Review of American Beauty (1999) by Vern H — 02 Apr 2013

It's relentlessly dark, has some disturbing, realistic plot material that is difficult to watch, and has an odd and confusingly ambiguous ending, American Beauty is still a challenging, intensely fascinating, and slightly poetic satire on the stereotypes and aberrant, emotional undercurrents of suburban America.

Thanks to an extremely strong while morbidly hilarious performance from Kevin Spacy, many other great performances, a subversive and uniquely compelling script, moody and erotic imagery, some hilariously dark humor, beautiful and striking cinematography, and multi-layered, seductive direction from Sam Mendes, the movie ends up being an emotionally complex experience that will stay with you and make you think.