American Beauty (1999)
Sam Menders
A Wonder Cure for All Your Daily Problems of Any Sort
I am not sure whether I should be upset, angry, or amused. Here's a film that tries a little too hard to be a little too smart for its own good. Don't get me wrong, I did enjoy the movie, at least for the most part of it. But I did not love it, and maybe I did not even like it. Why? Because it was a long, overdrawn cliché. Let's take inventory: a 42-year old loser hates his job, hates his life, hates... no wait, he is indifferent to his job, indifferent to his life, indifferent to his wife, has no clue about his daughter and lusts after nubile flesh; then we have an overstressed overachieving perfectionist of a wife who turns out to be an overzealous slut; then we have the requisite dumb blonde whore in a BMW who turns out to be a virgin with a golden vulnerable little heart; then we have a gay marine who hates himself for being gay, hates his wife who acts like a fixture of the furniture, and hates his son because... we don't know, presumably because he's a marine; then we have the ugly duckling daughter who is utterly misunderstood wants to redo her boobs (why? they looked fine to me!), tags along with the aforementioned blonde and generally feels the prescribed dose of teenage angst, which... SURPRISE... makes her fall for the unsavory character next door, a wanker who spends most of his waking hours videotaping events of varying degree of weirdness while pretending to find beauty (of all things!) in them; and he's a drug dealer too. Give me a break!
The one thing that could have redeemed the flick was to pull it all together, make some sense, deliver some message, make the pedestrian characters appear interesting and at least somewhat consequential. But noooo... we get to see Annette Bening on the verge of hysteria in just about every scene (including the ``wild sex'' one in the cheap motel) although we know what her problem is -- not enough sex. We also get to see Kevin Spacey act out a typical midlife crisis although we know what his problem is -- not enough sex. We also get to see Mena Suvari talk dirty, behave obnoxiously (and this includes the romantic scene with Kevin Spacey) although we know what her problem is -- not enough sex. And so on and so forth. The entire movie is just an indictment of celibacy in various forms. If they all could just get laid (either with same sex partners or otherwise), then everyone will be happy, just like the gay (pun intended) couple next door. Everything is served minty fresh with a side of rose petals (the sublime poetic message). If you play the movie backwards, you will hear whispers: ``have sex, have sex, have sex.'' No problem there, but the makers could have hardly been any blunter short of hitting me on the head with a brick (with a ``have sex'' imprint on it).
Phluuuuease! Who comes up with this crap? My gut reaction is simple: me know sex great, me know no sex bad (I've read about the Puritans), me also know sex great whatever way you like it, me tired of listening to someone trying to break out their own cell and pretending to be liberating the others (i.e. us, the imbecile audience). When I walked out of the theater, I felt I'd been preached to and even though I'd agreed with the sermon and I'd liked the preacher, I did not care to listen to it again. Oh, and by the way, we knew who the killer was, dammit. It was sort of expected and so trite, it made me want to puke.
As I said, I did enjoy the movie. Kevin Spacey has to take the blame for that. His acting skills are undeniable and he truly makes the film fun to watch. I am usually fond of Annette Bening, but she was too volatile here. Did not believe her, did not like it. The teenage cast is okay, nothing rivetting but at least they are not annoying. So, the movie gets 2 for content, 9 for acting, and negative infinity for wisdom. Overall score: 6 out of 10 just because I agree with the basic message.
December 13, 1999. BLS