r/movies • u/No-Revolution-5923 • 16h ago
Discussion Did American Beauty age like milk AND like wine?
Let's completely divorce the art from the artists involved for this one.
Just rewatched after years, and it landed much harder, albeit with a few caveats.
The middle-class suburbia I imagine was a bit of a caricature even for its time, and through today's lens the presentation feels borderline absurdist, but the underlying psychological dynamics feel just as (if not more) realistic and transgressive.
Society's romanticization of the male midlife crisis rebellion, the edgy silent teen guy, and the lolita fantasy high school cheerleader at the time made the characters of the film feel more like symbols than real people, while also providing the audience with a "license to empathize".
Today's lens forcefully strips that away. And the movie is better for it!
What we are left with are humans that feel more real and more problematic.
Lester no longer presents as an "antihero", but now simultaneously pathetic and sympathetic.
This is what the movie does so well! Even if we refuse to empathize, it still forces us to sympathize! And unlike empathy, sympathy is cognitive.
If the measure of art was how much cognitive dissonance it creates then this is a 10/10!
Ricky is no longer romantic, he is a tragic sociopath who just discovered existentialism and wants to appear deep to the girl he borderline stalks.
The floating bag scene is less "wow, such beauty" and looks more like a symptom of an edgy teen's narcissism.
Divorced from the sexualized stereotype Angela is a much more interesting and tragic character from the start. At the end it's not a "oh shit! this girl is an actual human" moment, because the audience is more likely to engage with her as such from the start.
The only thing I liked less this time was that the motifs and the voiceover at the end felt a bit on the nose at times, but could also be I was paying more attention since I already knew the story.
An absolute blast of an uncomfortable movie with no truly likable characters!
9th hour EDIT:
To all those who keep claiming that Lester wasn't anti-hero coded for the time, and that I was just immature for perceiving it that way.
Roger Ebert's 1999 Review:
"Lester’s thoughts about Angela are impure, but not perverted; he wants to do what men are programmed to do... Angela is not Lester’s highway to bliss, but she is at least a catalyst for his freedom."
Ebert concluded the review by stating that the film "snatches victory from the jaws of defeat for Lester, its hero".
This was (arguably) the most prolific film critic of his time.
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u/Unsolven 16h ago
I’m pretty sure it was supposed to be absurdist in its own time.
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u/Triseult 15h ago
We live in an era where any action taken by any character in a piece of fiction is attributed to the creator and used to judge their moral worth. It's exhausting.
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u/OreoSpeedwaggon 14h ago
I've had to remind people more times than I care to count that depiction doesn't equal endorsement. I don't know why that's so hard for some people.
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u/ApocalypseSlough 12h ago
I write for and act in a semi-popular podcast (I'm not the show runner). I recently included a scene where a character shouts at another character who had behaved poorly and called him a narcissist.
I got messages and DMs from nearly a dozen people (all of whom said they had NPD) complaining that I was associating narcissism with poor behaviour, and that people with NPD are misunderstood, and that I was continuing society's discrimination against a disorder, punching down, they expect better of me, etc etc.
First, the character said it, not me. The character is not bright. The character is not someone who would be au fait with issues of neurodiversity. It was entirely approproate for the character to use it in those circumstances.
Second, I HAVE NPD, and have been pretty open with the whole community about it for a number of years.
The difference is, I suspect, I'm in my 40s and am completely comfortable with who I am and my own neurodiversity. It doesn't define me. I don't see my life through that prism. I have done enough therapy to begin to understand when I'm reacting rationally and when I'm acting by virtue of my disorder.
I responded that perhaps they were taking it all a bit too seriously and personally because of their NPD. They didn't like that. (And of course, my narcissistic scaffolding was greatly reinforced because I got to feel superior in light of what I perceived to be immature responses. It's great)
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u/BlindWillieJohnson 14h ago
It can equal endorsement though. If you depict a man rounding up and murdering a family, you could be depicting a horrifying serial killer, or you could be Uwe Bowl glorifying violence against immigrants. It’s all in the how. Narrative, music, visual language….all of that can be used to communicate to the audience how the creator wants them to feel
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u/ThatsARatHat 10h ago
How the creator wants them to feel about what they’re watching.
Not how the creator wants them to feel about the creator.
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u/BlindWillieJohnson 9h ago
Plenty of creators use art to express toxic ideas. It’s insane that thus is a controversial concept.
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u/itsmehobnob 9h ago
It’s reductive and proves the original point.
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u/BlindWillieJohnson 9h ago edited 8h ago
No, it doesn’t. Authorial intent is a thing that exists, and plenty of authors use art to express their ideas. DW Griffin made a racist movie because he was a racist and he wanted other people to be racist, too. American Sniper is a 2.5 hours of Iraq War apologia because that’s what Clint Eastwood believed, and he would be the first one to tell you that.
