Prismark10 The Troubles in Northern Ireland inspired a lot films and dramas. Some more controversial than others.Alan Clarke's Elephant was totally left field. When the BBC broadcast it, they were inundated with complaints on television programmes such as 'Points of View.'Never before we had a television drama, almost wordless where one person shoots another person, a few minutes later someone else shoots another and so on and so on. Be they working in a petrol station, in a swimming pool, playing football, eating in a restaurant, at home or walking in the park, someone blasts them.These horrific random acts of violence in due course desensitizes us, maybe even leave us bored and confused as without dialogue we are unsure as to what is happening and just seeing people walking about until they take a gun out and shoot somebody.Alan Clarke was an early adopter of the Steadicam for television work which means we follow the various people out and about as the camera operator is alongside them.This was one of Clarke's last works who died a year later. Seeing Elephant again many years later, when the film is almost 25 years old, you get struck that this is a period piece with the now old model cars and that Northern Ireland has moved on since the peace process.

jokexom The film is made up of 18 short films, showing unjustified killings. In each part of this strange thriller, a murderer and a sacrifice and usually but them in the shot no one.The painting "Elephant", is filled with a cold, so a neutral atmosphere. If from what you can get here is a pleasure as the mood of the film. All shorts are designed in one color, unrelated, they still look very harmonious.This film may be a benefit for young filmmakers to make films, in which there are scenes of murder.Of course, if you look at the film with plenty of imagination, it can be to make up the history of each murder, thereby determining why it happened.After a while, after this film, there is a picture of Gus Van Sant, going by the same name. There definitely is a connection there, because in one of the interviews himself Van Sant said that after watching the "elephant" Clark, he wanted to withdraw his "Elephant." I think he is right and is the spectator Clark, who watched this movie with plenty of imagination. That imagined Van Sant, the mass murder at the school, and quite original show cause, not as pure, but the name speaks for itself, the problem is definitely there, it is just in the minds of others, there is much we would not get. Both elephants, a very similar atmosphere that captivates the viewer, who manages the end to inspect these movies.

cstewart-5 I remember watching this when I was 15 years and living in the country south of Belfast, it caused a bit of a stir. So what! It was a well aligned look at the madness that was going' those days.The film was great, but will serve as a dirty birthmark on future generations.The colors of the print represent the dark-blue rainy place well, the angles are fresh, but a camera and a filter can't elude reality. The silence is in-line with the unfortunate soul who may get finished off in this film, or?For the future generations in Ulster I would burn this film.

Lexo-2 I saw Elephant when it was first broadcast on BBC TV in 1989. There was a certain amount of hoo-ha about it, as the BBC had already put it back for a few months - films about the North of Ireland were, and are, touchy subjects. Watching it is riveting. The complete absence of story, dialogue and explanation serves to bring home the fact that, after all the talk and propaganda and fine words about freeing Ireland from the British oppressors or defending Ulster from the filthy Taigs, killing is killing - people are dying, frequently and horribly, and can there ever be a "reason" for it? I grew up in sheltered south Dublin and witnessed the Troubles at second-hand, filtered through the language of journalism; Elephant brought home to me, in the most visceral way, the relentless insanity of the situation. The film should be compulsory viewing in UK and Irish schools.The major criticism of Elephant is that it's too simple - that the lack of context and explanation aren't enough. But the serial nature of it, muder after murder after murder, have an unforgettable power. It's not meant to be an attempt at the overall picture; it's a cry of horror against an appalling situation. I saw it once, ten years ago, and have never forgotten it.It was directed by the late Alan Clarke, undoubtedly the best director of TV Britain has ever seen (maybe the best British director since Michael Powell). He had already given early breaks to Tim Roth (in Made in Britain) and Gary Oldman (in The Firm - not the Tom Cruise vehicle, but a brutal TV movie about soccer hooliganism). The title comes from the writer Bernard MacLaverty, who said that the Troubles were like having an elephant in your living room. That's what it was like to watch this film.