Gus Van Sant's newest film "Elephant" is a triumphant return to form for the once-and-future indie director.
"Elephant" comes to us after Van Sant's venture into the land of Hollywood yielded mixed results - "Good Will Hunting" was amazing and "Finding Forrester" was bogged down in pretension.
"Elephant" seems to tell the story of ordinary students going to an ordinary day of school - until we realize it's Columbine high school and the date is April 20, 1999.
Following students who were not in the news and focusing instead on the ordinary aspect of that terrible tragedy, Van Sant captures youthful feelings with an authenticity that has become his signature style. Still, "Elephant" encounters problems, especially considering what the movie is really about.
Van Sant cast mainly unknown kids in this movie, and much has been made of their naãve professionalism, which allowed them to hold their own with actors like Timothy Bottoms, who is cast as an alcoholic father. The unknowns primarily used their own names as their character names, and their faces often betray just how young they are in the business of movie making.
So, does this help the film or hinder it?
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To say the emotions these children capture are authentic is a severe understatement and their presence on screen is one to be reckoned with. The unknowns hold more than their own and their authenticity lends a necessary helping hand to the vision that Van Sant sets out to present.
Unfortunately, about halfway through the film, Van Sant seems to lose sight of what exactly was engaging us in his film and he starts to sensationalize something that nobody wants to see sensationalized.
The school day begins normal enough, but before long, things are going wrong and the audience will inevitably know where the plot is heading. Is there anything wrong with a film detailing the tragedy of that day? Surely not. But Van Sant gets into trouble when he starts to let his own opinions get in the way of the previously objective storytelling.
This is not to say a director should not inject his or her own opinion into a film's subject matter since that is what a director is supposed to do. Some restraint however, would have been appreciated in the final scenes when it is clear that Van Sant is trying to make a statement. Too bad it's hard to tell what specific statement he wants to make.
Overall, "Elephant" is a well-built film with amazing performances from a fresh and unknown cast. "Elephant" is also important in that it allows Van Sant an opportunity to get back to doing what made him famous - making important, thematically strong films about things people actually care about. "Elephant" is recommended to all who lived through these times and as a guide for anyone who did not.
