Rating: 
Summary: American Beauty
Review: I thought this was a "B" rated trash movie. What a disappointment. Kevin Spacy is such a great actor - this was a total waste of his talent. I cannot believe it won the oscars it did!
Rating: 
Summary: So this is what perfection is!
Review: I think 1999 was one of the best years for cinema in a very long time. In fact, I cannot remember a better year. Every year I write a "Top 10 Films of the Year" article. In 1999, I had to do fifteen and I still had to make cuts that I didn't want to. But "American Beauty" was put at the top of my list without a second thought.This is a movie about modern American life, about desire, about unhappiness, about love, lust, sin, and redemption. This film gives me chills every single time I see it, no lie. It is funny, sad, uplifting, and all too true. The tagline "Look Closer" sums it up perfectly. You never know what's going on behind your neighbors picket fences. The performances in this film are top notch. Kevin Spacey IS Lester Burnham. He makes me believe in his characters motivations and actions. Annette Benning is absolutely brilliant. Chris Cooper is utterly amazing and Wes Bentley is (to use an overdone term) a revelation. And I do not believe that Mena Suvari got nearly enough attention for her performance. The script is dead on perfect. Brilliant themes, perfect pacing, funny, and enthralling. I cannot wait to see what Alan Ball turns out next. The cinematography is beautiful. Every shot is a work of art. The lighting, the colors, its perfect! Sam Mendes masterfully helms this picture. He uses great restraint and controls what could so easily get out of hand like a true master. See this movie. See this movie NOW! You won't regret it, I promise.
Rating:
Summary: Opposite of Magnolia
Review: When this movie was first released in theatres back in September of 1999, I shyed away from purchasing a ticket at the box office. I had seen the reviews and was unimpressed. Ironically, it starred Kevin Spacey who is among my favorite actors working today. The subject matter (at first glance) seemed contrived in it's satirical look at modern day suburbia. It seemed prime for a Sunday 8pm time slot on the Lifetime channel and not the big screen. After seeing "Magnolia" (which I hated) in December later that year, I was in no hurry to see "American Beauty". The two films seemed all too similar in tone and dramatic content. I was glad that I finally gave in earlier this year and rented this fine work by first time film director Sam Mendes. Unlike "Magnolia", this film has a discernible purpose: to give the audience a voyeuristic view into the life of Lester Burnham (Spacey) and the supporting players and draw similarities to how we view our own lives. The rest of the cast is suberb (especially Wes Bentley who steals every scene). "American Beauty" is a poignant and powerful film which I highly recommend.
Rating:
Summary: Not about Truth, Justice, and the American Way
Review: I have seen plays on the West End in London that are much like American Beauty. They are technically well done, well lit, dry, and as comfortable as a moral sewer. I didn't like any of the characters in the film. It was not America, it was the New Yorker, intellectuals feasting upon suburban America with MALICE. I didn't find the film funny or moving. It was ugly. It is the most violent film in years. And without a heart, you have just another aborted fetus. If you smell what I am cooking?
Rating:
Summary: You will miss out if you miss this
Review: A satire (if you will) on modern day society in America, Kevin Spacey is "the man" as a mid-life-crisis dad in this messed-up scarily-accurate ride. Annette Bening delivers as the wife, with Thora Birch possibly finally breaking through as his less-than-content daughter. Fight Club-esque in some parts, Sam Mendes has managed to make a film even the Oscar critics raved about (even though it did cause some controversy).
Rating: 
Summary: Layers of Emptiness
Review: Nothing here is as it appears. It's about shallowness, emptiness, and fleeting illusions, and as each shallow layer is peeled away, another shallow layer is shown. Lester Burnham throws off the outer layers of his shallow life after meeting a blonde cheerleader who makes him feel young again, and he becomes naïve, prone to child-like rage, and shallow. There's a wife from an impoverished background who's trying to maintain her middle-class façade of gentility, an alienated daughter checking out breast augmentation, a philosophical boyfriend who deals drugs, a homophobic neighbour - each with more layers and masks. The rose-strewn nymphet of Lester's fantasies is revealed to be a trash-mouthed snob obsessed with appearances, then later either as just another insecure teenager, or possibly a tease who's playing ole Lester for a sucker. She's one of the symbols for the theme of the movie, which is about the beauty in our everyday lives. But all of the symbols for beauty, like the plastic bag blowing in the wind and the dead pigeon, are empty, or dead, which means the beauty is, too, and we're pretentious and shallow when we believe it's real. I had several problems with the movie. I felt that Annette Bening's performance was over the top for the character she was playing. Her theatrical gestures and rather farcical emotions in every scene didn't suit the hard-working and serious Carolyn Burnham. Granted, we know she's projecting a false image, and we find out she's certainly not stodgy, but it's a jarring discrepancy. We never really learn why the Burnham family members all hated each other, even before Lester's lust for the girl. Indifference would have made sense, but why the sheer hatred for each other? And it was difficult to separate the movie from the hype. Because of the "hilariously satirical" and "uproariously funny" advertising blurbs that accompanied it, I was expecting something quite different, or at least something with not quite such a message of hopelessness. The characters and the desperation in their situations are more the stuff of pathos than satire. All the characters were worthy of at least empathy from us, although I suspect Kevin Spacey's sweetness made Lester Burnham more appealing than he otherwise would have been. We may like them or not, or identify with them, or not, but laughing at them is cruel. We're always told to follow our hearts, and to do what makes us happy, but the message in this movie is that nothing is gained by doing so, other than false and temporary illusion, like the illusion that beauty is revealed to be. Perhaps that's the joke, and it's on us.