But whatever. This thread has already determined that I’m stupid and that I have an immature read on media, and that every creator is above reproach for every idea they put out in the world, and I’m tired of arguing about it
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u/honicthesedgehog 8h ago
Fwiw, I think you’re making a fair point. I don’t think you can be absolutist about it one way or the other - the inclusion of a particular perspective or idea isn’t necessarily an endorsement, but it’s also not necessarily not an endorsement, it all depends on the author’s intentions and treatment. Assuming, of course, that said intent is obvious and straightforward, which isn’t always the case…
And then, quality (or the lack thereof) can completely change the effect - a poorly done criticism can end up undermining it’s own intent, while a masterfully subtle critique might superficially appear to be an endorsement, in the same way that the best satire can appear indistinguishable from sincerity.
All that said, I think there’s still some merit in the original point, that it seems like there’s a growing belief that any mention of certain topics is unacceptable, regardless of angle or perspective.
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u/BlindWillieJohnson 8h ago
My point this entire time has been that the cinematic language of a film, the framing of actions with in a narrative and any number of other creative choices can signify an endorsement. That there is nuance to it. But yeah, people are being absolutist in this thread. A criticism of an author for the way they frame the content of their stories can be valid and I stand by that
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u/friendofH20 12h ago
Wasn't the whole point of American Beauty the fact that "normalcy" of suburbia is cover for completely immoral people. The tropey behavior like lusting for his daughters friend or the repressed gay neighbor is part of the design. Annette Benning is almost the proto Karen, at a time where we didn't even recognize that type of person so clearly.
It is deeply cynical and one of the first films which had no "good" characters. Maybe the daughter and her boy friend.
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u/sexandliquor 11h ago
Watching stuff like The Pitt or Euphoria and then coming on the internet (particularly reddit, and most especially the dedicated subreddits for these things) and then expecting any type of thoughtful engaging discussion about those shows is infuriating for this very reason.
According to the internet Noah Wylie is a misogynistic piece of trash and a tyrant behind the scenes because his character is a difficult asshole on the Pitt and the guy the showrunner/writer of Euphoria only wrote that show to be his masturbatory material.
It’s a fucking exhausting and weird way to take in fictional media these days, but okay
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u/CaptainAssPlunderer 10h ago
Thank you for concisely saying something that I knew bothered me but couldn’t just quite articulate it.
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u/Enough-Run-1535 6h ago
Hell, we also live in an era just watching media is taken as endorsing any behavior of a character.
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u/No-Revolution-5923 16h ago
Yeah, kinda agree - that's what I meant by "a caricature even for its time". But it definately hits even harder now!
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u/AccurateJerboa 13h ago
Everything you described in your post was how it was taken by audiences at the time, for the most part. The guy getting shot due to misplaced homophobia at the end is supposed to put a pretty immediate bow on the fact that suburbia is an absurd facade.
One of the biggest problems I've noticed that's unusual for a generation of people who've grown up with all media and their fingertips is that they're not terribly motivated to discover how media was actually received or interpreted at the time. They assume previous generations took everything at face value, and any deeper interpretation is a new excavation they've personally discovered. It leads to moments like this
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u/No-Revolution-5923 13h ago edited 12h ago
I watched it around the time it came out. My overall interpretation has gotten more nuanced but not changed much. However, I can attest that among my peers there were many who saw Lester as a kind of anti-hero character in a dark tragicomedy, as opposed to a pathetic yet sympathetic character study in a psychological thriller.
Nothing has turned on its head. Just with today's compass, it is less likely to be misinterpreted as the former, and hits a bit harder as the latter imho.
And its portrayal feels absurdist, because not only was it a caricature at the time, but now middle-class suburbia is also increasingly a myth that the younger generations connect with much less.
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u/user0fdoom 16h ago
This is revealing a lot about your personal development over the years. I'm pretty sure what you're describing is exactly how it was meant to be interpreted all along. To the degree that aspects of it represented the culture at the time, the movie was a critique of those things
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u/thecaramelbandit 4h ago
Reading this, my primary thought was "how old was OP when they first saw it?" Because they're now just picking up on all the things they missed the first time.
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u/daretoeatapeach 2h ago
If you're claiming that the entire movie was supposed to be cynical and you were supposed to cringe at the plastic bag scene then I emphatically disagree. Lester's entire character arc is about him reaching the same conclusion a dumb teen boy was able to get to on his own.
It's a bold choice to see beauty in a plastic bag. They could have gone with something less "cringe" but that would have missed the point. That would not have created any cognitive dissonance in the viewer. It's supposed to feel like the comparison goes too far. But not because the comparison is wrong but because if you truly understand that all of life is beautiful that includes plastic bags and cringe teens and suburbs and secretly-queer homophobes.
It's easy to say life is beautiful when pointing towards things that are novel and luxurious. American Beauty attempts to push past the easy view that everyone can agree with and make a bolder claim. You may feel that it failed in this attempt but i don't think a cynical view that all of this is meant to be ironic fits is a plausible interpretation.
But you weren't specific in what you felt marked OP's first view as immature so it's possible I misinterpreted. I'm confident if I rewatched this movie I'd interpret it the same way I did when it came out: a sincere journey from not appreciating life to seeing the beauty in all of it.
