Rating: 
Summary: A True Classic
Review: American Beauty is a true classic!! It is a fabulous movie and one of the best movies of all time. I have never gotten tired of this movie, I can watch it over and over with out getting sick of it. Kevin Spacey won an Oscar for best actor, which he truly deserved. Spacey was the man, especially when he quit his job and started working for a fast food joint. And Mena Suvari, well she is self-exclamatory, she is the American Beauty. I can't say enough good things about this movie it is just truly a masterpiece. I recommend this for all the epic movie lovers!
Rating: 
Summary: American Beauty (The Awards Edition)
Review: As far as the movie, I doubt that I need to tell you much about it. You've already seen the rave reviews from critics and fans. A great masterpiece on lives that are unfulfilled by living the 24/7 suburbia lifestyle. A smart criticism of the shallowness that exists in American life and behavior. Great moments such as the homophobic Marine displayed as a closet gay.A little annoying with it's premise based in "yuppie life." For instance, the college kid that carries around a camcorder, the usual yuppie suburbia cliche of a fairly successful drug dealer, etc... The important part though is that if you are not someone who has lived this priviledged lifestyle, you can still relate to the characters and their search for truth in the world. The director deserved the Academy Award. I can't think of many motion pictures that had this much smoothness to the scenes. (Even more brilliant when you consider the director was working in an extended portrayal of normal suburbia life.) But I'd also like to tell you about the Awards Edition inserts. A HUGE disappointment and the main reason I'm lowering this to four stars. There is a 10-15 minute clip that is excellent with a focus on the director, writer, produers and actors. But the other two segements are junk. There is a 10-15 minute clip that is comparable to an Entertainment Tonight clip. The other 40 or so minutes is dedicated to the director reviewing the story boards for the movie. Each three picture panel is reviewed on average five minute each and is a great source for sleep. :) It contains much addolation from the movie makers on how well they pulled off a certain scene from it's story board picture to the actual film, some brilliant insight, but a rip-off. The "Making Of" portion is a let down. DO NOT MISS this movie though. A great piece of film making.
Rating: 
Summary: It' was ok not great
Review: Rent this movie first and if you like it buy if not don't!
Rating:
Summary: Great Movie - Too Bad it Doesn't Play on my DVD Players..
Review: I tried to see this movie on both my Apple G4 DVD-ROM drive as well as my Toshiba SD1200 DVD player, but both had extreme problems with the dual-layer encoding. They just wouldn't play regardless of what audio option I chose. Could simply be a defective disc, however. Fortunately, I was able to see the 2nd half of the movie on HBO when it started showing a few weeks ago. A fantastic movie, but beware of potential DVD-player related problems.
Rating:
Summary: A note to critics
Review: A note to all you aspiring critics-- starting a review off with "I'm a big fan of movies" or "I love all kinds of movies" does not indicate that you are gifted with some insight into movies. It means that you're self absorbed and probably like any kind of dreck that makes sense to the kind of person who would think that it's intelligent to precede a review with the comment, "I'm a big fan of movies". Yeah, the rest of us are here because we hate movies. American Beauty isn't the best movie ever, and it isn't the most original. But it manages to breath life into situations that have been done hundreds of times before (no need for a litany) and give us something new and original. It's good stuff and it's worth watching.
Rating:
Summary: Amazing!
Review: An amazing, powerful movie. One of the best I have ever seen. It is fascinating to read the many reviews of this movie, especially the negative ones. To those people I say that this movie is like a mirror depicting American life (Alan Ball himself has said as much.) Those who didn't like the movie didn't like what they saw in the mirror. They're going to dislike this statement even more (Why??). I especially like the reviewer who said that the movie had an underlying, subversive Buddhist theme. I agree that the movie contains many ideas supported by Buddhist doctrine, but why is that subversive? I would say more generally that the movie encompasses ideas contained in general eastern philosophy (Buddhism, Taoism, Hinduism.) What is this movie about? If it is about a dysfunctional American family, then 2001: A Space Odyssey is about some guys who take a trip to Jupiter. How about this for a theme: 1.) Life is suffering 2.) The cause of all suffering is desire Lester Burnham undergoes a process throughout the movie. This process might be called spiritual awakening or enlightenment. He begins to recognize the transitory nature of everything that he thought was "important," including his own life. Very subversive ideas! Do you want to live your life with denial, repression and illusion? Or with awareness? Wake up all you Lester's out there! (easier said than done, I know!)
Rating:
Summary: Vandelist, what this movie means to me...
Review: Simply put, like so many things in living, our focus on what's meaningful swings back and forth, into and away from resolve. We know what we should do, but our nature instructs us to do what we should not. This movie was largely a swing into resolve. The particulars of that "resolve" were clearly, powerfully defined by the boy's speech as he interpreted with his heart the beauty in the little bag swept up in the whirling wind. The beauty, which was illustrated in that "bag" was realized by the father - and just, perfectly at the right moment. In that moment, everything that was wrong was made right. I thought there was unutterable truth and beauty in this. This is a wonderful movie.
Rating:
Summary: one of the best of 1999
Review: 1999 was a great year, if not the best year in movies ever, and american beauty earning the oscar for best picture is debatable by many. all i gotta say about that is it deserved it far more than cider house rules...i don't know how that movie even got nominated, but that's a different story. 1999 had a whole bunch of great movies, but probably none better than american beauty. some have argued that it really doesn't show a mid-life crisis well, but the thing about it is, it's not meant to show a mid-life crisis well; it's trying to show the vanity in materialism, in living a world because we are taught to live in the world a certain way, which causes us to miss the beauty around us. can we truly stop and smell the roses? this movie is great for this point, enjoy the beauty around you. God made us a world to enjoy, let's not just fly by without taking a peek, and let's not ruin it by vainly scratching for the best 4000 dollar couch.
Rating: 
Summary: The Emperor's new Clothes
Review: This film has been so immoderately praised that it is time, perhaps, for a more sober assessment. And when you get below the hype there is not much here to get excited about. Take the acting. Kevin Spacey does not act particularly well in this film, in fact he hardly acts at all - he walks through the part, looking every bit as smug as he does when interviewed. To suggest that this role merited an Oscar is to lose any sense of what acting is all about. Similarly with the script: it is not bad, but hardly a masterpiece. In fact it is full of tedious, shop-worn, caricatures, the most unpleasant of them being the martinet father who turns out to be a repressed homosexual (natch!). Shades here of Lawrence's Prussian Officer. But if a writer has to resort to this kind of easy target then he is really not working hard enough. But then the whole script is just too easy. Does the film end up telling us anything new about a mid-life crisis? Not really. Poor Lester Burnham rediscovers the power of lust and a good workout. Good for him. Only the cinematographer, Conrad Hall, really deserved the Oscar that he got. The film looks good - unfortunately this beauty is really only skin deep.
Rating: 
Summary: A PIECE OF TRASH
Review: Perhaps because I heard so much hype, I may have expected more when I acquired the DVD. I should have guessed when the Hollywood "in" crowd loves something this much, WATCH OUT. Looks to me like those ever so pseudo "hip" self absorbed obnoxious inbred hollywood libs giving us their take on middle class america. Clinton and his Hollywood lapdogs obviously loved this movie. The basic equation here is to suggest middle america is so screwed up, so dysfunctional, that in relative terms, the Hollywood crowd must be just about normal. Now isn't that convenient.
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