Shrill, self-indulgent pabulum

Rating: 5/10 (9 May 2005)

One of the most overly celebrated films in cinema history, American Beauty is a ridiculous piece of baby boomer self-indulgence.
The film is nearly devoid of inspiration, and what inspiration there is to be found is largely juvenile. Annette Bening and Chris Cooper (talented actors, both) give perhaps the worst performances of their characters. Their negative/villainous characters lack any sort of depth or fullness. They exist merely as tackling dummies for the heavy-handed messages of the film.
And what juvenile messages they are! Anyone who was surprised or moved by the ridiculous scene in which Bening refuses to make love to Spacey (lest they spill wine on their couch) is abandoning any sort of intelligent analysis. This sort of quasi-symbolic debate is what passes for a social statement in AB.
American Beauty is pornography for the upper-middle-class baby boomer. You can practically feel the desperation of the filmmakers to pleasure their audience with scenes of Spacey telling off his boss, returning to the passions of his youth etc. And the public fell for it, hook, line and sinker. Heavy-handed symbolism (Wow, rose petals! Gee, the color red sure shows up a lot! Wonder what that could mean?) and trite dialogue were easily ignored.
From a technical perspective, the film is highly competent, and as a result it will bore few. But it's essentially trash, and unimaginative trash at that.