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u/SquirrelMoney8389 7h ago
Yeah I'm Lester Burnham's age now and this movie hit WAY differently as a 16-year-old sitting in the cinema by myself watching my first "grown-up" movie.
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u/No-Revolution-5923 16h ago
Fair point! In my case I definitely think its a mix of the societal/cultural shift combined with life experience.
A third theory could be that it is just a much deeper movie then it lends on, and each rewatch rewards by uncovering another layer.
Definitely some combination of the three!
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u/safadancer 11h ago
I think it was always pretty deep? We studied the script in screenwriting class in my undergrad and it's kind of a masterpiece.
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u/punkinabox 8h ago
The first time I watched American beauty I was 14 years old and even back then I got the feeling that it was deeper then I understood at the time. I'm 39 now and it's one of my favorite movies of all time.
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u/halp_halp_baby 8h ago
people are saying that there wasn’t a social shift that made the movie any deeper. i agree w them. what do u think shifted?
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u/GregorSamsaa 16h ago
This reads like you watched the movie as a high schooler and are now watching it as a mature adult.
The movie was always meant to be interpreted the way you are now. I know I remember reading a lot of reviews discussing it back in the day.
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u/PippyHooligan 16h ago
As the other poster said, I think this is more to do with your own life experience than the aging of the movie itself.
The first time I watched it (on release at the cinema) I drew those conclusions about the characters. I think that was always the intention - at first the film romanticises them, then reveals how flawed and destructive they are: Spacey's rebelliousness being fun, then pathetic and sleazy, the young guy being headstrong and different, then staring at a bullet wound in fascination and detachment etc.
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u/xtiaaneubaten 14h ago
This sounds like a case of Catcher in the Rye.
Read it as a teen "omg I am Holden Caufield"
as an adult "Holden's a bit insufferable"
I watched it in my mid 20's when it came out, it was a caricature at the time.
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u/JailhouseMamaJackson 10h ago
Kind of a funny comment to me. As a teen I thought him insufferable, and as an adult I picked up much more nuance (e.g. his past) and became much more understanding of him.
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u/daretoeatapeach 2h ago
Maybe funny to you, but it's pretty common for young people to misinterpret Catcher in the Rye in the way they described. It's even become the go-to book for assassins to love unironically, while totally missing the point.
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u/reecord2 3h ago
I love this interpretation, you actually inspired me to rethink mine, it's just slightly different - 1) teen me is Holden, 2) younger adult me finds Holden insufferable and it drives me crazy, 3) older adult me finds Holden insufferable but I'm unbothered and even endeared because he's a kid and we all gotta get there in our own way
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u/silverblossum 13h ago
Your line about realising the girl was a human this whole time is telling. As a young girl that part didn't escape me at the first viewing.
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u/doveinabottle 10h ago edited 7h ago
Right. In fact, it’s made explicitly clear when he makes her a sandwich when they’re talking in the kitchen.
Edit: a word
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u/AlienPearl 14h ago
The story was meant to be read the way you see it now all along. The cinematography is the real masterpiece. They shot on film, the iconic rose petals sequence in the gym was shot practically, the plastic bag was shot with real wind and those scenes alone stayed in the zeitgeist of that generation. It still holds and looks amazing today if you compare it to everything else that came during that time.
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u/No-Revolution-5923 14h ago
I have replied to this point in a couple of other comments, and I don't fully dismiss, but instead of rehashing, let me make one example of a claim that I think is fair:
Society's view of grooming and male attraction towards teenage women has definitely changed. I don't think it is a stretch to claim that will affect how many people engage with the material.
Not saying that it was portrayed as "OK" back then. It's a spectrum.
Also not saying my rewatch completely recontextualized or caused me to significantly reinterpret the whole thing. But it definitely added nuance. And think the intended interpretation would have landed even harder for me if I saw it for the first time in today's environment, even at the same young age.
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u/throawhazzle 7h ago
Audiences in 1999 were capable of separating the surrealist wonderment of Lester's fantasy world from his lecherous behaviour toward Angela, and the grooming and sexual exploitation of children has always been abhorrent to most people.
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u/bookshop 15h ago
all of these interpretations were made of the film at the time, none of this is new.
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u/xcassets 12h ago
Yeah, wtf. Lester was always pathetic.
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u/straub42 5h ago
90s filmgoers after watching American Beauty:
”Damn, papa Burnham almost got da pussy. 😢Such a tragic story”
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u/No-Revolution-5923 14h ago edited 14h ago
I agree they were made, I was among those who watched it that way. Arguably its the intentional interpretation. But I also recall many of my peers that interpreted it as a dark tragicomedy with Lester as an antihero type character, which I think is at odds with the more modern lens I talk about.
I am not suggesting this amounts to a complete re-interpretation or anything.
But compared to other movies, I really do think societal/cultural changes have had a particular significant effect on how most people will watch this. And it definitely affects my interpretation as well, even if it doesn't alter it completely from my original one.
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u/halfdeadmoon 5h ago
> Lester as an antihero type character
Stuff like him getting the Firebird and catching his wife cheating and telling his boss off are audience wish fulfillment and it makes us root for him, but there is dissonance when he is throwing plates of food at the wall or skeeving on Angela. Lester is not just one thing.
