Polytechnique

Since I'm really really looking forward to seeing Dune in the future, I felt like checking out this early film from Denis Villeneuve's filmography. This movie's based on a real-life tragedy that occurred at the Polytechnique Montreal engineering school in 1989, and it dramatizes the event in a way that feels very humanistic. It doesn't make any comments or draw conclusions about the event and still leaves you feeling for most of the people involved. It does a great job of being ambiguous, something Villeneuve has mastered throughout his filmography. My heart goes out to the survivors, and my thanks go out to Villeneuve for being so great at making films like this.

An amazing little French Canadian film about the Quebec massacre. Personally I recommend watching everything Denis Villeneuve has made. This guy is among the greatest living directors in the world right now and he is definitely making some of the most interesting films of our time...Incendies, Prisoners, Arrival, etc. This is one of the films Denis made before he became well known. I've seen everything he's made now except for his newest version of Dune, which I'll check out in the theatre when it opens in October. Every single one of his films was well worth the watch! Forget the overhyped Fincher and Nolan of the newer generation of directors, this guy easily wipes the floor with them. In my view, Denis is definitely the most interesting filmmaker alive today that hasn't made anything prior to the mid 1990's. 7/10.

I've read many comments by people stating that this film is bias because it only reflects the point of view of the victims who were mainly female and that is just giving support to the feminist movement but that is not the case.

This film isn't about the shooter, it isn't about the families...it's about the victims/survivors of this horrific ordeal. It does not focus on the background of the killer, it does not explain in great detail why he committed this terrible act of violence... it depicts what the victims/survivors went through.

Some people tend to feel empathic for the shooter, commenting on the fact that he felt prosecuted for his gender and that he felt threatened and hatred for females who in his own opinion were taking jobs away from males who deserved them... Kind of like the two shooters from Columbine who to some people became a icon for anti-bullying, thinking that the only reason they committed these crimes was because they were prosecuted by their peers and the community. It doesn't change the fact that both the Columbine shooters and Marc Lepine took innocent lives and then so cowardly take their own.

Some people liken this movie to "Elephant" and I agree but it also reminds me of "April Showers" since both movies did not focus on the killer but on the people who suffered through the event.

This film, shot mostly handheld with a black and white color grade, is a realistic recreation of a real life nightmare scenario that happened not too long ago in modern history. Focusing on a small group of fictional recreations of real life people, this film truly shows the dangers of untreated pyschological disorders, including depression, and the dangers of anti social idealogy in the hands of an armed person. It is a well done film with excellent acting from the cast, and is an anxiety inducing and truly negative experience, but one worth watching, to both remember the horror of the past, and to realize that such events still happen far too frequently in the present.

As a piece of cinema, this is truly a sight to behold. The filming is beautiful in its ability to tell the story of a horrific shooting in Montreal in 1989. The black and white filming and the direction remind of the "Dekalog" by Krzysztof Kieslowski.

The acting is exceptional. The performance by a young Karine Vanasse is powerful in its understated subtlety.

The story is deeply moving. This type of plot isn't for everyone, but if realistic drama is enjoyable to you, as it is to me, then you will be impressed by the quality of this movie.