Looking closer at American Beauty

"My name is Lester Burnham. In less than a year I'll be dead"

IN A STRANGE twist of events, I practically stopped watching films on my computer and resigned from pirated downloads, preferring instead to go to the cinema or buy quality DVDs on amazon.co.uk. I'm fully aware of the benefits of new forms of cinema experience and I have the know-how to make the most of them, yet I refuse to follow the crowd on that. I guess, it's a backlash of sorts. As everybody jumps at easy and cheap ways to consume culture, I'm going back to old-fashioned ways. It also has a lot to do with the quantity or quality dilemma. I'm not really under pressure any more to watch the latest or the most popular productions. I don't have a dog in this race anymore and I can afford to experiment and go my own way.

True to this attitude, I started collecting what I consider masterpieces or outstanding works of cinema art on DVD. Apart from watching these great stories again, often for the umpteenth time, I especially appreciate bonus material if it contributes anything. I was delighted to discover that American Beauty DVD I bought some time ago and only found time to watch yesterday included audio commentary by Sam Mendes, the director, and Alan Ball, the screenwriter.

I think it'd watched this film twice before. Once in the cinema in my hometown when I was seventeen or eighteen and a high school student. I distinctly remember going there on my own and bumping into two classmates of mine. I was shaken when I left and continued to think about what I'd seen for days to come. There was the kind of emotional and moral intensity I was seeking as a teenager. It mostly originated in the way every character in the film is going through an identity crisis, struggling to re-evaluate their lives and find meaning in a reality that's become unbearably counterfeit. Despite its focus on suburban hypocrisy and a sense of personal entrapment, it managed to leave me with plenty of good positive things to consider about my own condition. Not even the film's brutal ending was capable of drying this wave of inspiration flowing from the story.

This time round, I mainly watched it for superior acting, especially from Kevin Spacey whose performance in Margin Call reminded me of this outstanding actor. His head-over-heels journey from a subdued suburban father and a depressed rank-and-file employee into an assertive, gym-going buddy who is rediscovering small joys of life and regaining his shattered self-confidence is just remarkable. It was brilliantly written by Alan Ball and then masterly executed by Spacey to leave the audience with a classic tragic character who is destined to die as he breaks free from his limitations and gets to be happy one more time before the thunder strikes.

I have to admit I'm also attracted to American Beauty because of its passionate critique of hypocrisy running through today's society. This particular drama plays out in suburban America, but many of its mechanisms could be found elsewhere without much effort. Mendes and Co. did an outstanding job scratching beneath the surface, if not demolishing the facade that we are often encouraged or forced to put up and hide behind. It's no accident that rebelious characters, like Lester, his daughter Jane (Thora Birch) or drug-dealing neighbour Ricky (Wes Bentley) are likely to get an upper hand with the audience compared to those who stick to the oppressive rules.