ELEPHANT (1989)

  I thought I had already seen the stupidest movie with the title ELEPHANT a while back when I watched Gus Van Sant's take on the Columbine school shooting  but apparently I was very wrong. Compared to this thing that one was an absolute masterpiece. This here is just a 39 minute long, very repetitive, series of assassinations of people by guns and that's it. Barely any dialogue, no plot, no reasons given for anything that happens, just violence for violence's sake, or in this case, according to director Alan Clarke, to point out that violence is bad. While I'm no expert on the horrible violence between Ireland and England in the 80s and before, this certainly didn't teach me anything. Maybe if you're more familiar with the whole thing, this would resonate more vividly. From what I know though the killings, which often employed bombs and other implements of destruction weren't always quite as neat and painless as depicted here.  This was made for, and shown on, British TV which explains why it's not super gory but seems amazing that it ever actually got shown.