There’s something about today’s world that feels as if innocence no longer exists. Things seem faster, harder – more intense. Occasionally there are moments where it seems like a simpler day is still possible. Afternoons of sunshine and soccer practice and hanging out with your friends until your mom’s station wagon comes around the corner. They do happen. But it only takes a second for those moments to become overloaded with shock, horror and confusion.
For much of the U.S., one of those moments was learning about the events at Columbine High School. On Tuesday April 20th, 1999, two students came to school carrying more anger, resentment and fire power than we thought possible. By Noon, 25 were wounded and 15 were dead, including the two shooters who had committed suicide. Within one afternoon, the way we think about high school changed forever.
With his newest film, Elephant, writer/director Gus Van Sant continues his exploration into what it’s like to be young and searching for a place in the world. What makes the film most poignant is its lack of “Hollywood” presence. There is no explanatory wrap-up, real script or big names cast. Instead, Van Sant works with real high school students to create a portrait of the modern teenage world. Because of this, it’s difficult not to connect with someone in the movie since they don’t seem to be playing characters in a story so much as kids in high school.
So when you have the chance to speak to one of them, you aren’t as compelled to talk to them as actors in a movie, but from the perspective of high school students growing up in a world where such a movie is inspired. Has high school changed so much that we no longer understand what its like?
“I think people in general, especially adults, fail to realize sort of the difficulty of everything,” says Nathan Tyson who plays one of the students in Elephant. “[Like the] social pressures, and the hustle and bustle and how easy it is to get lost in the crowd. I think people realize it, but they sort of cast it aside as more of a phase.”
It’s Halloween evening and Tyson, who got the part after an open casting call that drew more than 2000 kids, is hanging out with his friends somewhere outside Portland, Oregon. He’s a high school senior and is planning on getting home by Midnight since he has to take the SATs in the morning.
“The real problem I think is communication between students and adults,” he says. “I think some adults, not all, but I do believe some adults don’t necessarily take the opinions of kids seriously and are sometimes cast aside based not on the fact of their validity, but because of their age. So I think that some students, or kids, end up getting lost because these adults who are supposed to listen and help them mature aren’t listening to what they have to say. And then their peers are all in the same sort of situation. So it makes it really difficult for a mind to really mature and evolve when it doesn’t have anything to grasp onto.”
One of the ways Van Sant distinguishes the film from other adolescent movies is it acts more like a Frederick Wiseman documentary than a film from the Freddie Prinze, Jr. genre. “Where high school is, you know – the parties are in huge mansions with 100, 150 people and there’s specific designed cliques it’s all really too perfect. There’s no real problems in those high schools,” says Tyson.
Instead of being offered moral lessons that seek resolve, we follow the actions of a group of students as they make their way through what appears to be an ordinary day. From the artist to the jock, the popular to the awkward, Van Sant and cinematographer, Harris Savides, use long takes and an overlapping story structure to develop the plot. The unorthodox approach wasn’t what Tyson anticipated when he found out he was going to be a lead in the film. Having to carry one shot for more than a standard 3-5 minute cut is easily understood as nerve-wracking. And as Tyson admits, all you’re thinking is “don’t trip.”
“When we arrived on set and actually started filming it was these unbelievably long, tracking shots that lasted like 10-15 minutes and it was just walking,” he explains. “At the time, I didn’t really see the relevance and I sort of struggled with the idea since I wasn’t entirely sure how [Gus and Harris] were going to incorporate [the shots] into sort of an intricate delineation of thought, or emotion, or basically essential plot development.”
The long takes, are not only aesthetically stunning, but also essential to the overall composition of the movie. They literally connect the characters, from teacher to parent to student, and create a seamless world that is high school.
“The thing about the characters is that they all represent sort of the different niches that kids fulfill within sort of this microcosm of society called high school,” Tyson explains. “So each student can relate themselves differently to one of the characters. Like there’s the hobbyist who’s Elias, who’s the photographer; and then there’s the jock who is myself, and then there’s that kid who everyone knows and everyone really kind of likes but has his own family problems, and that’s John…and then there are the girls. Everyone looking at a different perspective, relative to sort of social identification I suppose you could say.”
Tyson has always been involved in sports, including gymnastics for 10 years, so playing the jock wasn’t what he describes as a huge stretch and it made it easier for him to improvise. Still, getting to know Tyson uncovers the very conflicts that run rampant in high school, most notably identity. Despite his maturity and stoic demeanor, Tyson admits he was conscious of his role and how that may effect other cast members perceptions of who he was. “Sometimes I felt like with some of the kids that knew I was cast as the jock…I felt like that’s what they saw me as, not being particularly bright. But then I was helping one of the kids with his homework,” he explains.
A few minutes talking with Tyson, and the one-dimensional “jock” role quickly disappears. In its place you find an athlete who draws a lot, writes poetry, takes film classes and describes himself as the artsy kid in the family. A guy who his friends eagerly describe as “smart,” “humble” and unchanged by all the attention from the movie.
“All the people I really know, they know what I’m like and people will have their opinion of me. Most relative was probably the dumb jock stereotype. But anyone worthwhile, will listen to what I have to say. So I’m not really too worried about being stereotyped. And I don’t think in the film that I look like the stereotypical Hollywood jock whose like 35-years old and has a full grown beard and is like 6’5″ 280 lbs.”
It was this type of communication and acceptance that Tyson points to as what most surprised him while working on Elephant. “Personally, the willingness of adults to listen to the kids on set, especially Gus Van Sant. He was very genuine in his interest to hear what we had to say regarding anything…whether it be personal or about the filming of the movie. That was really surprising to get that kind of respect from not only an adult but an adult of his stature.”
Van Sant often asked the ensemble to recreate conversations he had overheard – and in one case, built an entire scene around one’s talent for the piano. The incredible connection between Van Sant and his actors is clear on screen. The natural, organic performances rely on their subtlety to make the film work. It’s also grounds for a connection between peer and peer. As Tyson says, he hopes the film inspi a sensitivity and awareness of others. “Be more perceptive of sort of how we tend to split ourselves up into these social classes within high school and to sort of try and break that strain. I mean, everyone’s going to have their group that they feel most comfortable with, but I don’t think it should be seen as socially uncanny to stretch out of the group into another.”
Although Tyson had planned on going to college for advertising, now that Elephant has garnered so much praise and attention, including the Palme D’Or, and Best Director awards at Cannes, acting has become his career focus. “I’m going to L.A.. I have general meetings set up with FOX and Disney and the WB, and so basically this film has opened up a lot of opportunities for me, just more or less in networking – being able to meet people who I’d never be able to be in contact with before.”
He describes his ideal project timidly, once again reminding you of high school’s self-consciousness. “It might sound stupid, but basically I want to be in some respects the next Tom Cruise or Matt Damon in films like The Bourne Identity or Minority Report. Where it’s action, but has a really strong, more kind of complex plot development, not just senseless…blowing everything up.”
Within his emotional paradox, it’s easy to recall the perils of searching for your identity in high school. Sometimes you do forget how difficult it is to act like an adult, while you’re still a kid. When approached with the topic of the opposite sex, and if he has become more popular with “the girls” now that he’s a big movie star he quickly answers “no,” but laughs with timid embarrassment. And what about having an onscreen romance? “We talked and became friends so it wasn’t any big deal. It was just like work, it was pretend.” But when prodded further, his boyish laugh gives him away…and he confesses, “honestly? It was pretty cool, yeah.”
High school…some things never change.
