"American Beauty" is the first feature film directed by British director Sam Mendes. The film uses a black comedy approach, through two ordinary American families, showing the ugliness and darkness hidden in the seemingly harmonious appearance of American society, and deliberately exaggerates, distorts, and enlarges them to make the audience feel absurd. While being ridiculous and funny, he also felt uncontrollable heaviness and depression. With its unique artistic performance and profound meaning, the film won the 72nd Oscar five awards in one fell swoop and became the big winner of the Oscars that year.
In terms of theme expression, the film adopts a layered approach. Through the key portrayal of several typical characters, the many crises surrounding the two families reflect the appearance of all beings in American society and the common social problems, and finally through the step-by-step transformation and awakening of the protagonist, the film is extended to the right A discussion of the crisis of human nature. The protagonist Lester is a representative of a class of middle-class men: a mediocre career, ignored by his family; lost his previous ideals, willing to be mediocre, undesirable. Caroline is a typical type of being eroded by material desires. She believes in success, and in order to succeed, she maintains her perfect image everywhere. Failure in her eyes is shameful, so she tried her best to suppress the weakness in her heart. Daughter Jane is indifferent on the outside and low self-esteem on the inside. She hates the indifference of her parents and prays for attention in a rebellious way. And Jane’s good friend Angela is beautiful but fragile at heart, afraid of mediocrity, and cannot tolerate being ignored. Ricky's father, Frank, is another male representative of the middle class: a person who completely denies, hides, and suppresses himself in order to be affirmed by the society. Almost every character in the film is trying his best to obey the rules of the game in society and try to play his own role. As Frank said when he taught Ricky: "You can't love what you want, you have to know how to behave!" However, these people who want to become normal hide too much ugliness. In the game they played, they gradually lost their true self and the ability to love and be loved. The gulf between the spirit and the flesh is terrifying, and it will make people fall into endless loneliness unconsciously. As a result, Leicester's numbness, Caroline's mask, Frank's brutality, etc., became their weapons to fight loneliness and continue to survive. Among these people, the only one who understands the beauty of life is Ricky, who seems to be the most abnormal and is considered a freak. This is undoubtedly a huge irony. Is this the so-called American dream? Is this the so-called prosperous and well-developed happy life advocated by the US government? In the seemingly calm, calm narrative, the film conveys the doubts about American society to every audience.
So, what will be the fate of people in the face of a false, vulnerable and perilous real life? Through Leicester's transformation, the director gave his own answer. Lester's transformation is also progressive, rising from the outside to the soul, and finally completes self-salvation. It all started with Angela's appearance, it was she who made Leicester find his heartbeat again. Angela's perfect appearance not only awakened Lester's sexual desire, but also made him feel the beauty and the rhythm of life. Before that, for more than two decades, he was just a living dead who had forgotten that he was still breathing. It was Angela who made him find himself and have the motivation to live a positive life. In front of her, he was so nervous that he gagged. Her stay will make him uncontrollable fantasies and at a loss what to do. He would even work hard to reshape his body because of Angela's joke. All actions are like a return to the youth, full of enthusiasm and vitality. If we say that what Angela gave to Leicester, it was the discovery of her own desires. Then, Ricky let him find a new attitude towards life. Ricky's free and easy and self-persistence was unimaginable for Lester. After witnessing Ricky quit his job easily, he even sighed "You are my idol". Ricky had the courage of a young man that Lester envied. This deeply touched Leicester's eagerness to be released. Finally, Leicester bravely challenged fate. He quit his job, chased the girl he liked, bought the sports car he wanted...and lived the ideal life in his mind. However, at this time, Leicester was still just a lonely breakthrough, using indulgence to achieve self-liberation, which was mixed with helplessness and urgency. Such resistance is worrying. Because the opposite of Leicester at this time is no longer just an individual, but the entire social norm. His actions have freed himself from the original group and become an outlier of the same kind. In front of a powerful opponent, his late rebellion seemed so weak and out of place. In the end, after a brief period of crazy indulgence, with Angela as an opportunity again, Leicester completed a true return. On that rainy night, when he learned that Angela was still a pure girl, Lester gave up his immediate possession. At that moment, it was Angela's weakness and innocence that awakened his fatherhood. It should be said that Lester guarded the perfection in his heart with his warm fatherly love. It was also that night that he realized his self-examination after eliminating his desires and returning his soul to his family. Recalling the happiness of the family in the past also made him understand the true meaning of life. All of a sudden, Leicester felt so much beauty. These beauties filled his heart and made him full of life gratitude. However, just as Leicester achieved self-salvation, his life came to an abrupt end with the sound of a gun. This ending contains too much meaning for the director. Abnormally swollen material desires, indifference and hypocrisy, and a group of lost people, this is the middle-class group where Lester belongs. Here, the rules of the game can no longer be changed. Restricted by established social norms and secular concepts, Lester cannot escape even if he is sober. He has fallen deep into the shackles of society and the times. This is the tragedy of fate.
