Hi all, this tumblr mainly exists as a way of tracking all the movies I've been watching and some of the initial thoughts, and general feelings, I've had about them.
5/5 - Fantastic movies; movies which need to be seen and enjoyed by everyone.
4/5 - Movies which are very good but don’t have that spark which compels you to make others watch them as well.
3/5 - Average movies; watchable and enjoyable, but nothing which elevates them higher. The baseline all movies are given before watching.
2/5 - Can be watched but really bland and forgettable.
1/5 - Minimal to no reason to watch these films. It may have some redeeming factors e.g. it’s so bad it’s good or there’s one character that’s awesome enough to make it not a total waste of time.
0/5- Total waste of time. Nothing redeemable about these films.
As with every review blog/site, this is all my own personal opinion so feel free to take everything with a grain of salt.
Also I'm Scottish so all reviews will be in UK English. Get used to theatre, colour and words ending in -ised.
Catching Elephant is a theme by Andy Taylor
#382/#99 American Beauty
(Rewatch)
A look into the separate mid-life crises of married couple Lester and Carolyn Burnham (Kevin Spacey and Annette Bening), their introverted daughter Jane (Thora Birch) and their new next door neighbours Col. Frank Fitts (Chris Cooper) and his troubled son Ricky (Wes Bentley).
This is an odd film. I sounds like such a boring subject matter from the description but it’s actually a really interesting insight into a lot of various subjects such as getting older, no longer being the person you used to be and whether or not the image we present to the world is actually how we are on the inside.
This is Spacey’s film. He owns every scene he’s in and he deservedly won the academy award for it. His character represent the unchecked id of a midlife crisis and still manages to have an emotional arc/epiphany by the end of the film. Bening is also wonderful in her role. There are glimmers of the girl Lester fell in love with but the pressures of suburbia and being a strong independent modern woman have just twisted and warped her until she is this unrecognisable person Lester, and by proxy, the audience just intensely dislike. Cooper too has a great performance and one that requires a secondary watching given the ending.
The only problems I have with this film are the teenage daughter and boy characters. I understand their narrative significance and why their interactions with Spacey matter but I just do not like either of these people. I’m not entirely sure I’m not supposed to feel this way about them but were I to re-watch this film I would quite happily fast forward past them until the more interesting people show up again.
It’s not a film you do come back to all that often but it’s worth at least a viewing once for Spacey’s performance alone. 4/5
