Elephant (2003)
Released in 2003, Elephant arrived at a moment when American culture was still reckoning, openly and anxiously, with the legacy of the Columbine High School massacre of April 1999. The film takes its title loosely from Alan Clarke's 1989 BBC short of the same name, itself a study of sectarian killings in Northern Ireland, and the phrase is often explained by the old parable of blind men each touching a different part of an elephant and reaching entirely different conclusions about what it is. That sense of partial, incomplete understanding sits at the heart of Van Sant's approach: he offers no tidy explanation, no psychological profile, no ticking checklist of warning signs. Whether that restraint reads as courageous or irresponsible probably depends on the evening you watch it, and the mood you bring to the screen.
Gus Van Sant was in an interesting place creatively when he made this. His career had swung between prestige Hollywood work, most notably Good Will Hunting (1997), and a more austere, formally experimental strand running through films like Gerry (2002), which preceded Elephant directly and established the slow, drifting, almost hypnotic visual language he uses here. Elephant was produced by HBO Films alongside Blue Relief Productions and Meno Film Company on what was clearly a modest budget, shot on location at a real Oregon high school with largely unknown teenage actors. That choice, to cast faces you do not recognise from anything else, is part of the film's unsettling texture. Van Sant won the Palme d'Or at Cannes that year, as well as the Best Director prize, which placed the film at the centre of a pointed critical conversation about the role of art in bearing witness to atrocity.
The principal cast, Alex Frost and Eric Deulen as the two perpetrators alongside John Robinson, Elias McConnell, and Jordan Taylor among the students whose day we follow, were almost entirely non-professional at the time. That shows, but not in the way you might expect. Their performances have a loose, unguarded quality that a trained actor might iron out in pursuit of polish. Robinson in particular carries a kind of quiet, preoccupied presence that fits the film's rhythm well. The approach is less about conventional dramatic performance and more about observation, watching teenagers be teenagers in corridors and cafeterias, before the weight of what is coming starts to press in. It is the kind of film that invites comparison with other formally bold works from the same period that refused easy genre comfort, pictures that, like Z (1969), use cinema's capacity for witness as a form of argument about the world.
I have incredibly mixed feelings about Gus Van Sant’s 2003 film Elephant, largely because it’s a movie that is technically fascinating but morally terrifying.
On a purely structural level, I absolutely love the episodic style Van Sant employs. We spend the first chunk of the film just following various students going about their mundane daily routines, seeing the exact same day from a multitude of different perspectives. It’s a brilliant, slow-burn approach that really draws you into the normalcy of their lives. I honestly didn't even predict where the film was heading until about 20 or 30 minutes in, when John Robinson's character casually walks past two young lads dressed in camo carrying massive duffel bags. That’s the exact moment the penny drops, and the film instantly transforms into an agonisingly tense ticking time bomb.
From that point on, you’re just sitting there, waiting for the fateful massacre, and what makes the film so unique is how it actually unravels. Van Sant depicts some of the most horrific acts of violence mankind inflicts on itself, yet he does so with absolutely zero emotion and very little actual violence shown on screen. It’s a bit of an oxymoron, really: a film about a school shooting that is distinctly anti-violence because it utterly refuses to sensationalise the gore. For a clear low-budget production, it works remarkably well. The naturalistic acting from the largely unknown cast is highly convincing, and the haunting soundtrack pairs perfectly with the creeping, inescapable dread.
But here is where the positive spin has to stop, and the reality of the film's existence sets in. For all its artistic merit and anti-sensationalist approach, Elephant is an extremely dangerous piece of media. By showing the meticulous, cold-blooded preparation and the chillingly casual demeanour of the shooters, it essentially provides a blueprint. It is highly likely that this film has inspired real-life copycats over the years, and for that alone, it’s impossible to fully celebrate it. You can admire the filmmaking, but you have to deeply question the responsibility of putting such a thing out into the world.
Ultimately, Elephant is a masterclass in building unbearable tension, but it’s a deeply unsettling experience that leaves a foul taste in your mouth. It’s a brilliant piece of cinema that probably shouldn't exist, or at the very least, shouldn't be as easily accessible as it is.
It’s a technically brilliant, profoundly anti-violence film that is ultimately undermined by the very real, dangerous inspiration it has provided to the wrong people.
Elephant remains one of those films that film culture keeps circling back to precisely because it does not resolve its own tensions. Van Sant made something formally rigorous and morally charged, a film that forces you to sit with discomfort rather than offering the relief of catharsis or condemnation. Whether you leave the film thinking about cinema's responsibilities or about the specific horror it depicts, or both at once, you are unlikely to feel neutral. That unresolved feeling is, arguably, the point. It is a film that earns serious attention and serious unease in equal measure: polished but uncomfortable, admirable and troubling, a work that makes its case against violence while you spend the whole time wishing it had found a different way to do it.
Rating: ★★★½ | Year: 2003 | Watched: 2026-06-22
Trailer
▶ Watch the official trailer for Elephant (2003) on YouTube
Where to watch
Watch in the UK
Stream: HBO Max Amazon Channel
Physical: Amazon UK · Zavvi
Watch in the US
Rent: Amazon Video · Apple TV Store · Google Play Movies · YouTube
Buy: Amazon Video · Apple TV Store · Google Play Movies · YouTube
Physical: Amazon US
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