Review -- American Beauty

American Beauty is the most beautiful movie I've seen in a long time. (Decide if that pun is intentional or not for yourself.) It's funny, intriguing, and haunting. It's everything a good movie should be, and a little more.

Basically, the film is the tale of Lester Burnham (Kevin Spacey) and his life with his highly disfunctional family: his wife Carolyn (Annette Bening), who aspires to be a perfect being but is far from it, and his daughter Jane (the amazing Thora Birch), who is a typical jaded teenager attempting to detach herself from emotion and suffers from chronic low self-esteem.

What sets the story into motion are the new neighbors, the Fittses. This family is also quite disfunctional, with a military father (Chris Cooper), a catatonic mother (Allison Janney), and a son who's been to a mental institution but didn't really belong there (Wes Bentley). It's Ricky, the son, who is my favorite character; his insights into life are wonderfully brisk. Lester generally shares these opinions, making him appealing as well.

Another character thrown into the mix is Angela (Mena Suvari), Jane's "best friend," who Lester has a rather unhealthy obsession with. This develops the story further into the wonderfully fine-woven whole.

I loved this movie. The ending made me cry, the first movie that has made me do so in a long time. (Well, Runaway Bride, Wild Wild West, and Idle Hands all made me weep profoundly, but for a different reason.) It was just brilliant.

I didn't originally want to see American Beauty, truth be told. The trailer was just creepy. But the reviews convinced me that this was something that would be worth my time and money. I was right. And I believe it's worth your time and money as well.

This is quite possibly the best movie of the year. You can quote me on that.

Grade - A+

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