A brilliant debut from director Sam Mendes

Rating: 10/10 (8 December 2011)

Lester Burnham (Kevin Spacey) is a middle-aged magazine writer suffering from a mid-life crisis, he is discontent with his wife Carolyn (Annette Bening), his job and his life in general. His life changes when he becomes infatuated with his daughter's friend Angela Hayes (Mena Suvari). He changes his life for the better, embracing the music of his youth and working out in his garage, smoking pot. He blackmails his now former employers, gets a low-responsibility job at a fast food joint and buys his dream car. A life free from responsibility and worries comes at cost though, and Lester ultimately pays the ultimate price.
That is just one interpretation of this film, but to be honest, American Beauty is a film about so much more than sexual desire. It is a social commentary on the 'American Dream', the perfect lives that suburban families supposedly live, and the physical and psychologically effects on those who strive for it. The character of Carolyn best represents this, as a Realtor who is so ambitious to be the best, that she often breaks down and builds herself up again with motivational books and tapes, and also seeking comfort from successful Realtor Buddy Kane (Peter Gallagher).
American Beauty, as the name suggests, is also concerned with love and different perceptions of beauty. Jane (Thora Birch), the Burnhams' daughter, strives for breast augmentation and is constantly embarrassed by her parents, almost leaving her a social outcast. Conversely, her friend Angela is a confident and attractive blonde who brags of her sexual experiences while dreaming of becoming a model, she loves the possibility that Lester is attracted to her. In these two characters you have stereotypical characters it could be said but what changes this is Wes Bentley's character Ricky Fits. Fits' and his parents, a bigoted US marine (Chris Cooper) and his introverted wife (Alison Janney), move next door to Burnhams and Ricky quickly starts to observe them with his video camera, especially Jane. The two later begin a relationship, to Alison's dismay, and Ricky confides in Jane is acute sense of beauty he finds in the simple things, such as a paper bag blowing in the wind. The film definitely supports the 'beauty is in the eye of the beholder' view, Lester desires Angela's superficial beauty but Ricky finds inner beauty, in Jane and in the world around him.
The film also raises the conflict between the material world and the more spiritual world. Lester is the only character able to escape from the dull, materialistic society he sees around him by doing what he wants to do like buying his dream car and working out in a bid to impress Angela. Carolyn, on the other hand, has become disillusioned by the world as her ambitions to become better and better eat away at her. By the end of the film, however, it is Lester who is 'punished'. After a moment of clarity in which he comes to realise the importance of his family, he is killed by Ricky's father. However, Lester has actually been redeemed because he watches his life flash before him, and he sees all the beauty in his life, which does not include Angela.