I shouldn't have waited

Rating: 9/10 (29 February 2000)

I avoided American Beauty until now because 1. I usually am less enthusiastic about mass crowd pleasers (e.g. Sixth Sense) 2. I expected a loud cliche suburban melodrama or 3. Lolita II.
I was wrong.
This is a wonderful movie, perfectly written, stunningly acted and very well filmed. Yes this has all been said before, but American Beauty presents in a new unique way, and that is its strength. What I liked most was that the movie was rife with opportunities to degrade into histrionics and senimentality, yet it never happens. Like Fargo, and The Graduate (tho not quite i that class), American Beauty has a lot to say about the craziness of this world we live in. It may not be "uplifting", but it is all true.

While I laughed thru much of the money, I was also continually disturbed. The charcacters are complexly drawn, and just when we think we know them, we find they are not so simple, nor so neatly drawn. THe next door teenage boy is particularly noteworthy in this respect. Is a psycho freak or a sympathetic character?
The last ten minutes blew me away, I was fooled by what had become, to my surprise (tho it shouldn't have) a mystery story, and I left the theater with a feeling of great, bittersweet sorrow, that is still with me. The themes, what this movie has to say, are very relevant, at least to my life.

One of the best movies of the 90's.