communication breakdown

Movie Review: American Beauty (1999)

[ 9 / 10 ] The tagline of "American Beauty" sums up the film about as succinctly as possible: "Look closer". How better to describe one of the best movies of the 1990s? It is a dark, humorous, yet brutally honest look at suburban American life, and how so often there is a dark undercurrent to the American dream...

The film primarily follows the story of the Burnham family - on the surface, they are the model family. Lester (Kevin Spacey) is a capable advertising executive, Carolyn is a successful real estate agent, and Jane, though reserved, is stable at the very least. But as Lester's (terrific) opening monologue reveals, things are not as they seem in the Burnham household. In reality, Lester and Carolyn's marriage is in shambles, Carolyn ignores him, Lester hates his job, and Jane hates both her parents for awkwardly trying to involve themselves in her adolescent life. This sounds much more like the typical American family.

Two nearly-simultaneous events throw the family (and all those around them) onto a disastrous course. First, Lester meets his daughter's friend Angela. Sexually frustrated and in need of some sort of stimulation to break out of his marital stagnancy, he is suddenly interested in her to the point of obsession (which only embarasses Jane and increases the void between father and daughter). Second, a new family moves in next door, who are wildly different from the Burnham's. Frank Fitts (played to perfection by the amazing Chris Cooper) is a Marine, and to him, his job doesn't end when he gets home - he rules his home with an iron fist. His wife, submissive by nature, is little more than a whisper and a shadow in the home, while their son Ricky is a troubled yet introspective teenager with a penchant for trying to capture the essence of beauty on videotape. Yet, as with the Burnham family, not all is clear upon first glance of the Fitts...

The film explores human emotion, and does it flawlessly - every word spoken by each character is so precisely chosen that it is eerily real. Just look at the Burnham family. Lester is our protagonist, and represents the everyman of the story - you can't help but cheer when he quits his job, understand his obsession with unspeakable beauty, and chuckle appreciatively at his dinner outbursts. His daughter Jane is real too, yet in a different way - she perfectly portrays the outcast teenager, ashamed of her parents, alienated from her friends, alone with her problems and feelings of emptiness. Carolyn, on the other hand, doesn't have a real bone in her body - her entire life is a fabrication - but Annette Bening pulls off the part so flawlessly that you can't help but recognize her self-serving behavior. It may not be pretty, but it's part of the reality of life.

There are some serious themes explored here - the search for beauty, the need for companionship and love, but most importantly, how we all have secrets that we try to hide but inevitably find their way to the surface. There is plenty of dark humor in the movie, but ultimately it is a tragic tale of how families can be ruined. Lester's journey toward rediscovery is so enjoyable, so hilarious, that you can't help but root for him as he acts as the mouthpiece of reason. Yet in the end, the darkness around him catches up with him, as it does with all the characters - and it is this dichotomy of humor and drama that makes the movie so timeless. Real life is not all laughs, and not all tears - it is a healthy (and sometimes unpredictible) mix of both, and that is exactly what happens in "American Beauty".

There is nothing about this film which is not enjoyable. It just misses my mark of perfection, only because I reserve the highest tier of my rankings for movies which personally and profoundly move me, or are enjoyable to the point that I could watch them endlessly. While it did not move me on such a level, it is nonetheless a phenomenal achievement, a landmark of filmmaking for the 1990s. "American Beauty" might just as well have been named "American Tragedy" - it captures both so perfectly and eloquently that there's not much reason to go looking elsewhere for better examples.