ELEPHANT (USA, 2003) BY GUS VAN SANT

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Trailer

Synopsis: An ordinary high school day. Except that it’s not. A variety of adolescents at a suburban high school drift through a seemingly uneventful day, until two students arrive with violent intentions. The film chronicles the events surrounding the Columbine High School shooting.

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About the director: Gus Van Sant (born July 24, 1952) is an American film director, producer, photographer, and musician. He has earned acclaim as both an independent and mainstream filmmaker. His films typically deal with themes of marginalized subcultures, in particular homosexuality. Van Sant is considered one of the most prominent auteurs of the New Queer Cinema movement. His early career was devoted to directing television commercials in the Pacific Northwest. He made his feature-length cinematic directorial debut with Mala Noche (1985). His second feature, Drugstore Cowboy (1989), was highly acclaimed, and earned him screenwriting awards from the Los Angeles Film Critics Association and New York Film Critics Circle and the award for Best Director from the National Society of Film Critics. His next film, My Own Private Idaho (1991), was similarly praised, as was the black comedy To Die For (1995), the drama Good Will Hunting (1997), and the biographical film Milk (2008); for the latter two, Van Sant was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Director and both films received Best Picture nominations. In 2003, Van Sant's film about the Columbine High School massacre, Elephant, won the Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival. Van Sant also received the festival's Best Director Award that same year, making him one of only two filmmakers—the other being Joel Coen—to win both accolades at the festival in the same year.

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*English with French and Dutch subtitles.

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