Elephant

One of the best pieces of decidedly conceptual cinema I've seen. Apparently this is just random people shooting random people dead for no apparent reason. But the fact that all of them (killers AND victims) are men, and the setting (Northern Ireland) are ample evidence of what the general background is. The technique - tracking shot, then static handheld shot - is brilliant. I just really recommend watching this - shouldn't analyze it although I'm tempted to. Just watch it and be affected.

My immediate thought was, wow, might this be the most misanthropic movie I've seen? But discovering the context was illuminating. I can only imagine the feeling of turning on the television in '89 and this is on, and it's that situation which I believe lends this film it's shocking, raw power.

Confrontational and haunting, my kind of cinema.

If the title suggests that what's missing is understanding of the socioeconomic context, nevertheless the combination of: 1) tracking shot following perpetrator; 2) Bressonian focus on hand-firing-gun; 3) slain victim, suggests that the invention and availability of firearms itself opens the possibility for their deliberate and methodical use, forcefully pursued, as a "rationalised" means independent of any particular end. Look for the Commodore, Australia's first world-class car (says the ad).

Chilling, engrossing, billiant.

I watch this and I'm unaffected by its repetition. You get the picture after the 3rd murder. After the 4th or 5th killing I started laughing at how seriously it takes itself. After the 10th killing I got painfully bored. After the 15th or 16th killing I was angry at how it says very little and makes you feel nothing at all. It's like watching a man-child play murder with his dolls - amusing at first but mostly inane. I'm suspicious of people who are "moved" by this.

Harrowing and cold, this is an obvious concept for a film, but one pulled off with an effective amount of cynicism and bleakness. However, it does stray too far into objective representation, and becomes repetitive and undermines the further killings through desensitisation. The other 'Elephant' says more about violence and murder.

There's no elephant

Striking in its restraint and simplicity, as well as in its captivating camerawork. The extremely repetitive nature of it could feel like a downside at first, but it ends up being a positive the longer it goes on and solidifies its comments on a cycle of violence as a literal cycle of violent images endlessly repeating

I’m generally a desensitised person (I wish I wasn’t quite so much but it is what it is) but the moments in this where the gunman is searching for a victim are brutal you just want them to not find them so much