In terms of drama, the biggest charm of the film is its unconventional narrative structure and unique perspective.
At the beginning of the film, the protagonist Lester stated the fact that he has died. And the whole film is the memory of Leicester after his death, the last year of his life. First of all, such an arrangement of viewpoints can attract the audience's attention and arouse their curiosity in an instant. What happened this year? What caused the death of the protagonist? With these questions, with worry and pity for Leicester, the audience will take the initiative to walk into the plot and find out. Secondly, a deceased person's review of his life is more shocking and persuasive, and it also casts a layer of inexplicable sadness on the film. With the development of the plot, this sadness finally broke out at the moment of Leicester's death, with great tension. In terms of the structure of the story, it starts with a flashback. The three street-view aerial shots clearly divide the film into three sections: the dark life before the change, the rebellion, and the self-salvation before death. In each paragraph, the director only selects simple life segments, work conditions, school, family friction at the table, and so on. There is no strong drama collision, instead a calm and calm talk. However, it is this calm narration that exposes all the ugliness hidden in normal life to the audience naked. The explosion of this suppression in calm is more penetrating. It thunders in a silent place, and its huge explosive force hits the audience's hearts. The use of DV images is another important feature of this film. First of all, it played an important role in narrative. It was not only a bond connecting the two families, but also the fuse of the final tragedy. Ricky secretly took pictures of Jane, and the two met each other. And a picture of Leicester naked, which caused Frank to misunderstand the relationship between his son and Leicester, which eventually led to a ridiculous murder. Secondly, Ricky and his DV are another important point of view in the film. This viewpoint is more objective and cruel. It passes through the surface of life and looks directly at the ugliness. With the interaction between the video world and the real world, people began to be confused about what is true, and this is exactly the director's good intentions. Furthermore, DV video plays the role of naming themes. With the help of the DV in Ricky's hands, the film reveals to the audience the small beauty of life and shows the agility behind everything. Just like the plastic bag dancing in the wind, despite being forced to be helpless, even though I don't know the ending, I still try my best to enjoy the happiness that life bestows at this moment.
In terms of audiovisual, I have to mention the very expressive spatial shape of the film. The director is particularly good at portraying the character's personality by creating space, suggesting the inner mood of the character, and rendering the atmosphere. It can be said that in the film, the space full of profound meaning actually participates in the narrative and is one of the most important elements in storytelling. Take Lester’s shots at the beginning of the film as an example. The camera shot down from the ceiling of the bedroom, and most of the room was in dark shadows. The furnishings in the room are simple, with white as the main color, and the whole picture looks particularly empty and deserted. A white table lamp at each end of the bed, together with the shadow of the lamp on the backlit wall, forms a strong shape. They play a role in distracting the audience's attention. Lester, who was already in the shadows, became even more inconspicuous, as if to disappear into the picture. Repressed, ignored, and lost sense of existence, only one space can accurately explain the current situation of the protagonist. Coupled with Lester's "heart is dead" confession, it made the audience feel pity for him from the bottom of their hearts, which was very contagious. Take the passage where Leicester met Ricky for the first time and they smoked marijuana outside the banquet hall as an example: a whole piece of towering gray brick wall, flashing with a strangely shiny black ground, makes Leicester who live in it look particularly small. And helpless. A small white goalkeeper locked the secular world inside the wall, and the two of them were almost completely in a space full of black shadows, almost expressionist style. With this somewhat exaggerated style, the director cleverly hinted at Leicester's upcoming wandering and the loneliness that this resistance will have to endure.