Rating:
Summary: An American Classic
Review: One of the highlights of this film was the beautiful direction by Englishman Sam Mendes, a man who had never done a film before approaching this one. His work on this film was nothing short of mastery, showing the beauty in everything we find so mundane, but the truest beauty of this film was in Alan Ball's script, a profound work that finds comfort in being occasionally aimless without ever missing the point: that you should never be afraid to be yourself. This film is hard to brush away after the credits roll and you drive back to your life, and if you share my opinion, you will not want to let this one out of your heart for as long as you shall live.
Rating:
Summary: "Beauty"-ful Movie
Review: I think that "American Beauty" is one of the best movies I've seen in a long time. It is so beautifully done and definitely deserved every single award it has recieved. There is also a great ensemble cast including Kevin Spacey and Annette Bening who make the screen light up and make you anticipate what is going to happen. I will definitely add this to my DVD collection. Excellent! 10/10!
Rating: 
Summary: Extremely entertaining...and extremely cliche'
Review: I've seen this movie 3 times, and each viewing has been quite enjoyable. American Beauty attacks the mediocrities of suburban America and we the viewers feel we're watching something funky, a little offbeat--we weren't though. The whole concept of the film is wonderful, finally dealing with typicalities of Anytown, USA. But how interesting are the characters? Ricky Fitz is mildly interesting, but Sam Mendes feels he must only portray a unique character through an odd-ball, loner personality. CLICHE #1 Kevin Spacey was a riot, but in turn...such an average, kind of boring guy. He fesses to liking Pink Floyd,(wow!) buys remote control cars and a big fancy car, likes to smoke pot, watches James Bond and becomes so enamored in his personal appearance like every other American male. His re-birth is not spiritual, but materialistic. His idea of being a NEW man is buying a Thunderbird. This guy isn't interesting, this is my next door neighbor, my local mechanic etc... CLICHE#2 The scene at the dinner table is living proof of Mendes's shallowism. Lawrence Welk? Lawrence Welk? Is that the best you could come up with? He's too easy to pick on, how bout in the background maybe Luther Vandross, but no..People like to pick on typically made-fun of things. It's the same scenario as making an action film with car chases: it's expected. CLICHE #3 The most nauseating scene in the film is when Ricky and the girl come home and Ricky's mother is sitting at the table in a daze. Her life is so blase' and empty that she sits at the table in la-la land. WRONG! Real women in depression don't do that, they sit around watching t.v. or something. Are our american audiences so narrow minded that we must have the visual to support the idea? CLICHE #...i've lost count. Finally, I want to say this movie is just one big stereotype. It's as if Mendes followed some guide or rule book on how to make a movie. What if the family portrayed was black? or hispanic? Why not have the mother fat and unnatractive? No, Hollywood insists on picture pleasing actors. Watch Independent films if you can, they closely depict life as much as possible. Mendes's message is that suburban America is not always pretty on the outside. I think that point was made clearly 14 years ago in Lynch's 'Blue Velvet'. Dennis Hopper and Dean Stockwell, THOSE are characters that envoke enthusiasm in me. The film was enjoyable, but upon further analysis...just another product of a Hollywood point of view. It won best picture rightfully but that doesn't mean much. After all, Rocky won best picture...didn't it? American Beauty is worth your time. But if you feel like your watching something funky and off-beat, you aren't. Just another result of the Tinsel Town philosophy. Nice soundtrack though.
Rating:
Summary: "American Dreadful"
Review: 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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