American Beauty is a 1999 drama written by Sam Mendes and Alan Ball, and directed by Mendes (in his directorial debut). It starred Kevin Spacey, Annette Bening, Mena Suvari, Thora Birch, Wes Bentley, and Chris Cooper. The outstanding supporting cast includes Allison Janney, Peter Gallagher, Marissa Jaret Winokur, Scott Bakula, John Cho, and Amber Smith (the latter two having very brief scenes). In the film, Spacey plays Lester Burnham, a middle-aged guy in a loveless marriage and a dead-end job who goes through a midlife crisis, inspired to quit his job by his new neighbor (and his daughter's new boyfriend), Ricky (played by Bentley). Benning plays his very Type-A wife, Carolyn, and Thora Birch plays his teenage daughter, Jane. Burnham starts lusting after his daughter's friend, Angela, and Cooper plays Ricky's father, Frank. The movie is about the parts of suburban life that people keep hidden behind closed doors, and how the perfect lives people try to project to their neighbors are often not reality.
The blu-ray release is a single-disc release. It carries over some (but not all) of the bonus content from the original DVD release. The bonus features include two versions of the theatrical trailers, a storyboard presentation with commentary by Mendes and the Director of Photography, a behind-the-scenes featurette featuring interviews with the cast and crew, and a commentary track on the film by Mendes and Alan Ball. It does not include the digital screenplay, production notes, the DVD-ROM content, or cast and crew biographies that were included on the DVD. The A/V quality of the Blu-Ray is excellent, and the HD format is a definite upgrade from the DVD.
Ultimately, the movie is wonderful. It won several Academy Awards, including Best Picture. It is well-written and very well-acted. Some of the story is very cringeworthy, which was the point. All of the main characters are flawed at the very least, deeply so in some cases. It is a unique movie in which even the protagonists are not all that good. It deals with issues such as homophobia, adultery, lust, drug use, abuse (and ignoring abuse), and the like. It does contain a lot of swearing, sexual content, and nudity, so it very much earns its R-rating. And of course, in the last several years, Spacey has become a persona non grata because of multiple accusations of sexual misconduct. He was absolutely the star of the movie, and his performance helped carry the film and make it what it was. However, he definitely did not carry the film all by himself, and it would not have been as good as it was without the rest of the cast and crew. So, whatever Spacey did or did not do in his personal life, you can still enjoy the movie. Ultimately, it is a great movie that deserved all the acclaim it received and is absolutely worth watching.
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