Director Gus Van Sant returns to portraying teenage life in a film that fans of Elephant (2003) might appreciate. We follow one teenager, Alex (Gabe Nevins), a skater, as he hangs out at a Portland skate park, pays fleeting interest to his girlfriend (Taylor Momsen) and desperately tries to ignore the fact that heās just also killed a security guard by mistake. A good, natural performance by Nevins (whoās never acted before), but the film is too repetitive and the abundance of admiring, slo-mo shots of skaters grows tiresome.Ā
2007-U.S.-France. 84 min. Color. Written and directed byĀ Gus Van Sant. Novel: Blake Nelson. Cast: Gabe Nevins (Alex), Jake Miller (Jared), Dan Liu (Richard Lu), Taylor Momsen, Lauren McKinney, Grace Carter.
Trivia: Van Sant used MySpace to find the right amateur actors for the film.