I love my threads. Nobody see these kind of movies. I am start thinking thatworld is a big X-man-Matrix-CaribbeanPirates-Spiderman-Hulk-Bond-etc...fantasy, without problems to solve.
I must do like Nazgulinthedark did when she came to KMC and start talking to myself.
"Panen et circensis" for all.
__________________ Por minha Dama
«...et tu seras pour moi unique au monde, et je serais pour toi unique au monde...»
You know what, Corlindel ? Yesterday you started a thread about "Ken Park" and today one about "Elephant". Well, these are 2 moviess I've seen and about which I hesitated to launch threads....
(Isn't this fantastic ? )
Well I liked it, but I think it deserved a second view, in order t focus on the constuction of the film...
At some moments, I had difficulty staying really "in" the movie (my thoughts were elsewhere)...
But as I said it was great...Nicely done...and quite original...
I've been waiting for this movie to come to video, since unfortunately there are no small, independant theaters around here that show these types of movies. Looks very interesting.
I just finished watching it. It was a very strong and eerie film. Though it doesn't answer any questions as to why events like this take place, it does show it as truthfully as possible. Great movie.
Gotta disagree with you both, the movie was majorly flawed, and tried a wee bit too hard to be gripping, even for an arthouse film.
1) They spent the majority of the film developing all the characters except for the 2 main characters. The characters that were developed where already self explanatory to anyone who attended High School, just by looking at them.
2) The plotting and cinematography was the exact same as Amorres Perros/21 Grams.
3) There was absolutely no catalyst described as to why these two kids went on a rampage. Maybe they took a few too many spitballs in physics class? Who knows.
4) What was with the random and amateur implications that the killers were gay? It confused their whole scheme of targeting preps and jocks, when they clearly took out (fellow) outcasts in people like the glasses wearing librarian co-ed. Outcasts taking out people just like them, letting others survive?
5) The lack of realism. I find it extremely hard to believe you can order an AK-47 off of the internet, much less have a major delivery service have a kid who is OBVIOUSLY under the age of 18 sign for it.
The school seemed pretty calm for being underseige with two gun weilding students, especially with the whole "firecracker" sequence. A little too nonchalant to make it come across as a real threat.
Nobody had the sense to sound a fire alarm? No yelling, no screaming? Like I said, it was far from "real".
6) It's a sad state of affairs when the supporting cast, in droves nonetheless, put on a better performance and delivered their lines with more conviction than the 2 major characters. The delivery by the Eminem lookalike to the downed teacher in the hallway seemed flat, even for a High Schooler, almost like he didn't even believe in his own cause.
Sorry, guys. I rented it because it's been recieving much acclaim, and I don't quite get what it was trying to achieve, and I feel as if I wasted my time, personally. Could have atleast thrown in a bowling session if they wanted to make any correlation to Columbine, because this movie seemed pretty distant from any "reenactment" of any sort.
I agree with alot of your points. The school was ridiculously calm during the event, but I believe that much of what we were seeing was after most of it had taken place and most of the kids had escaped. It doesn't show this, but it's more then likely.
The AK-47 part is dead on, but the kids in columbine got guns like that some how, ordering them online seems just as plausable as buying them from a store.
The gay thing was indeed a little strange, didn't get that part myself but I just ignored it. There was probably a reason for it, but I don't feel like analysing the film to figure it out.
I think that the targetting of everyone they saw was just to show that they didn't really care who they killed, they just wanted to hurt/kill as many people as possible, regaurdless of whether or not they were outcasts.
I think it was the purpose of the film not to answer the questions like "why" these events happen. The fact of the matter is that no one knows why they happen. I thought this was a very strong part of the film because, instead of the filmmaker giving us his opinion of why they happen, he just showed them happening and nothing more. Leaving it up to the viewer to decide for themselves. This was probably the most unique thing about the film.
Most other films dealing with events like this try to give some sort of reasoning behind it. This movie just insinuates the basically "the kids aint right", and that's all anyone knows for sure.
i don't know if anyone answered the question about "the gay thing", but, i think the only way that ties into the whole film's premise, is that dialogue done by the teachers and students. I think, the dialogue revolved around that "it is difficult to figure out who is gay and who isn't". So, it was supose to be unexpected when you find out that the killers were gay. Huh! get it! That Gus Van Sant is a real trixter. Unless this particular aspect was based on something real, thats the only explanation one can conjure up.
yeah, and the whole aspect of the film NOT telling anyone why the two kids went of the rampage is creepier and just better than if the film had taken a long winded message telling us that these kids were picked on or that they saw too many violent movies. That would make this movie a peice of crap, and thankfully they didn't do that.
and plus, whoever said the filming of this movie was like 21 Grams is way off.
Yes. The layout of the movie is similiar to that, and as well Pulp Fiction, Memento, and Perros, but the cinematography is some of the weirdest i have seen in a pseudo-mainstream movie. It was very low-key, and wasn't really full of many camera techniques, just long cuts, and that is so cool and refreshing to see.
Last edited by Waggy the Dog on May 7th, 2004 at 09:29 PM
Well Cinemaddiction, once again I've got to intervene
- There is no gay thing ! yes, there is a scene, etc. but it absolutely doesn't imply that the killers are gay. It belongs to the same scheme as the scene in which they comment on (laugh at) the Nazi gathering. They are just totally lost (for I lack a better word at the moment) : they seem totally out of the high school world (it's likely to be the fact that they're both just no able to date any girl) and in the meantime this
shows that they is just no reason in there to do this bloodshed (at least to Van Sant's mind).
-21 grams was made in the same time as Elephant (even a bit after, I think)
- The aim of this film is not to be faithful to the real events...otherwise it would be a documentary. And we're lucky it's not. Cos otherwise Van Sant couldn't have given pieces of explanation for this tragedy in it.
PS: I'm sorry if this post is totally incomprehensible. I'm so tired I can't even make one good sentence in English tonight
KMC Community Forums
Nov 19th, 2003 06:07 PM
)
Got to convince someone to go with me.
Elephant
