The Movie
Some Best Picture Oscar winners leave me cold, and always will, while others seem to improve with age. Now that I'm older, wiser, and have a lot more in common with Lester Burnham (Kevin Spacey, who also won an Oscar, for his starring role), I find myself more fully appreciating the power of American Beauty. It's a brutally honest look at life in suburbia, as a hopelessly ordinary man watches his wife, his child and his career slip away. But rather than hang his head in morose self-pity, he enters a second adolescence with a vigor he hasn't felt in years. Chief among his gleeful indiscretions is his obsession with one of his daughter's high school friends, but it's his friendship with the marijuana-dealing next-door neighbor that winds up getting him in real trouble.
All of the acting is exceptional in this movie. This might be the best performance of Annette Bening's career, but what of poor Wes Bentley, who made a fast fade-out after his breakthrough here?
The Picture
Through the lens of the legendary Conrad Hall, who won his second Oscar for Beauty, the picture exhibits generally strong detail despite a hint of softness. The bold use of light and color along with some indelible compositions of the 2.4:1 frame make this movie hypnotic at times. There's a distinctive quality shift to the neighbor's video camera point-of-view throughout, and the backgrounds have that slightly artificial compressed appearance.
The Sound
This is a quiet movie, which is well-suited to the subject matter but doesn't always yield a compelling home theater experience, even in DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1. A large-scale, 360-degree scene like the basketball game has some surround activity but nothing too discrete, and it's rather quiet, as is the irksome dinner Muzak over the Burnham's whole-house audio system. There is however some discrete activity in the mains, and a welcome touch of resonance across the soundfield as needed. Thomas Newman's nominated score meanwhile is exquisitely recorded and mixed.
The Extras
All of the Blu-ray supplements are carried over from DVD. The audio commentary by director Sam Mendes and screenwriter Alan Ball (each of whom took home a statue for his work) is definitely worth a listen. "American Beauty: Look Closer" (22 minutes) is a mix of interesting and trite interviews from 2000, some real insight but also a tendency to sing its own praises in the frequent reference to all the critical accolades and media coverage.
The Storyboard Presentation with Sam Mendes and Director of Photography Conrad L. Hall is in fact an array of simple, static images, not interactive or picture-in-picture or anything, but still a priceless hour narrated by the master cinematographer. Both of these video extras are in standard definition. The DVD included some nifty ROM bonus content, all missing here of course.
Final Thoughts
A harsh yet remarkably funny tale of rejuvenation, misunderstanding and responsibility, American Beauty really is a masterful moviemaking achievement, particularly for first-timers Mendes and Ball. Blu-ray-wise, however, in all respects I was expecting at least a bit more from Paramount's prestigious "Sapphire Series" line.
Product Details
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