Van Sant's subtle touches evoke the reality of a traumatic shock in a fresh way...fresh like the blood that we know is inside the victim's bodies but are alarmed when we see it. People in the high school are cut down with an arbitrariness seen in the work of Luis Bunuel - nihilism is as present in this world as the sky that watches over the school and community, turning from a pretty blue into a depressing grey that bring non-judgmental clouds. The death just rains down and there isn't much anyone can do about it but watch.
With most Hollywood movies, you have to leave your brain at the door. With Van Sant, you have to leave your emotions at the door. He has little care for how he attacks you along the way to telling his story. This is an important point. If you go into the theatre with the common expectation of seeing reactions of horror in the victim's faces, you'll be disapointed with Van Sant's complete disregard for manipulative Hollywood film making conventions. And you'll probably hate the film for not answering the questions about why these violent incidents, like Columbine, can happen.
But if you just let it happen, in all its stark, nihilistic truth, you can walk away with a non-verbal understanding of teenage madness - an approach that might be used by adults if they want to really get inside of the adolescent's head. Van Sant's finest visual of pulling the viewer inside the killer's mind is early in the movie, when a hand-held camera stays on the back of a potential future victim as he walks into the school and through his day. As he's walking, we hear Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata, a piece intended to capture and control chaos. Only this rendition rambles, like the mind that is playing the piano. In this touch, it's as though Van Sant's killer was making a sincere effort to get into the mind of a normal kid, but ultimately failed and took interest in destroying what he couldn't have. It's something that Carl Dreyer would have done - create an unspoken artistic link between two people, but never allowing the connection to manifest in any way that brings resolution.
With most Hollywood movies, you have to leave your brain at the door. With Van Sant, you have to leave your emotions at the door. He has little care for how he attacks you along the way to telling his story. This is an important point. If you go into the theatre with the common expectation of seeing reactions of horror in the victim's faces, you'll be disapointed with Van Sant's complete disregard for manipulative Hollywood film making conventions. And you'll probably hate the film for not answering the questions about why these violent incidents, like Columbine, can happen.
But if you just let it happen, in all its stark, nihilistic truth, you can walk away with a non-verbal understanding of teenage madness - an approach that might be used by adults if they want to really get inside of the adolescent's head. Van Sant's finest visual of pulling the viewer inside the killer's mind is early in the movie, when a hand-held camera stays on the back of a potential future victim as he walks into the school and through his day. As he's walking, we hear Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata, a piece intended to capture and control chaos. Only this rendition rambles, like the mind that is playing the piano. In this touch, it's as though Van Sant's killer was making a sincere effort to get into the mind of a normal kid, but ultimately failed and took interest in destroying what he couldn't have. It's something that Carl Dreyer would have done - create an unspoken artistic link between two people, but never allowing the connection to manifest in any way that brings resolution.