Gus Van Sant

[Doc]

I am a big fan of his. It seems as if everything people hate about him is everything I like.
I just feel like he's all about obnoxiously (unrealistically) angsty shit. Elephant was a mess (the idea of showing the whole day was nice, but the last 20 minutes didn't work. I'm not sure what feeling he was going for, but basically what he did was make a stereotype out of teenagers that was downright annoying).

[Killroy]

What's everyones thoughts on the director, Gus Van Sant (http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0001814/)? I am a big fan of his work, yet understand why some people may not like his style. Out of all the films I have watched, my favorites from him are (pretty much in order of favorite to least favorite):

To Die For (1995) (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0114681/)
Elephant (2003) (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0363589/)
My Own Private Idaho (1991) (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0102494/)
Drugstore Cowboy (1989) (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0097240/)
Good Will Hunting (1997) (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0119217/)
Finding Forrester (2000) (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0181536/)
Last Days (2005) (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0403217/)

That's a pretty good list of movies to like from one director, I think. It probably ranks him way up on my list of favorite directors. I may make an entire post dedicated to To Die For one day, as I do not think a lot of people have watched it, or have discovered it.

In the case of Elephant, a movie in which you get a wide range of comments, from hating it to loving it, I am in the loving it crowd. If a camera had followed me around High School on any of the days I showed up, it wouldn't have looked much different than the characters the camera follows in the film. I always wanted to try a review of this film, but Ebert already wrote a great one (http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20031107/REVIEWS/311070301/1023) that I align with 100 percent.

Any other fans out there? I did not list his Psycho remake as I hated it, but has anyone watched any of his other work I do not have listed? Anything worth checking out.

For the people who are not fans, what's the deal? :)

[Doc]

In the case of Elephant it just seems melodramatic. I hate to say it but I think it gets a lot of attention because people feel obligated to praise it, since it deals with a touchy/tragic subject.

Good Will Hunting is wonderful. I can't think of a real criticism that I have for that. Very enjoyable.

Finding Forrester bored me, because I just felt like it didn't have anything to offer that a thousand other "feel good" movies don't have, featuring the same plot.

Psycho was, of course, unforgivable.

And the greatest problem of all... Gus was producer on one of the worst films of all time.
KIDS

Oh man. The single most exploitive, inaccurate, and overblown piece of shit I've ever seen. I feel like this is Van Sant's schtick. He takes adolescence and makes it something it isn't, for the sake of shocking (or as I'm sure his fans will say, dramatizing it)

[Killroy]

And the greatest problem of all... Gus was producer on one of the worst films of all time.
KIDS

Oh man. The single most exploitive, inaccurate, and overblown piece of shit I've ever seen. I feel like this is Van Sant's schtick. He takes adolescence and makes it something it isn't, for the sake of shocking (or as I'm sure his fans will say, dramatizing it)

See, that is so strange. I loved Kids. At the time I saw this movie, I was a manager of a retail store and was around a bunch of teenagers at work and after. I wasn't much older than them, but I'm sure some would say i was too old to be hanging out with them. They acted and talked exactly like those kids (minus the NY accents). They were not any different than me and my hoodlum friends were at their age, they just seemed to be a little younger and a little more reckless. Hell, one blew his brains out in a room with his girlfriend sitting there. The kids then went in the room and had to wipe his brains off the paraphernalia that was there before they could call 911.

That was in 1995. Before then, back when I was a teenager, we had a 12-year-old and 13-year-old girl who would make the rounds with all the hoodlums in our group for alcohol and rides. One of the girls made the paper here in NC 'cause she was murdered and no one missed her for months. She had been stripping underage at a club near me. They caught her killer within the last two years and was Charlotte's first solved case in the newly created cold-case division.

My point is that like the movie Thirteen, Rivers Edge, and even Kids, these were people I hung out with. That may not say much about me, but that was a long time ago, but a lot of us came out ok. But these movies do ring true. Maybe not for everyone, as everyone has different life experiences. The problem is that these directors in all the movies I just mentioned have to portray a story of the lives of certain youth within a couple hours. That may be part of the problem, squeezing all of these actions and scenarios within a couple hours when in actuality they took place over a course of years.

[McVain]

I didn't like the movie KIDS but I do agree with Killroy.

Anyway... I think Van Sant is decent. I'm not a huge fan but I don't dislike him either. My Own Private Idaho is probably my personal favorite of his. I was pretty let down by Last Days though. It did expect a bit better.

As for his [non]re-imagining of Psycho... You just can't please people with remakes. lol Don't get me wrong... I thought his idea was terrible, but I just don't think many remakes will ever get much praise. There are a few though.