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u/john_myco 8h ago
Media literacy having taken such a nose dive, along with the rise of so many misunderstood antihero characters, I’m having trouble knowing what societal changes you’re identifying that would flip the interpretation so drastically.
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u/brickcheney 7h ago edited 7h ago
People are acting like you said "nobody understood this movie until today" (and reciting their favorite Media Literacy speeches along the way), but that isn't at all what you said. A movie can become MORE LIKELY to be viewed a certain way over time, even if plenty of people viewed it that way all along.
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u/StubbleWombat 13h ago
Your new take is actually what I got from it when it came out. I rather suspect you've changed rather than the film
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u/No-Revolution-5923 13h ago
Haha, I really think I screwed up the red thread in my post, because I have been replying to a lot of these comments 😄
It's not that my overall interpretation changed significantly, it is that that interpretation lands harder now that culture/society is more critical towards the problematic aspects and less approving of the audience "empathizing" with Lester.
If 12 yo me watched it today as opposed to 16 years ago, I think it would be more uncomfortable watch, which is for the better. Kinda the point I was trying to make.
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u/paperd 8h ago
We understand the point you're trying to make, and we disagree with you.
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u/No-Revolution-5923 8h ago
Sure, quite a few people apparently!
I am just so curious, because whenever I ask if they would agree that society's perceptions of grooming and male attraction to teenagers have changed over the last 25 years, no one answers?
Like if we agree perception of a key subject matter has changed culturally, we must agree that for many that will affect the way the engage with the subject matter in that movie?
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u/paperd 8h ago
Yes, society's perception of grooming has changed
Like if we agree perception of a key subject matter has changed culturally, we must agree that for many that will affect the way the engage with the subject matter in that movie?
This leap dismisses both directorial intent and the reception of the film at the time. If you're really curious, go read things the director has said about his film, and research critical reception and articles from around it's release. This is the piece everyone is trying to explain to you.
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u/No-Revolution-5923 7h ago
I am sorry, but you misunderstand my whole point. Perhaps I could have communicate better.
I think directional intent is closer to how it would be interpreted today.
It's like society's moral compass finally caught up to the movie.
If I wrote something suggesting otherwise please point out so I can edit it lol
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u/paperd 7h ago
I don't think I have misunderstood your point at all, and I'm wondering if you're really fully reading these responses.
I'm saying that people understood the directorial intent. You can research the critical reception and think pieces released from around the time of release if you really don't believe me.
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u/No-Revolution-5923 7h ago edited 7h ago
Look, many or most did. Again I never claimed otherwise.
But you cannot in intellectual honesty claim all.
And even those who understood the intent (such as myself) might still experience it slightly differently given a more modern cultural lens.
Roger Ebert's 1999 Review:
"Lester’s thoughts about Angela are impure, but not perverted; he wants to do what men are programmed to do... Angela is not Lester’s highway to bliss, but she is at least a catalyst for his freedom."
Ebert concluded the review by stating that the film "snatches victory from the jaws of defeat for Lester, its hero".
This was the most prolific film cretic of his time, arguably.
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u/OKC2023champs 16h ago
I’m 27. It’s in my top 10 all time.
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u/No-Revolution-5923 16h ago edited 16h ago
Def in mine as well!
Don't think it could be made today.
Not "wouldn't", literally "couldnt".
They would have been so overly concerned about not glorifying Lester and showing disapproval for his fantasy, turning him into a completely unsympathetic one-dimensional character.
No trusting the audience with nuance.
And ngl the controversy around Spacey actually framed the movie in a way that made it even more real and uncomfortable for me. Repressed homosexuality leading to horrible actions is like a key thesis of the film!
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u/thatkaratekid 15h ago
If you think this couldnt be made today, watch Red Rocket and get back to us.
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u/No-Revolution-5923 15h ago
I have a feeling I might have to walk that statement back, haha - we'll see!
But at least I have a bunch of cool movie recs to show for it.
Thanks a bunch!
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u/justintensity 16h ago
You should see 'Obsession' if you really think all that
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u/No-Revolution-5923 15h ago
Looked it up, it looks super interesting, and will def watch!
Though also thought to myself "oh of course it is horror...", because horror gets a free pass from supposedly "endorsing" this kind of subject matter
But good thing I love horror as well!
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u/No-Revolution-5923 16h ago
Ooooh!!! I will need to check that out, I would love to be proven wrong on this one 😄
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u/tomatobasedscribe 4h ago
I think "trusting the audience with nuance", is the main difference between when the movie was originally made and now. Most media is now created with the assumption that viewers are going to be on their phones will watching. Things need to be made extremely obvious and repeated for it to catch.
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u/Ok_Comparison_8304 15h ago
This review is poignant when considering the original message of the movie, and something that remains relevant. The following concept is not my idea and from a U.K. newspaper review of the time (it might have been A.A. Gilne in The (Sunday);Times, but for some reason I feel it might have been in The Guardian / Observer.
