|
|
DVD : American Beauty (Widescreen Edition)In association with Amazon.comstarring: Annette Bening, Thora Birch, Chris Cooper, Peter Gallagher, Sam Robards directed by: Sam Mendes  List Price: $12.99 Amazon.com's Price: $5.99 You Save: $7.00 (54%)Prices subject to change. Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours
This item ships for FREE with Super Saver Shipping.
Aspect Ratio: 2.35:1Audience Rating: R (Restricted) Binding: DVD Brand: PARAMOUNT PICTURES EAN: 9780783241234 Format: Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, DTS Surround Sound, DVD-Video, Special Edition, Widescreen, NTSC ISBN: 0783241232 Label: Dreamworks Video Manufacturer: Dreamworks Video Model: 85382 Number Of Items: 1 Picture Format: Anamorphic Widescreen Publisher: Dreamworks Video Region Code: 1 Release Date: October 24, 2000 Running Time: 122 minutes Studio: Dreamworks Video Theatrical Release Date: 1999 Sales Rank: 1010 MPN: 65382 Related Items:
Editorial Review: Product Description: Marking the feature film directorial debut of award-winning theatre director Sam Mendes this funny moving and shocking journey through life in suburban America follows the trials and tribulations of Lester (Kevin Spacey) and Carolyn (Annette Bening) an upper-middle class couple whose marriage - and lives - are slowly unraveling. Lester s wife hates him his daughter Jane regards him with contempt and his boss is positioning him for the ax. So Lester decides to make a few changes in his life; the freer he gets the happier he gets which is even more maddening to his wife and daughter. But Lester is about to learn that the ultimate freedom comes at the ultimate price. Winner of five Academy Awards: Best Picture Director Actor Screenplay and Cinematography.System Requirements:Starring: Kevin Spacey Annette Bening Thora Birch Chris Cooper Peter Gallagher Mena Suvari and Wes Bentley. Directed By: Sam Mendes. Running Time: 122 Min. Color. This film is presented in "Widescreen" format. Copyright 2000 Universal Distribution Corp.Format: DVD MOVIE Genre: DRAMA Rating: R UPC: 667068538229 Manufacturer No: 65382 Amazon.com essential video: From its first gliding aerial shot of a generic suburban street, American Beauty moves with a mesmerizing confidence and acuity epitomized by Kevin Spacey's calm narration. Spacey is Lester Burnham, a harried Everyman whose midlife awakening is the spine of the story, and his very first lines hook us with their teasing fatalism--like Sunset Boulevard's Joe Gillis, Burnham tells us his story from beyond the grave. It's an audacious start for a film that justifies that audacity. Weaving social satire, domestic tragedy, and whodunit into a single package, Alan Ball's first theatrical script dares to blur generic lines and keep us off balance, winking seamlessly from dark, scabrous comedy to deeply moving drama. The Burnham family joins the cinematic short list of great dysfunctional American families, as Lester is pitted against his manic, materialistic realtor wife, Carolyn (Annette Bening, making the most of a mostly unsympathetic role) and his sullen, contemptuous teenaged daughter, Jane (Thora Birch, utterly convincing in her edgy balance of self-absorption and wistful longing). Into their lives come two catalytic outsiders. A young cheerleader (Mena Suvari) jolts Lester into a sexual epiphany that blooms into a second adolescence. And an eerily calm young neighbor (Wes Bentley) transforms both Lester and Jane with his canny influence. Credit another big-screen newcomer, English theatrical director Sam Mendes, with expertly juggling these potentially disjunctive elements into a superb ensemble piece that achieves a stylized pace without lapsing into transparent self-indulgence. Mendes has shrewdly insured his success with a solid crew of stage veterans, yet he's also made an inspired discovery in Bentley, whose Ricky Fitts becomes a fulcrum for both plot and theme. Cinematographer Conrad Hall's sumptuous visual design further elevates the film, infusing the beige interiors of the Burnhams' lives with vivid bursts of deep crimson, the color of roses--and of blood. --Sam Sutherland Average Rating:
 Rating:  - American RealityThis is a great, satirical, passionate, sensual, and disturbing movie. You will love the character development and find yourself on the side of different characters as time goes on. The characters are so diverse and dissimilar from one another that it is realistic, in that they are not cookie-cutters of one another. Complexity of characters is what really makes this movie. Kevin Spacey and Annette Benning give performances that are so convincing that you feel like you've just witnessed ... Read More Rating:  - technically beautiful ... morally crapIt should take more than technical perfection to deserve recognition by the Academy. The plot is expertly crafted. The direction is superb. The acting immaculate. The photography and editing exemplify the highest standards of film making. We learn nothing useful from this film. In this case the senseless death of the hero character is an insult. This film was a waste of good cellulose. What would have been useful is the way back ... teaching us how to turn desperate and ... Read More Rating: - Enough has been said but....There have been so many reviews of this movie I will limit my comment to state my sheer amazement after reading the 1 STAR reviews ... It is beyond comprehension this brilliant piece of artistry can be rated below 3 STARS by anyone.... In my mind it is one of the most socio-realistic screen plays that have ever come out of Hollywood - not due to the (perhaps overly) tragicomic characterizations but because each character represents something real in all of us... But maybe that does not resonate ... Read More Rating: - From Pain To PleasureMy girlfriend bought this movie. I didn't want to see it. I thought it was a "chick flick". It was raining outside, and I had used up all my options. Now I had to watch it. I should have known it would be good with Kevin Spacey in it. Everything he does it great. But I had no idea it was this good. I can usually figure out the endings of most Hollywood movies these days. They are all the same: the plots, the characters, the acting, or lack of it. I knew how this one was going to end, but ... Read More Rating: - The world according to drama majorsThe film's ending can be predicted after the first few scenes, unless one is completely unfamiliar with cookie cutter PC cliche-laden plot lines churned out by Hollywood's scriptwriting factories. (A quick quiz: in the land of Hollywood who is the ultimate villian -- the drug pusher, the cheating wife, the near-pedophile husband ... or, the man who won't come out of the closet?) A shallow film, about shallow people, given 5 stars by shallow reviewers. Browse for similar items by category:
|
||