Every single frame is adorable!

Rating: 10/10 (8 February 2000)

Believe me, I've seen a lot of movies (each year a try to watch about 200 films I have not seen before), but American Beauty surpasses everything. It's the best picture I've ever seen. I never before focused on one single film as my favorite (there were always about 1,000 fav films), but with American Beauty it is different. It's just perfect, brilliant, marvelous, divine. Every single frame is adorable - and yet, it's so simple - there is no need for hoards of extras, for elaborate sets or meaningful events in the course of the story. Just a few strange people, people just like us. This film features some of the best acting performances ever to be seen on screen, esp. Kevin Spacey, Annette Bening, Wes Bentley & beautiful Thora Birch. Witty & intelligent dialogue that's rare in today's cinema, and the structure of Alan Ball's script is just perfect - the best plot narration I can imagine. Marvellous cinematography - one of the rare pictures in current cinema that denies fast-paced camera moves, but instead just sits there in static images that tell you so much more than every camera move ever could. I'd like to say more about that film, but my breath is still taken from watching it the fifth time last night. Besides, I fail further words that could describe it. It's just masterly accomplished regarding any aesthetics, the contents, the acting, the photography, the editing, the story, the art in itself...
A grateful bow to first-timer Sam Mendes and his crew.