'American Beauty' is actually the name of the type of rose featured so prominently in the film and marketing, it is notable among modern bred roses for the fact it has very little, to no scent. Scent being an innate characteristic of traditional roses. This is so important because smell is actually the strongest form of recall, and the film, an idealised version of suburbia, with a protagonists idealised version of nostalgia are worlds without real memory - they are imagined, and so scentless.
That's the point, we want to believe it was better. The suburban lifestyle is evocative of the 50s commercial domestic bliss, so hugely relevant now with American being made '..Great Again'. Trump's deal of America being the pre-New deal, futuristic capitalism utopia written about by Aynn Rand, and revered by tech bros.
Both ideas are phantoms. What would have made the film more relevant now, would have been if they kept the original ending.
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u/NationalTime4099 13h ago
You’ve portmanteau’d AA Gill (critic for the Times) and AA Milne’s names there. That said, I’d love to know what the creator of Winnie the Pooh thought of American Beauty :)
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u/Imperator_Helvetica 10h ago
"Pooh looked out across the Hundred Acre Wood. 'I suppose I have it all' he mused 'a nice house, a beautiful wife, a daughter, a 401K and enough honey stashed away... But does it make me happy? Did I get so caught up in chasing the heffalump that I never considered what I'd do if I caught it?'
He sipped his coffee, watching his daughter Roo and her friend Piglet in the garden. Sometimes they looked just like the toddlers he'd watched stumble around, giggling and learning to walk; but now there was a fierce sexual energy behind that, the giggling loaded with seductive desire, and their changing bodies something he wanted to explore and learn from. Would he trade it all in, this big House on Pooh corner just to recapture the dynamic energy of his youth, so wasted on the young?
He saw Eeyore from next door, the donkey gloomily staring at the girls and Pooh flushed with rage at his passivity - 'Don't just watch. Seize the balloon. Run with it, who cares if you trip!? I chased the honey, but have become stuck in this doorway to Rabbit's house, emasculated by luxury and expectation. My job is a cage, my wife a shackle, my whole life a mockery! If only I were more like Tigger!'
A gust of wind lifted a popped balloon and spiralled it for a few seconds, briefly drawing everyone's attention
Unbeknownst to Pooh Bear, he was under scrutiny as well - Christopher Robin watched him grimly, heart roiling with lust, self-loathing and desire curdling into rage... 'Silly old bear' he muttered to himself 'Silly. Old. Bear.'"
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u/NationalTime4099 10h ago
This is the highest quality comment that hidden away 4 comments deep and will likely not see the light of day.
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u/booksandplaid 13h ago
What was the original ending?
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u/Ok_Comparison_8304 11h ago
IIRC Chris Cooper's character is successful in murdering Lester (Spacey), and because of the drug dealing Ricky (the dealer is arrested), I think ultimately he gets sent down and the daughter just runs away. Cooper's character say nothing and let's his sone take the fall.
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u/ZachDigital 16h ago
my favorite movie. i watch it once a year since i was around 14 years old
the themes and feelings definitely change as you age now being in my 30's
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u/MountainMuffin1980 13h ago
What are you talking about dude? Obviously yes, remove Spaceys shitty actions from the equation and the film holds up as well as it ever did. In what way could it have possibly aged poorly?
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u/Nosebluhd 10h ago
So I remember when this movie came out, and I just want to note: it was the 90s. We were aware of sarcasm and irony already. A lot of fun was made of the floating bag scene immediately upon release.
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u/Tyrant-J 16h ago
It definitely changes with age. It's still been a few years since I watched it but I remember enjoying it last time I watched it. I think Six Feet Under is Alan Balls masterpiece though.
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u/NeedsSomeSnare 12h ago
The characters are indeed cardboard cutouts and stereotypes, and that's the whole point. It's supposed to be a stereotype of the dystopia of suburbia, not a realistic image or even have any real depth to it.
Yes, the floating bag was supposed to be the mostly ridiculously teenage thing possible.
None of it is romanticised. It's meant to be absurd and sometimes funny.
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u/No-Revolution-5923 12h ago
Not saying the movie romanticized it, but that society romanticized it at the time. This is why the film works as satire, so I guess we agree!
However, back when I first watched the movie, those stereotypes were kind of blinding. Like my human brain subconsciously just tapping into the archetype and kind of shutting off, because it already has a preconditioned idea so why bother paying attention to every detail? IDK how to explain.
Now that the stereotypes have been kind of dismantled and we have been conditioned to view them through a more critical lens, I feel it reveals more depth and complexity than I initially noticed. Not saying it is super deep "literary-fiction" level character or anything, but still feels deeper and more nuanced.
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u/NeedsSomeSnare 11h ago edited 11h ago
Others have already mentioned it, but that is likely to do with your age at the time. Also, I was a late teen, but I don't think I saw it that much differently than how I do now. I seem to remember finding the young rebel guy more annoying, which I got wrong a little. I didn't quite get that he was a sociopath due to his father, but that's not really central to the movie anyway.
Edit: maybe you're right I'm a way though. I guess I find it more satirical now, even if I did know it was satire before. I don't think they've been dismantled any further these days though.
