American Beauty (1999)
Average Rating: 8/10
Reviews Counted: 155
Fresh: 137 | Rotten: 18
Flawlessly cast and brimming with dark, acid wit, American Beauty is a smart, provocative high point of late '90s mainstream Hollywood film.
Average Rating: 7.8/10
Critic Reviews: 35
Fresh: 32 | Rotten: 3
Flawlessly cast and brimming with dark, acid wit, American Beauty is a smart, provocative high point of late '90s mainstream Hollywood film.
liked it
Average Rating: 3.8/5
User Ratings: 572,226
My Rating
Movie Info
Noted theater director Sam Mendes, who was responsible for the acclaimed 1998 revival of Cabaret and Nicole Kidman's turn in The Blue Room, made his motion picture debut with this film about the dark side of an American family, and about the nature and price of beauty in a culture obsessed with outward appearances. Kevin Spacey plays Lester Burnham, a man in his mid-40s going through an intense midlife crisis; he's grown cynical and is convinced that he has no reason to go on. Lester's
Watch It Now
Cast
-
Kevin Spacey
Lester Burnham -
Annette Bening
Caroline Burnham -
Thora Birch
Jane Burnham -
Wes Bentley
Ricky Fitts -
Mena Suvari
Angela Hayes -
Chris Cooper
Colonel Fitts -
Peter Gallagher
Buddy Kane -
Allison Janney
Barbara Fitts -
Scott Bakula
Jim Olmeyer -
Sam Robards
Jim Berkley -
-
-
-
-
-
ADVERTISEMENT
All Critics (155) | Top Critics (35) | Fresh (144) | Rotten (18) | DVD (39)
This amazing and impassioned fantasia about American loneliness begins as satire and ends with a vision of the sublime.
Top CriticAs the latest mainstream movie symptom of our premillennial malaise, American Beauty is so brilliantly acted, written, directed and visualized that for all its despondency and despair, it is a lot of fun.
Director Mendes guides an artful path between desire and self-disgust, playing youth against experience, male against female.
A great, tremendously entertaining experience. I only wish there were more films this satisfying.
This is definitely a knife-to-the-heart movie -- the kind whose potent effect is easy to feel yet hard to describe.
The kind of artful defiance that Hollywood is usually too timid to deliver: a jolting comedy that makes you laugh till it hurts.
American Beauty is a profoundly satisfying piece of cinema which works its way inside you, grabs hold of your heart and simply refuses to let go.
American Beauty was a deserving best picture and Lester's rich existential journey and social commentary of modern America peels away the inauthentic and superficial to reveal the epic allure in a bleak suburbia.
Cripplingly broad, with network-sitcom beats dressed in R-rated threads... [endorses] a particularly adolescent male point of view.
Powerful acting, great story, but far too mature for kids.
Among other special features of the Blu-ray DVD version, Sam Mendes' commentary is truly intelligent and illuminating.
The flaws that exist in American Beauty are effortlessly overcome by a cast that blossoms. Spacey in particular exhibits a rare wit and gravitas with Lester's weary frowns and cutting smirks, proving his mettle in this career peak performance.
It's daring in that it sympathizes with a protagonist who's a pederast though its portrait of an American family on the brink of collapse is essentially a cartoon
One of the most startling, brilliant pictures to come out of a major studio in many years.
An elusive and allusive work of art that won't be pinned down easily.
Recently, Happiness and Election have taken pot shots at suburban morals and ethics, but none has hit so close to the bone and so on-target as American Beauty.
It's like Norman Bates getting good advice from Mother.
An incisive if over-the-top take on familial dysfunction.
Above all, "American Beauty" is about finding peace and a sense of wonder in the least likely of places, such as your inner torment or, failing that, perhaps a floating plastic bag.
Brit Sam Mendes makes an impressive directorial debut with a glossy, well-acted satire of the American burbs, a theatrically stylized meditation that combines the zeitgeist of 1950s Eisnehower with that of 1990s Clinton.
Dark, intelligent, scandalous, emotional, and truthful -- one of the year's best.
This is what movies are all about.
Audience Reviews for American Beauty
Super Reviewer
-
- Lester Burnham: I guess I could be pretty pissed off about what happened to me, but it's hard to stay mad when there's so much beauty in the world. Sometimes I feel like I'm seeing it all at once and it's too much. My heart fills up like a balloon that's about to burst. And then I remember to relax, and stop trying to hold on to it. And then it flows through me like rain and I can't feel anything but gratitude for every single moment of my stupid little life. You have no idea what I'm talking about I'm sure, but don't worry, you will someday.
