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American Beauty (The Awards Edition) Customer Reviews (73 - 75 of 109 Reviews)

There is only one word for this movie..... PERFECT
I've seen a lot of Hollywood crap, and I was just getting sick of that whole movie industy when I happened to see American Beauty. I'm a story-line fanatic and I've seen way too many stupid blunders on most movies, but this one was just flawless.
It was absolutely perfect. In fact, the only camparable movie to this one was that Korean film, Old Boy.

Brilliantly written film...
I've read some of the other reviews, and they blab away the plot. I won't do that. What's important is that this is a first screenplay from Alan Ball, and he deserved his Oscar. Sam Mendes put it all in perspective, and brought a brilliant cast to fruition. A lot of this is about middle-age angst, but there are terrific insights about current young person's issues. Wes Bentley is wonderful, as is Thora Birch, and, later, Mena Suvari. The film really centers around Kevin Spacey and he deserved his Oscar. Some may take issue that Annette Benning should've won. (She lost to Hilary Swank, who was in almost every frame of "Boys Don't Cry")Phenomenal extra characters, and Chris Cooper was exceptional as Bentley's gung-ho military father (nominated for a SAG award). Peter Gallagher hasn't had as good a role since Altman's "Short Cuts". His scenes with Benning are amusing.The plot twists are plenty, and the ending already told at the beginning. The problem with the current DVD is that there were alternate endings, not included; and it would really be fun to find out other things might've been going on. The resolution was so open-ended, I'd love to see what Mendes & Ball had in mind as alternatives. Awards Edition? OK. A real edition? That might be fun.

"American Dreadful"
After viewing "American Beauty" on VHS, and I found myself confronted with the most viscerally negative reaction I can ever recall experiencing toward a film. Two words immediately spring to mind: DISAPPOINTMENT and OUTRAGE. DISAPPOINTMENT, because the film simply lacks the requisite quality for the manifold awards and laurels it has received, and OUTRAGE, because this movie is billed as a "provocative and wickedly funny" satire, and a "defining achievement in cinematic history." Provocative, indeed, it is; "wickedly funny," and "a defining achievement," it most certainly is NOT!

"American Beauty" is a film which purports to make a stinging social commentary about the barrenness of American life at the dawn of a new millennium, and the need for people to wake up and see beauty in their surroundings. The vehicle for this message is ironically a pair of dysfunctional suburban families. Meet the Burnhams: Lester, a middle-aged "burn-out" at work; completely alienated from his hyperkinetic and overambitious wife, Carolyn, and his moody teenage daughter, Jane. Meet also the Fittses: Frank, a retired Marine Corps colonel - a rabid homophobe and an abusive "control freak" toward his voyeuristic, detached teenage son, Ricky, and his semi-catatonic wife, Barbara.

In a film which somehow seeks to educate its viewers on the beauty of life, we have scenarios like these placed before us: Lester lusts after his daughter's girlfriend, a teenager with a wildly scatological mouth. He quits his $60,000 a year job and takes a job flipping burgers at a fast food joint, he buys his "dream car," and he begins smoking pot. Carolyn begins a torrid affair with a rival real estate agent, a fact which doesn't seem to bother Lester at all when he finds out about it. Frank forces Ricky to give urine samples to test for drug use, and, fearing that his son is gay, beats on him repeatedly. Jane begins sleeping with Ricky, and suggests he put her lecherous father "out of his misery."

All this in the name of "beauty."

"American Beauty" is billed as a "wickedly funny" satire. Now, when I read or hear the word "satire," I immediately associate it with the word "humor." That humor can be black, acerbic, biting, ironic, or dry...it doesn't matter. My point is, I believe that satire, in order to be effective, must be imbued with at least a modicum of humor. And humor is one quality "American Beauty" does not possess.

I find nothing funny about a 42-year old man engaging in overtly lewd daydreams about, and sexual overtures toward, a teenage girl; nothing funny about a homophobic, bigoted father forcing his son to give urine samples to test for drug use, or repeatedly beating on him for infractions of his "rules;" nothing funny about a man threatening violence toward his wife by throwing a platterful of asparagus at the dining room wall; nothing funny about a teenage daughter wanting to see her father dead.

The only scenes in the entire movie which rise to the level of humor - albeit humor of the blackest variety - are the sex scene between Carolyn Burnham and Buddy Kane, the "Real Estate King." That, and the scene when newly cuckolded, burger-flipping Lester catches his wife with her aforementioned partner. Those scenes did, in fact, evoke from me a wry chuckle or two.

Now, I will concede, that "American Beauty" is an artistically and technically brilliant film. Kevin Spacey, Annette Bening, Thora Birch, Mena Suvari, Chris Cooper, and Wes Bently all excel in their roles. Spacey may even have deserved his Oscar. The cinematography is superb. The screenplay is eloquent and lyrical. Put these things together, and what you should come up with a masterpiece. Film critics, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, and the public at large all seem to think that's exactly what they've got...a masterpiece, I mean.

Alas, I do not share in that sentiment. For the life of me, I cannot understand why "American Beauty" remains such a critical and box-office success. Throughout this film's two hour, two minute running time, it remained for me little more than a lame attempt at witty social commentary, and a plodding, dreary film which was a drudgery to sit through.

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