Director: Sam Mendes
Starring: Kevin Spacey,Mena Suvari,Annette Bening
The problem with American Beauty—and I hesitate to point this out because I like the darn movie—is that it gives us a bunch of lessons that we, for the most part, have already learned. The suburbs aren’t really all peaches and cream, for one. Material wealth and possessions do not buy happiness is another lesson. Having a midlife crisis really bites is a third. Gee, thanks for the news flash, Hollywood. But like I said, I like the movie. And despite the fact that American Beauty isn’t as original and provocative as that shiny Oscar says it is, I’ll go right ahead and tell you why it is you too should like it anyway.
American Beauty traces the last few months in the life of Lester Burnham (Spacey), a middle-aged, middle-management type languishing in a loveless marriage, a joyless family, and a listless suburban existence. (When I tell you he’s gonna die, I’m not blowing any secrets--he tells you as much at the beginning of the movie in voiceover narration.} Things are bleak for Lester until he meets Angela (Mena Suvari), his teenage daughter’s nubile best friend. Then, something in him snaps, and Lester attempts to break through the bounds of his midlife crisis—with ultimately tragic results.
This sick-soul-of-suburbia thing has been done before and done better. Having said that, American Beauty does have some redeeming qualities. For one, the script has some bite to it—there’s some nicely placed lines here and there. When Spacey explains to his angry wife (Bening) why it is he has bought a sports car without consulting her, he raises his fist in the air and delivers a droll “I rule!” It’s also a really sad script. If the movie’s final moments don’t move you, even if you didn’t find the rest of the movie that great, then you, my friend, have a heart of stone.
For all intents and purposes, however, this is Kevin Spacey’s movie. Spacey, who won the Best Actor Oscar for his performance here, gives the best turn of his career as Lester. Sure, he was superb in The Usual Suspects and L.A. Confidential, but in a role that could have been so easy to bungle, he’s just about perfect. Spacey has a way of saying his lines as if each one had a double meaning, which is what makes his character so recognizably human. Other characters in this movie, by contrast, are all archetypes—the shrill housewife, the homophobic military man, the sensitive teenage artist-to-be, the shallow cheerleader, the sulky daughter.
Critics went gaga for American Beauty and you can see why. It’s the kind of movie that’s practically made-to-order for critics. Frankly, I think it’s a little overrated, and God knows the Oscar was a bit of overkill. It is worth seeing though—if nothing else, it’ll jar you awake and make you reconsider if your measly suburban existence is worth a lick. If what I’ve written here hits a little too close to home though, skip the flick. Ignorance, as they say, is bliss.
