japh on Elephant directed by Gus Van Sant: “the problem with this movie is that van sant tried to make a statment about youth violence. i wish he had simply stuck to the style of the opening of the film, letting the camera graze on the everyday problems of typical youth. problems with parents. interest in the opposite sex. instead, the film follow the trajectory of two fucked up kids who go on a violent gun-laden rampage through their high-school.”
But that's not all the film does. It follows more trajectories than just the two fucked-up kids who go on a gun-laden rampage through the school. It follows the trajectory of a hunk ("he's sooo cute") who plays football with his friends during a break, then as he goes to find his girlfriend and then sign out of school at the office. It follows the trajectory of the class discussion on homosexuality. It follows the trajectory of a photographer who takes a photo of a punk couple and then his journey back to school. It follows the trajectory of a girl who does not wear shorts to gym class as she walks back to the change room and then to the library. It follows the the trajectory of two girls who are friends gossip about the football hunk but, during lunch, argue about how much time they spend together after class and then proceed to the bathroom where they deal with lunch's aftermath in a way only teenage girls can. It also follows the trajectory of a guy who had to tell his dad to pull over because he was drunk, then drive him to school where he phone his brother to come pick his dad up. The film does everything that japh says it doesn't, and the killers are just one vignette in what would have been an otherwise mundane day. There is, in other words, not just one statement the movie makes, but many, and all of the statements share a theme that parents don't really have a good idea of what really goes on inside high school, some of it very beautiful (like the work of photographer throughout, including the attitude he has at the—or rather his—end) and some of it ugly like the obvious end scene but also the girls in the washroom.