American Beauty Review

A dark comedy about the underside of Suburban life in the good old U S of A, that walked away with three of the biggies at the Golden Globes Awards last weekend: Best Picture (Drama), Best Director and Best Screenplay.

However we know this happiness wont last, as at the beginning of the movie Lester tells us in his narration that he'll be dead within a year. And he is far from the only unhappy soul in the film; his wife (Annette Bening) lives only to further her career and can't comprehend why her husband seems to have turned his back on adulthood, their teenage daughter seems to have lost faith in life already, her only friend relies on her sexuality to get on in life (whilst also entrancing Lester), and the boy next door is a philisophical drug dealer beaten regularly by his homophobic father.Knowing from the out that the hero will be dead by the end of the last reel could seriously impair your potential enjoyment of the film, but it doesn't; this telling character study will engage you while it seems to gently criticise almost everyone in the picture. What's more this is a film that looks stunning; how often does the image of a carrier bag blowing against a wall stay with you long after you've seen it?

That this film is the motion picture directorial debut of British theatre director Sam Mendes is truly astonishing; the confidence he shows in dealing with the assorted dysfunctional characters is all the more impressive when you realise how his gentle treatment of them has you caring for practically everyone. Although the script (from former "Cybil" and "Grace Under Fire" TV writer Alan Ball) is pure Americana, and Dreamworks must be praised for supporting such an untypical studio movie, ultimately there is a delightful irony in the fact that it took a foreigner to bring this paean to middle America to life on the big screen.

Once again Kevin Spacey proves himself to be the finest screen actor of his generation with his portrayal of Lester Burnham, a bored forty two year old who seems to have lost interest in his family and his career. After he resigns from his ad sales job he begins to live his life the way he did when he was twenty, when he still had faith in himself and the future. This isn't simply nostalgia; Lester is genuinely happy as he starts getting back in shape, takes a job in a drive through burger joint, and reacquaints himself with the laid back pleasure of the odd joint.

A dark comedy about the underside of Suburban life in the good old U S of A, that walked away with three of the biggies at the Golden Globes Awards last weekend: Best Picture (Drama), Best Director and Best Screenplay.