Elephant

Watched Elephant DVD.

This movie reminded me a lot about the characters in my high school and the places within it. The high school in this movie is bigger than mine was, but the kids walking through the halls and the mundanity (but also diversity) of daily high school life comes across really well. Required reading before watching this movie is "The Depressive and the Psychopath" by Dave Cullen. Cullen argues that Eric Harris was the psychopathic mastermind while his partner, Dylan Klebold, while not an unwilling participant, was manipulated into killing his schoolmates. (There is an interesting speculation near the end of the movie about the nature of their partnership.) Harris and Klebold had a much higher bodycount in mind when they started out, and that comes across in the movie as well. This is not a documentary, but it is filmed in documentary-style—without commentary—and my heart was pumping from the beginning. I knew what was going to happen, just not when. It was an uncomfortable movie to watch, not least because the tracking shots often lasted significantly longer than the average film, but just like anything, the uncomfortable movies are usually the most important ones.