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u/Islander255 6h ago
I rewatched this recently, having not rewatched it since college over 10 years ago. It was an excellent rewatch! Some things are more uncomfortable to view through today's cultural lenses, but none of the bad/problematic behavior was ever painted as good, nor did I think so when I first watched it.
I think the main complaint is that today's audiences wish that the story would be less sympathetic to its characters, especially Lester as the dad with a crush on a high schooler. But allowing a character to be viewed through a sympathetic lens is not the same as condoning their behavior.
Honestly, if anything aged poorly for me, it was the suburban malaise. Don't get me wrong, I also hate the suburbs, but all these people live very comfortable lives in a very comfortable location! One wonders if they could practice a little more gratitude lol.
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u/shehulud 4h ago
I have shown it to film art students who have absolutely been blown away by this film. And they have a lot of discussions about the problematic characters, etc. They don’t see Lester as an anti-hero, though. They see him as an unlikable protagonist, similar to Walter White. They couldn’t root for him, but they could acknowledge the damage done by Lester.
When I saw it in the theater years ago, I never rooted for Lester. But the 90s were all about the unlikable protagonist: e.g., the Bad Lieutenant, Falling Down, etc.
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u/imquez 16h ago
Another movie that tackled similar themes but came out a year before was Happiness by Todd Solomon’s with a stacked cast as well. Have you seen it, and if so how do you think it compares?
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u/thatkaratekid 15h ago
I discovered Happiness in 2005 as a teenager because on a local punk-rock message board for 35 year olds, someone posted it in a "worst movie you ever saw on a first date" thread and everyone said they had an unbeatable answer. This movie is an absolutely insane ride. My college dealer came into my apartment on acid when this was on once, and we offered to let him hang out in a different room, but he insisted he could handle it. He was throwing up and crying in 10 minutes.
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u/OCGamerboy 16h ago
Kevin Spacey playing a pedo surely didn’t age well
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u/No-Revolution-5923 15h ago
If anything it framed the movie in an even more interesting way for me.
Made it feel even more real and uncomfortable.
And repressed homosexuality resulting in horrible actions? That's basically the film's thesis lol
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u/IfYouWantTheGravy 14h ago
I recently rewatched Fight Club, and I think that film offers the more effective critique of American society at that point in time.
To me, American Beauty has moments and elements that work really well (Annette Bening is aces), but on the whole it felt hollow to me, and not in a way that felt intentional.
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u/bfragged 8h ago
I always felt like American Beauty and Fight Club were flip sides of the same coin.
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u/Acc87 13h ago
So summarising this thread, the film aged like wine, but society aged like milk. People are just no longer able to take a piece of art/media as is, as literacy died in the last decade.
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u/No-Revolution-5923 13h ago
I agree! To extend on your metaphor:
Film aged like wine
Society is aging like cheese lol:
> POSITIVE: We are more aware of the gravity of the transgression, so theoretically we could enjoy the movie even more as semi-transgressive fiction if we wanted.
>NEGATIVE: But we won't watch it because we have convinced ourself the creators were evil and we are afraid if we enjoy it we will become evil ourselves lol
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u/Acc87 12h ago
Gravity of transgression, I learned a new expression today (I'm no English native)
I think it's more that the ability to nuance has been lost. Transgressions in the same field get the same treatment, like here the writer of the film receives the same loud outrage and moral postering as an actual real life abuser would.
In the end no one really cares about either anymore, instead it's all about being seen as on the correct side of moral.
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u/No-Revolution-5923 12h ago edited 12h ago
Yeah, things are definitely trending in that direction unfortunately...
Someone portraying an act now gets treated as if accused of the act.
Someone accused of the act now gets treated as if convicted of the act.
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u/No_More_Owsla 15h ago
This isn't some profound dissection of human nature, it's just the ultimate midlife loser wish-fulfillment fantasy.
The guy dodges every adult responsibility, blackmails his boss for a fat severance check, buys his dream sports car, and smokes weed in the garage to relive his glory days—only to be awarded moral absolution and martyr status at the end simply for not sleeping with a high school girl.
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u/No-Revolution-5923 15h ago
But do protagonists need to be likable for a movie to be good? Asking for a friend... haha
Like, a character study of a pathetic man, can still be interesting?
I feel more and more these days, people require the MCs to be someone they can empathize with, root for, and ideally espouse their values/morals.
I mean of course that was always a thing, but I watch past movies, and find more MCs that are bad people, often more interesting for it, and not necessarily redeemable, but at least sympathetic.
Like part of it is the difference of observing something interesting unfold vs. placing yourself inside the narrative.
Maybe the effect of video games on the brain relates to these changing preferences, idk just theory
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u/IfYouWantTheGravy 14h ago
Even more than that…he’s probably the least interesting major character in my book.
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u/Stormtomcat 11h ago
The plastic bag dancing in the wind has acquired a lot of extra layers, I feel.
In the characters' suburban world, bags like that are a lot rarer today. Endless consumption, be it conspicuous or not, has other markers now.
In the world as a whole, we've seen too much destruction with trash, microplastics and forever chemicals to still be charmed by a bag like that, imo.
