One of the pioneering "Evil Quirky Indie" flicks

Rating: 3/10 (4 August 2014)

The cinematography is utterly impeccable, yet it still somehow has the limited-scale feel of an indie production, which makes me feel like I can trust it -- like this isn't an impersonal studio exec's cash-grab, it's an individual's honest self-expression.
And the plot is about things I'd never seen before in a "serious," well- produced movie -- a guy jerking off in the shower? Giving up a career and smoking pot even though you have a family to support? Going after your teenaged daughter's hot blonde friend? Why, this is groundbreaking! Honest! "Progressive!" What a commentary on the human condition! That's what I thought when I watched this when I was younger and very naive. Yet even then, it left me feeling unsettled, even disturbed.
I found it disturbing because this movie isn't an honest story about the human condition, like it pretends to be. "Ordinary People" is that movie. "American Beauty" and other pseudo-indie flicks that began popping up in the late 90s are some kind of propaganda for being a smug, lazy *sshole, framing a character who drops his responsibilities (at his family's expense!) as a hero.
When this Marxist turd came out, EVERYONE thought it was the absolute TITS. This is because the filmmakers found a way to pass off a movie about how cool it is to never grow up as high-brow art. Seriously, it's like the emperor's new clothes: Kevin Spacey jerking off in the shower, smoking pot, and going after some teenaged chick isn't really "groundbreaking." It's just some middle-aged guy dealing with the problems in his life by living like he's a teenager, the hell with his wife and daughter who depend on him. This is a bad message, which is the only "groundbreaking" thing about it.
You know f***ers, I can write that story too. How about a quirky indie flick called "Edgar" that's about the titular character in middle America who kidnaps and skins children alive. Except he's the hero, played as a mild-mannered retail clerk with a snarky but gentle sense of humor by Colin Farrell. Throw in some puddle-deep moral relativism claptrap to justify his actions and you've got American Beauty's logical next step toward brainwashing people into moral retards.
Also, the thing with the plastic bag in the wind being beautiful was just gay. I get it, it sounds deep and philosophical and people are afraid of being seen as dull if they don't agree. I also get that if a plastic bag in the wind is beautiful, then so is every other commonplace thing, like coffee pots and car exhaust. If everything on earth is beautiful, that robs you of the ambition to create beauty since it's already there. What a great excuse for not feeling bad about never doing anything.
By extension, if everything is beautiful, then all behavior is equally beautiful. Therefore morality is subjective. Therefore anything is justified as long as it "feels right." What a great way to lubricate the phallus of immorality into the quivering psychic vaginas of naive young people looking for an excuse to indulge in every selfish whim, regardless of the consequences.
this is why i don't like a lot of movies made since the late 90s. Like American Beauty, they frame immoral or harmful lifestyles as good or acceptable. "Trainspotters," all about beautiful young heroin addicts, was like this. Where have all the grown-ups gone? Sh*t like drug addiction and just giving up on your obligations is traditionally looked down on for a reason.