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| Genre: | Drama |
| Year: | 1999 |
| Rating: | R |
| Length: | 2h 2mins |
| Cast: | Sam Mendes, Kevin Spacey, Annette Bening, Thora Birch |
Lester Burnham (Kevin Spacey), a middle-aged, middle-American everyman, is in midlife burnout. When he lusts for his daughter's seductive friend, he plunges into a regression that changes his life. Sam Mendes's sardonic look at the dysfunctional underside of suburban bliss, American Beauty, tore through the Academy Awards in 2000, winning five trophies, including Best Picture, Best Actor, and Best Screenplay. In a standout cast that includes Annette Bening and Chris Cooper, Spacey is especially moving: Normally an intelligent but distant actor, his Lester is in dead earnest as he whips himself up into a new man while his marriage crumbles. Bening brings sympathy to her role as Lester's tightly wound wife, a struggling realtor. Exhibiting a startling amount of directorial acumen for a debut feature, Mendes -- a theatre veteran -- gives us a fresh, suspenseful, and entertaining take on an old subject: suburban ennui And while elements of the tale here may echo movies as disparate as Blue Velvet and Heathers, the expressionististic cinematography, beguiling score, and unblinking script add to the rare level of excellence and charm. The DVD includes commentary from Mendes and writer Alan Ball and American Beauty: Look Closer, a making-of documentary short. Monica McIntyre
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