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For mig er der ingen tvivl om, at Sam Mendes peakede med hans debutfilm American Beauty som stadig er en smuk, poetisk, nærmest perfekt film.

Sam Mendes foran 10-8. What the fuck??

Der må være nogle der ikke har set The Usual Suspects!

American Beauty cleaned up the film awards for 1999, as it well should have. It was, after all, nearly scientifically engineered to win awards. [...]

Ball and director Sam Mendes (both Oscar winners, and both first-timers), perhaps unknowingly, concocted a perfect — and perfectly frustrating — accolade receptacle. American Beauty is a shallow, awkward brew of broad farce, condescending social commentary, and cheap melodramatics, validated by one "It"-actor of deserved renown (Spacey), eye-catching (and body-baring) turns by two virtual unknowns (Bentley and Birch), one "It"-actress of undeserved hype (Suvari), some arty pap having to do with badly CGI-ed rose petals, and a couple of really touching and meaningful moments that made it in there somehow, too. But most importantly, Ball and Mendes carefully spell out every situation, conflict, and emotion with the explicit approach of third-grade teachers, just to make sure everyone gets it. And that means the people who give out the awards. It's "art" for the not-too-bright.

Ball, formerly a writer for the short-lived sitcom "Cybil," gets stuck in TV mode. His characters all interact and react like rigid caricatures building toward a punchline, and Mendes, with his musical theater background, directs his actors to play accordingly, with lots of "big" confrontations, artificial speeches, and scenery-chewing breakdowns. There are times when it feels like American Beauty would've been truer to itself as one of those zany comedies about a grown man trying to act like a teenager, as Ball and Mendes craft some well-oiled farce in this direction. But when the farce tries to suddenly segue into drama again, there's not the necessary character development to back it up.

Even worse than these irreconcilable genre shifts, though, is the condescending nature of Ball's point-of-view. First there's the tired urban artist's conceit that middle class suburbia is really a mounting volcano of dysfunction, bitterness, repression, and fear. Debilitating neurosis is the status quo for all of Ball's characters — except for the neighborhood's idyllic gay couple, which, under the guise of progressive cheek still reduces gay characters to token, one-dimensional pawns of some social agenda. Neither does Ball allows any integrity whatsoever for Cooper's rigid Marine, who must be unequivocally bad to fit the writer's narrow purpose. And so is Bening's character limited to a gallery of shrieking fits and chilly glares to justify hero Lester's misdirected longing to juvenilia — and provide lots of juicy clips for the Oscar broadcast.

Ball uses as the impetus for Lester's denouement a ridiculously contrived misunderstanding of Blake Edwardsian — no, of Three's Company-esque — proportions. And beyond that, Lester's fate is simply gratuitous, sadly overshadowing the impact of his important moment of truth seconds prior; perhaps another sign from the writer of contempt for this pitiable suburban heel. [...]

Some of the other acting, however, is ludicrous. Bening's hammy theatrics echo Mommy Dearest, and Suvari — whose customarily weird inflection seems to go unnoticed as her dim star rises — is overbearing to the brink of embarrassment. If she were to give this same performance on an episode of Full House she would be roundly ridiculed — it's that bad. But she shows her boobies, so everyone lets it slide.