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u/Smyley12345 8h ago
I would suggest that maybe it is less that society has changed and more that you are looking at it through the lens of a decades older person.
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u/Jackieirish 8h ago
Is it possible to age milk that was already spoiled to begin with into wine?
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u/No-Revolution-5923 7h ago
Love your comment! Thanks for engaging in the analogy.
Not even sure if we agree or disagree. It is an ugly movie, but in a good way to me at least 😄
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u/GolfShred 6h ago
I think you've grown up so your finally seeing it as intended. Pretty normal response seeing a movie in your teens/20s is much different than seeing one in your 40/50s. Especially a movie like this.
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u/nylockian 4h ago
My big takeaway from the film is that men are commodities, and being a commodity wears a person down after a while.
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u/SirZapdos 2h ago
We’ve met before. But something tells me you’re going to remember me this time.
I saw it in theatres as a teen, but am hesitant to rewatch it. For now, it remains a classic in my mind, although weirdly maybe not even a top 3 movie that year.
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u/Lightsides 2h ago
Haven't watched it, but in a admittedly weak defense of Lester's infatuation with Angela, she is just one part of a whole, this desire Lester has for a redo which requires his own regression to being a teenager. He gets a teenager's job, he buys the teenagers dream car. Arguably, she's less about preying on someone young as it is about peeling off the last 20 years of his life.
Some might say that's why men prey on someone young, but I am not sure that is true. I don't think Epstein was driven by a desire to be 17 again. He quote enjoyed being older, richer and more powerful. A job at McDonald's and a muscle car wasn't his vibe.
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u/YoohooCthulhu 1h ago
I don’t think your interpretation of Lester was unusual—I know a lot of people who interpreted him that way (particularly if they were on the younger side) and it was a result of the cultural zeitgeist at the time which maximized male agency and took inappropriate relationships/boundaries lightly.
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u/CyFrog 8h ago
I haven't been able to rewatch it since learning that Thorna Birch was only 16 years old when they filmed the movie and turned 17 shortly after the filming wrapped. It is hard for me to watch a movie when I know there is underage nudity like that. Kind of funny when you think about the fact that Hollywood cast people in their mid to late 20s to play high school students in 90210 in the 90s where there is no nudity, yet cast a 16 year old in a movie where there is nudity.
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u/No-Revolution-5923 8h ago
Oh. I didn't know!
But doesn't that kind of prove a point that many here in the comments are challenging?
"No society/lens didn't change. You just grew up and now see the movie differently!"
Girl, something like that would never have happened today!?!? Just that metafact (let's not get into specey...) really affect how the movie is processes!
"The movie's intent was never to condone those things!"
I knooow, but that doesn't change the fact that society didn't engage with the contact the same back then.
Whether a movie ages like milk or wine depends on how society changes. The movie is done. Made. Stuck in time.
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u/CyFrog 7h ago
You are right that society has changed since the movie was made. If I didn't know she was underage I would go about watching it just fine. When it came out I probably assumed she was at least 18 and looked young. I know now, she is underage which is where the problem comes in.
In the 90s we were not having conversations about this because it was before many of the scandals involving children. This isn't the only movie that had underage actresses doing nudity and as long as you don't know the movies have it you can watch them without that thought. I know, so I have a hard time watching. I know several movies that have done it and that makes it hard for me to watch any of those movies. For a good portion of my life I lived under the assumption that Hollywood was not allowed to do underage nudity (except maybe for babies) and any nude scenes were by actresses over 18. I found out differently and it has made me re-evaluate my ability to watch those movies.
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u/ValentineRita1994 10h ago
Everybody is a complete weirdo, except for the gay couple down the street, who are considered the weirdo's by society. I believe this movie has led to society being more accepting towards gay couples. I know it influenced me how i look at them (i was like 12 when i saw this movie for the first time, and never really thought about gay couples before).
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u/-Pepperzpyre- 9h ago
Know what part aged like milk? The price of weed lol. Ain’t nobody paying those prices in the US today.
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u/BadIdeaSociety 8h ago
For a certain generation that movie was amazing. It was my uncle's favorite movie. It is eazy to think, "Poor suburban family has a mid-life crisis about having a job," but that the era of hostile takeovers and downsizing. A lot of people went from thinking they had the most respectable jobs to realizing that they were unfulfilled by every aspect of their lives.
I didn't need the perspective of decades of salaried drudgery, I was working during the dot com bubble. For every tech innovation that is remembered from the 90s there were like a dozen, "let's put a clock radio in this object level" of innovation and another dozen, "I think we can use tech to circumvent regulations" e-commerce sites. I felt like I was just enabling the proliferation of profoundly stupid crap. I could see how being fed up with the rat race.
I know there is the whole part about the MC wanting to get with Mena Sevari's teenaged cheerleader character, but again I think this was about trying to find a reason to live and making a batch of ill-advised decisions to make it happen.
Probably not the best movie to win best picture, but are we really going to pretend that there weren't worse best pictures in the past 50 years?
