeks to move the plot forward. Every bit of spoken word in this film is the equivalent of snapshots of all the mundane parts of everyday in your life. 95% of life is insubstantial, narratively speaking. Van Sant uses this to sidestep all expectations in making a movie about a Columbine-esque school shooting massacre.

He also refuses to use film grammar. He uses long tracking shots that follow at a medium distance. You may not be as familiar with film grammar as you are with written, but I bet you know more than you think. Quick cuts, close ups, framing, steady vs shaky cam, all of these create your viewing experience, the average viewer is not aware of this subtle (and at times not so subtle) manipulation. Van Sant refuses to tell you how to feel.

He also refuses to supply any rhyme or reason to why these two boys unleash this massacre. He offers up a little bit of bullying. Also a little hint of violent video games. But neither seems to ring true. We see a day in the life of all the victims. He presents death in the most real way possible, as the senseless, joyless, unexciting thing it is. Unlike Saving Private Ryan which is an anti-war movie that makes war exciting to watch, this does the opposite. It makes these killings as unexpected, unexplained, and foreign as they are for the people close to the tragedy. This could've been an exploitative movie that ham-fisted a message, instead we got this. You decide.