One of the best films of 1999, and a clear contender for a Golden Statuette come Oscar Time. First-time director Sam Mendes took a tremendous script from Alan Ball, added a cast that was perfect for their respective roles, and turned out one of the best debut films I've ever seen.

Kevin Spacey again shows why he's one of Hollywood's most talented actors in his role as Lester Burnham. Annette Benning is also a candidate for an Oscar as Lester's wife Carolyn Burnham.

Lester is a walking visual aid to use in describing Male Mid-Life Crisis. His daughter despises him, his wife is having an affair he doesn't know about, and he's about to lose his job. In his efforts to turn things around, he ends up quitting before being laid off, blackmailing his boss out of sixty thousand dollars and then goes out and buys the car of his dreams, a 1970 Pontiac Firebird in bright red. Then he makes yet another fated choice, choosing a job as a drive-through employee as a local fast-food emporium.

In a timely bit of coincidence it happens to be the same fast-food emporium that Carolyn and her lover drive through for a snack and their affair is discovered. Lester doesn't let his wife's infidelity disturb him, he's much too busy lifting weights, working out and smoking the best grass he's ever had the fortune to toke.

He's getting his weed from the neighbor boy across the street, who is completely and utterly enamored of Lester's daughter Jane (Thora Birch) and has an enormous collection of videos of her in his room. Of course, he has to contend with his father, a retired Marine officer who is much too tightly wrapped to cope well with life in the civilian world.

There is much more to the story that I'm deliberately leaving out, because it should be experienced by viewing the film rather than reading someone else's description. While we can't help but have some sympathy for Lester, it's almost as hard to like him as it is any of the other characters in the movie. The only completely normal couple that we see in the entire neighborhood where the Burnhams live is the gay couple "Jim and Jim" who live next door.

Dark, ironic, filled with laughs and poignant, American Beauty reaches all of your emotions during it's all too brief 121 minutes. When the end finally comes and you're ready to leave, you may well react as I did, and wish that there was still more to come.

American Beauty truly is a beauty of a film. Don't miss it.