In addition, the film also performed very well in showing different emotions in similar spaces. The director is very good at changing the details in the space in order to convey a richer and more varied message. Take the two dinner passages at Leicester's house as an example. The first dinner scene appeared in the seventh minute after the opening. The camera advances from outside the door, and the entire restaurant has a panoramic view. Grey walls and white doors and windows give the room a cold hue. The wall lamp and the faint light that penetrates through the floor-to-ceiling windows divide the room into two with light. The oval dining table is completely placed on the backlit side, with a family of three each occupying one side, and a heavy shadow is over them. The indifferent atmosphere fills the picture, and the whole space is dim and empty. At this time, there is no need for excessive words and frequent editing. Just a panoramic view is enough to expose the family relationship to the audience. However, the director did not stop at visual presentation. The lens has been slowly advancing, and finally completed a long moving lens of more than a minute. The forward shot leads the audience to slowly enter the lonely hearts of the protagonists and feel the chilling coldness. The second dinner scene was arranged the night after Leicester resigned. The first shot is still a panoramic view taken from outside the door. At this time, although it is the same restaurant, the atmosphere is quite different. A closer comparison will reveal that this time, the restaurant’s floor-to-ceiling windows are completely dark with no light coming in. A small change made the house instantly narrow. In addition, the light from behind the camera also helps to compress the space. The changes in details have really succeeded in creating a tense atmosphere for the subsequent dispute scenes. After the panorama, the lens cuts directly to Caroline's close-up shot. Then, a series of quick cuts were used to frame the protagonists in their respective spaces. The sense of depression continued to rise, and it was not until the final eruption of Leicester was relieved. The same example also includes two conversations between Leicester and his boss. During the first conversation, Lester's life had not changed, and he was still in a disadvantaged position. As a result, we saw that under the panoramic lens, Lester was sitting alone in the middle of the room at a distance. There are almost no extra decorations in the picture. He was surrounded by white walls on three sides, helpless. A sense of powerlessness spread in every corner instantly. In contrast, under the mid-range shot from the top, the space occupied by the manager sitting opposite appears full and substantial. The vertical striped blinds behind him and the black objects on the desktop all increase the stability of the picture. Let people truly feel the power of strength and authority. The second conversation was when Leicester announced his resignation. Lester sat directly at the manager's table, and the camera zoomed out from the panoramic view to the middle shot. In the picture, the black desk lamp on the right side of the foreground constitutes a heavy Color block. It highlights Lester's image and emphasizes his determination. Secondly, the black table in the background and the beam of light on the wall also played an important role. They make the space where Leicester is rich and stable, showing Leicester's confidence and courage to change. On the contrary, on the manager's side, a close-up lens with a shallow focal length compresses his space infinitely. The pale background makes the whole picture seem empty and weak, which well shows his weak situation. From the above two examples, we found that the same space, the same person, can express completely different meanings only because of the small changes in the spatial shape and the lens. It can be said that this film really allows the audience to appreciate the importance of spatial modeling to film art and the endless possibilities in practical applications in the future.
In summary, this film focuses on middle-class American families. By showing the darkness and ugliness of their peaceful lives, they revealed the serious family problems and social crises hidden in American society, and attacked the decadent values promoted by mainstream society. And through the resistance and self-salvation of the protagonist Lester, he sums up the true meaning of life that respects life and feels life. With its high-level production, positive social significance, and profound reflection on human nature, "American Beauty" became a wonderful rose in the United States and even the world film scene in 1999, and was regarded by many audiences as indescribable. Replaced classics.
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