Post 16: Elephant, a Gus Van Sant movie (2003)

1) What struck you most in the film?

What struck me the most in the film is his reality or his fake reality, the school shooting shown in the movie happened every day in the United States and by watching this film we have the impression to witness the true reconstitution of a rampage such as Columbine in 1999 or Sandy in 2012. During all the movie we know what is going to happened but we don't know how is going to happen. This film allows us to be inside a school shooting for the first time in cinema.

2) What also impressed you?

What impress me the most were the long shots without any cut at several moments of the film. Those 10 minutes shot allow us to have a view of the event from the perspective of several characters and give to the film a slow rythm which add a sort of suspense to the plot. So I'm really impress by the great quality of the direction which don't really surprise me from a film directed by Gus Van Sant a very good director.

3) Did you find anything more particularly upsetting?
I find very upsetting the fact that sometimes the director linger on very banal activities, like in the scene with the photograph, I know that he wants to show that this day is a normal one but he insists maybe too much on it. 

4) What did you find very disturbing?
The thing that I find very disturbing is that we don't have main characters in this movie, the camera follows different characters but there is no pattern or common point between all the characters expect maybe the fact that they are all in the High School during the school shooting but the scenario can be very disturbing. 

5) What was most shocking?
The most shocking is of course the scene of the rampage where the two shooters tracked the students in the corridors of the High School. The scene in the cold chamber that end the movie is very disturbing and very scary.

6) What does the film  suggest about the two school shooters?
Firstable the film suggest that the two shooters are homosexual like the shooters of the Columbine shootings it's an other example of the similarity between the film and the true massacre in Columbine. Second the shooters are very nerdy and because of that they are being bullied in class. And finally we can say that the shooters are no monster, the director didn't want to give a manichean look on this event so we can see for example that one of the shooter has a musical sensibility.

7) What's more, what does the film director make clear about the two killers?
He makes very clear the fact that they are not mad or disturbed he avoids this scenaristic facility by saying that they doing this because of many factors and especially the easy access to weapon. The portrait of the killers is not manichean, they are not evil and the students are not completely good, this shooting is the result of many other facts like the lack of confidence, the bullying and like I said the gun industry in the United States.

8) What kind of approach to the school shooting itself did Gus Van Sant opt for?
The director opt for a very slow approach of the school shooting, we saw the killers at the very beginning but we see the shooting at the very end, it's not a chronological story. At the end where the shooting takes place, he is not shown entirely, we just see part of the shooting or important moments. Gus Van Sant avoids to show too much violence like when a student gets kill it's violent but not too much it is shown in a very realistic way.

9) Moreover, what's the main consequence of the realistic treatment he uses? What about the 'poetic' touches he instills throughout the film?

The main consequence of this realistic approach we feel a lack of empathy towards the characters that are being involved in the shooting, we are shocked of course but because the director didn't present them very well we are not sad or less sad maybe. The poetic touches is where we can find the imprint of Gus Van Sant who like to tell his story in a certain poetical way, with long shots of landscape for example, in Elephant we can see that at some moments, the director uses slow motion to captured important scenes and we have a shot of the sky at various moments in the film. 

10) As a conclusion, what must we admit about the way in which the killing and the killers are perceived by the film viewers?

To conclude I would say that in contrary with other film, at the end of the film we don't feel a strong anger against the killers of course we feel a bit of a disgust toward them but we don't see the shooters as only responsible for this massacre. And I think is what this film is all about, this film wants us to meditate on how a school shooting happen, of course we can say like many that the shooters in those events are monster and they are completely hopeless but it's a way to hide the truth. The director explains to us that a school shooter is create with different factors, and the main factor is of course the gun policy in America.

Post 15: School shootings in the USA

1) The informations that I find as most interesting in this site can be find here:
http://www.acolumbinesite.com/security.html
On this section of the website we can found all the security camera surveillance tapes from the school shouting massacre of Columbine High School on April 20, 1999. The footage were only taken in the cafeteria, where the shooters went several times during the rampage, on these we can follow the events from the beginning of the shooting with Coach Sanders running to warn the students of the threat, to the end when Dylan and Eric throw propane grenades and shoot at some students. These images, especially the one where we can see Eric Harris with his shotgun, are particularly famous and very rare, one of the reason of the Columbine massacre impact were those footage that are haunting us since. I found this section very interesting because it's always more easy to understand and to feel sorrow and anger when you are dirdy, when you see the monsters you are less frightened by them. It's also important to point out that a lot of speculation has been made on the internet on the so called security camera surveillance tapes from the library, which don't really exist. Videos has circulated on Youtube after the tragedy, where we can see two shooters in a library on surveillance tapes. It appears that those tapes were from the film Zero Days released in 2001 which follows the course of two school shooters with homemade videos.

2)

Mass shoutings that occurs since the Sandy Hook Elementary School massacre in December 2012

Cover of Time Magazine, released in May 1999

Security camera surveillance tapes of Dylan Klebold and Eric Harris entering the cafeteria 

on April 20, 1999

Pictures of deathly victims of Columbine's shootings

3) Bowling for Columbine, directed and written by Michael Moore, released in 2002
For me, this documentary deals very well with the issue of school shootings and more generally with the issue of guns in the United States. As always, taking humor and boldness as weapons, Michael Moore successfully shows the contradictions and flows of the american society. In this film, he tries to understand why shootings occurs more often in the United States than in others country. With a lot of testimony, interviews and exclusive footage, Michael Moore investigates on this american problem, guns. And for him, it is very clear that one of the guilty is of course the very powerful NRA (National Rifles Association) supported by many Americans and especially the well known actor of Ben-Hur or Planet of the Apes, Charlton Heston. This confrontation leads us to a very strong scene where Michael Moore leave the picture of a little girl killed by a gun at Charlton Heston 'house because he is the speaker of the NRA. 

4) The main and most mentioned reason for the recurrence of school shootings in the USA is revenge against bullies or the will to hurt those who have hurt them. In the United States, school harassment is far more spread than in other countries like the very close Canada for example. The social categories in American schools are very strong, we have the popular kids and the lesser ones or also called Nerds. Availing to a free access to guns, kids which are been bullied are generally those who commit school shootings by frustration or simply by revenge. But why there are more school shootings in the United States than in Canada for example where guns are also very easy to get ? People and mostly American people, will answer this question by saying that this is because of they violent history or because of the kind of music (Rock'n'roll mainly) the shooters were listening. But as Michael Moore pointed out, the American history is less violent than German or French history and they have violent movies and Rock'n'roll too. So why exactly this happens more often in America ? For Michael Moore it is very clear that the completely free merchandising of guns, by respect of the fourth amendment they said, and the sort of gun-fascination around these isn't helping, but for him the government is to blame because by launching thousands of bombs on foreign countries, they don't really give a good example for the American youth.