-
- Lester Burnham: I guess I could be pretty pissed off about what happened to me. But it's hard o stay mad when there is so much beauty in the world. Sometimes I feel like I am seeing it all at once, and it is too much. My heart fills up like a ballon that is about to burst. And then I remember to relax. And stop trying to hold on to it. And then it flows through me like rain. And I can feel anything but gratitude for every moment of my stupid little life. You have no idea what I'm talking about do you? But don't worry you will someday.
-
- Lester Burnham: I guess I could be pretty pissed off about what happened to me. But it's hard o stay mad when there is so much beauty in the world. Sometimes I feel like I am seeing it all at once, and it is too much. My heart fills up like a ballon that is about to burst. And then I remember to relax. And stop trying to hold on to it. And then it flows through me like rain. And I can feel anything but gratitude for every moment of my stupid little life. You have no idea what I'm talking about do you? But don't worry you will someday.
-
- Lester Burnham: This isn't life! This is just stuff! And it's become more important to you than living!
-
- Lester Burnham: I feel like I've been in a coma for the past twenty years. And I'm just now waking up.
-
- Lester Burnham: I guess I could be pretty pissed off about what happened to me... but it's hard to stay mad, when there's so much beauty in the world. Sometimes I feel like I'm seeing it all at once, and it's too much, my heart fills up like a balloon that's about to burst... And then I remember to relax, and stop trying to hold on to it, and then it flows through me like rain and I can't feel anything but gratitude for every single moment of my stupid little life... You have no idea what I'm talking about, I'm sure. But don't worry... you will someday.
Discussion Forum
| Topic | Last Post | Replies |
|---|---|---|
| American Beauty Zeitzeist | 2 months ago | 0 |
Latest News on American Beauty
December 1, 2010:
Kevin Spacey Headed to the Stage for Sam Mendes' Richard IIIKevin Spacey and Sam Mendes will reunite for a stage production of "Richard III," set to debut in...
May 29, 2008:
Stuck Just the Latest Offbeat Choice for SuvariWith this Friday's Stuck, Mena Suvari adds another strange chapter to the decidedly un-Hollywood...
January 25, 2008:
Sam Mendes Making With the Funny for Focus FeaturesHe made his cinematic bones with dramatic films such as American Beauty and Road to Perdition, but...
What's Hot On RT
Bradley Cooper's Best Movies
Fast & Furious 6 is Certified Fresh
Fast & Furious cars gallery
Blockbusters ranked!
Featured on RT
- Critics Consensus: Fast & Furious 6 is Certified Fresh 22
- Red Carpet Photos with Vin Diesel, Michelle Rodriguez, Gina Carano and More 0
- Video: The Hangover Part III Cast Interviews 0
- Total Recall: Bradley Cooper's Best Movies 38
- Parental Guidance: Epic and Beautiful Creatures 2
- Comic Book Movies You Can Watch Online 9
- In Pictures: The Cars of Fast & Furious 0
Top Headlines
-
Evan Peters Joins X-Men: Days of Future Past
0
-
Toby Jones Talks Captain America: The Winter Soldier
0
-
The Poltergeist Reboot May Actually Be a Sequel
8
-
Will Forte Promises MacGruber 2
1
-
Universal Plans Timecop Reboot
2
-
Return of the Jedi Turns 30
1
-
Vin Diesel Says Fast & Furious 7 Will Take Place in L.A.
0
Fresh Links
Featured
Star Trek Movies Ranked
HitFix offers their own take on the worst-to-best of the Enterprise crew's cinematic adventures.
Top 10 Star Trek Villains
Rolling Stone unveils the Enterprise's most irksome adversaries.
Celebrity Yearkbook Flashback
We'll bet you never realized how many stars were cheerleaders and high school athletes!
50 Most Classic Movie Moms
In celebration of Mother's Day, TimeOut offers up 50 iconic matriarchs from the big screen.
Weirdest Movie Siblings
From Twins to The Royal Tenenbaums, Moviefone explores cinema's oddest siblings.
Promos
Follow RT on Twitter!
Spice up your feed with hourly Tomatometer updates!
Foreign Titles
- Belleza Americana (ES)
While the actors here are all great, Kevin Spacey, Annette Bening, Chris Cooper, Wes Bentley, the same cannot be said about the characters they have to play or the uneven screenplay by Alan Ball. Writer Alan Ball is trying too hard to create an mixture of comedy and grim drama but the end result does not quite work. Biggest problem is the characters which are all written into a one dimensional caricatures. These characters does not feel that much of an real people. They would be more home at the theatre play than they are here in this film.
Thomas Newman's oddly hypnotic score is an classic these days and Conrad L. Hall's cinematography captures the American suburbs perfectly. Film's most effective moment comes when it reaches it's unexpected and dark finale that is tragic and heartbreaking at the same time. With more balanced screenplay this could have been something much more. American Beauty is solid work but feels a bit too average and forced to be really great.