This is an interesting one. Gus Van Sant is a pretty annoying director in that his work really spans the whole spectrum of audience appeal to artsy-fartsy to use a technical term. I wasn’t nearly as wowed by Milk as the masses and felt even more let down when I heard an interview with Van Sant where he talked about the way he was going to make it which would’ve been more like this, Elephant, Last Days than the likes of Good Will Hunting and the way it ultimately turned out, a simply told awards contender. I much prefer this Van Sant.

The movie is about the aftermath of an awful accident on a railway track. The story in itself is simple but what makes it unique is the way it is told – literally by the young protoganist who is told at one point by a friend that he should write down what happened as a way of dealing with it. Like The Tracey Fragments, then, the movie is fragmented as a true teen’s thoughts … a mess, to be sure, but wholely intended. It’s difficult to think of anything more to say of the movie so uneventful is it … but I would take this originality in a heartbeat over 50% of the more successful movies of the past few years.

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