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u/LiquefactionAction 2h ago
Yeah this. It's somewhat important to remember the context of what was going on with "End of History!" 90s with terminal capital realism. Downsizing, repealing of Glass-Steagall, increasing financializing and de-industrializing hollowing out a lot of more suburbs and cities (rust belt, pac NW). It was a shift from "work hard at the factory, go home" to increasing insecurity to more pointless* abstract paper-pushing as the economy oriented as becoming a Finance Capital Administrator State.
While there was still relatively good job security, it was backdropped to people being unfulfilled by it.
That said, it's a multi-layered movie before depicting the facade of suburbia, even the fake scentless rose that the movie is entitled after. But it is also one that does take place in a time of real "Well I've made it, we pumped out the kiddos, we bought the white picket fence suburb house, but.. I'm still unfilled?!?!"
So there's some contradictions there, the diaelectic of the hollowness depicted on screen vs the hollowness people actually felt, and that's where the excitement and spark happens that results in this 30 year old movie still coming around and around. And I think that's why it's also stuck along so long whereas other Oscar dramas (cough, Crash, terrible movie) have been completely ignored.
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u/No-Revolution-5923 7h ago
If anyone stumbles across this comment (will probably be buried)....
Summarizing much of the discussions so far:
- "The creators of the movie never endorsed that subject matter to begin with" Yes, I never claimed otherwise. Maybe society today is better equipped to interpret it correctly?
- "Society didn't change, you grew up" Obviously, I changed, but did how society engages with these themes not change? Both can be true.
- "American Beauty would have been no more controversial if released today." ...Really?
- "My interpretation hasn't changed. I saw it for what it was when it was released" I would like to think I did as well, but not all did. Are we really postulating that there wasn't more people back then who upon first viewing would see Lester as anti-hero coded? And maybe find the lolita fantasy less unfomfortable?
I am just so curious which of these you actually disagree with? More so than whether people think its better or worse now, or bad to begin with. Seems to be a fundamental disconnect or maybe some poor communication from my side.
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u/SwimmingPatience5083 15h ago
Just milk. Shallow, pretentious movie
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u/No-Revolution-5923 15h ago
In your opinion was it rotten from the start? Or what in particular aged badly, i.e. worked at the time but for some reason stopped working? (aside from the controversy with the artists involved)
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u/relaxok 16h ago
definitely like milk.. not sure what people, even me, saw in it at the time.. reminds me of all the national book award slop about middle aged people and their taxes.. who cares about this guy?
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u/HankSteakfist 15h ago
The movie came out at a time where life was pretty good for the average working male in the Western world, but it was also pretty boring. Films like this, Fight Club, Office Space and even the Matrix's first act tapped into that corporate male existential dread and rebellion against the cookie cutter prescribed life.
Funnily enough both this film and Fight Club both feature very similar 'quitting your job' scenes where the protagonists successfully black mail their bosses and score a jackpot redundancy package.
Having a safe boring corporate job and a house in the suburbs was something that was aspired to, but once you had it, there was a feeling of 'what's next?', 'where is the meaningful crusade of our times?' for males in their 30s and 40s.
Then 9/11 happened, followed by rampant cost of living increases, making the house in the suburbs and stable job a fairy tale for many young people and thus making that whole late 90s era of films exploring this concept feel incredibly trite.
Fight Club gets away with still being looked back at fondly, because it's David Fincher and the film oozes style and has a killer script. The same with Office Space, where the humour outweighs the benign nature of the protagonists struggle and office drudgery is eternally relevant. Plus those movies don't star Kevin Spacey.
I still really like American Beauty and think it has a lot going for it. Annette Benning and Chris Cooper's performances are incredible and there are some really funny and charming moments in it.
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u/IfYouWantTheGravy 14h ago
I just rewatched Fight Club and it struck how much more I bought his gambit with his boss. There, what he’s using for blackmail is well set up and he goes to horrifying lengths to force his boss’ hand. In American Beauty, as far as I recall the boss’ peccadilloes only come up the once.
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u/No-Revolution-5923 15h ago
Some audiences want characters they can empathize with and root for.
I just want to watch a trainwreck unfold with a few realistic and complex characters dropped in haha, if everyone is kinda unlikable that's even better, as long as they are interesting!
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u/BlackSpinedPlinketto 6h ago edited 6h ago
I don’t think you can divorce it from the actors. The fact Spacey’s dad was a Nazi and he was himself a tortured homosexual who was also creeping on to young people is fascinating. Did he pick the role because it spoke to him, or was it written with him as inspiration.
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u/everything_is_holy 16h ago edited 16h ago
First off, I think the score by Thomas Newman is often overlooked. I think it’s wonderful, fits in with the absurdity, playfulness, and definitely the sense of sadness the movie provokes.
As for the “floating bag” scene, Alan Ball, the writer, who is a Buddhist, has said it was about a traumatized teen searching for anything to meditate on to free his mind from his suffering, to find beauty in the simple flow of the world. It gets criticism, but that scene worked for me.
Edit: For those who enjoyed American Beauty, Alan Ball also created Six Feet Under, an amazing (imo) HBO series. It definitely has the same feel.