Wow.

Rating: Null/10 (11 October 1999)

At times, seeing all the typical outpouring of Hollywood trash can leave a person filled with the idea that cinema is dead.
But then a beacon of pure brilliance comes along.
American Beauty is many things. Inspirational, entertaining, full of biting commentary. It makes you laugh. It makes you angry. It makes you smile. It makes you sad. It makes you question your own life.
All it's characters are human. They have faults. They can be good people, yet they can be horrible. There is no "ultimate bad guy", nor is there an "ultimate good guy". There are just people. When you think you have someone figured out, the movie peels back another layer of who the character really is...and throws your preconceptions out the window.
This is one of the rare movie, that actually brought tears to my eyes. Not from it's tragic events, but from the shear beauty of it all.
I don't like giving away plots of movies. This you should discover on your own. See this movie. You may like it. You may hate it. But either way, it will get inside your head and get inside your heart, and change you. It will change the way you think and the way you live.
As the movie says at the end...
"You may not understand this right now. But someday...you will."