You remember that plastic bag, right? It’s 1999. The theater is quiet. A floating piece of white trash dances in the wind for what feels like an eternity while Thomas Newman’s eerie, tinkling score makes you feel like you’re witnessing something holy. At the time, we all bought it. We sat there thinking, yeah, this is deep. But looking back at Kevin Spacey in American Beauty today feels less like a spiritual awakening and a lot more like a fever dream you’d rather forget. It’s weird. The movie hasn't changed, but we sure have.
The Lester Burnham Problem
Lester Burnham was supposed to be the "everyman." He was the poster child for the late-90s midlife crisis. Bored job? Check. Materialistic wife who cares more about the silk upholstery than him? Check. A sudden, "liberating" desire to quit his corporate gig, buy a 1970 Pontiac Firebird, and start lifting weights in the garage? Double check.
Spacey played Lester with this droll, sarcastic energy that felt revolutionary at the time. He wasn't just a loser; he was our loser. When he told his boss to "shove it" and blackmailed his way into a massive severance package, audiences cheered.
Honestly, it’s hard to find that same joy now.
When you watch Lester today, the "liberation" feels a lot more like a breakdown. And then there's the Angela factor. The central plot involves a 42-year-old man obsessing over his teenage daughter’s best friend. In 1999, critics called it a "bold exploration of desire." In 2026, it’s just creepy. There’s no other way to put it.
The distance between then and now is massive.
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Why Kevin Spacey Made It Work (And Why It’s Ruined)
Spacey didn't just stumble into this role. Director Sam Mendes actually had him as his first choice. He saw something in Spacey—a mix of high intelligence and a hidden, simmering vulnerability—that other directors hadn't tapped into yet. Before this, Spacey was the "bad guy." He was the manipulative Keyser Söze or the terrifying John Doe in Se7en.
In American Beauty, he had to be human. He had to be "Lester."
The performance is technically brilliant. You can’t take that away. He tracks Lester’s transformation from a slumped, dead-eyed office drone to a man who literally stands taller by the end of the film. He won the Oscar for Best Actor for a reason.
But here is the catch.
The allegations that hit Spacey in 2017 changed the "text" of the movie. It’s what critics call a "retrospective poisoning." When Anthony Rapp and others came forward with stories of misconduct, people went back and watched American Beauty with new eyes. Suddenly, Lester’s predatory gaze at Angela didn't look like "acting" anymore. It looked like a window.
Whether that’s fair to the art or not is a huge debate, but for most people, the experience of watching the film is now inseparable from the headlines.
The Suburbs Are Ugly, We Get It
Beyond the Spacey of it all, the movie itself is a bit of a time capsule. It captures that specific "Clinton-era ennui" where everyone was well-fed, the economy was booming, and yet everyone was miserable.
The film tries really hard to be a satire of the American Dream.
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- Carolyn Burnham (Annette Bening): The perfectionist realtor who cries in private because she can't sell a house.
- Colonel Fitts (Chris Cooper): The repressed, hyper-masculine neighbor who eventually kills Lester.
- Ricky Fitts (Wes Bentley): The weird kid with the camera who thinks a dead bird is beautiful.
It’s all very "Look Closer"—which was literally the movie’s tagline. But if you actually do look closer in 2026, the satire feels a little shallow. It’s like a teenager wrote a poem about how "society is a prison, man." It’s beautifully shot by Conrad Hall (those red roses are still stunning), but the message is kind of loud and clunky.
What Really Happened With the Ending?
People often forget that the original script by Alan Ball was much darker.
In the first draft, Jane and Ricky actually go to jail for Lester’s murder. The film was framed as a trial. But Sam Mendes realized that the "beauty" of the story was in Lester’s internal shift. He wanted the audience to feel for Lester right before he died.
The ending we got is the one where Lester looks at a family photo, realizes he actually has a good life, and refuses to sleep with Angela when he finds out she’s a virgin. He finally grows up. And then, bang.
It’s supposed to be poetic.
But for many, the "redemption" feels unearned. Lester spent the whole movie being a jerk to his wife and neglecting his daughter, only to have a five-minute epiphany before catching a bullet.
Is American Beauty Still Worth Watching?
If you can separate the art from the artist, there is still a lot to appreciate. The cinematography is world-class. The acting—especially from Bening and Cooper—is top-tier. It's a fascinating look at what we thought was "deep" at the turn of the millennium.
However, if you're looking for a relatable story about modern life, this might not be it. We live in a world of different anxieties now. We’re not worried about "boring suburbs" as much as we are about the cost of living, climate change, and the digital void. Lester’s problems feel like "rich people problems" from a simpler time.
How to approach the film today:
- Watch it as a period piece. Treat it like a 1999 time capsule rather than a universal truth.
- Focus on the ensemble. Bening’s performance is actually more interesting than Spacey’s in many ways.
- Ignore the "profundity." Don't try to find the meaning of life in the plastic bag. It’s just a bag.
Essentially, American Beauty is a movie that tells us more about the people who loved it in 1999 than it does about the world we live in now. It’s a ghost of a performance in a ghost of an era.
To really understand the legacy of this film, you have to look at the "Best Picture" winners that followed. We moved away from this kind of "suburban satire" and toward more diverse, gritty, and grounded stories. American Beauty was the end of an era, and in many ways, it was the end of Kevin Spacey’s untouchable status in Hollywood.
If you want to dive deeper into 90s cinema, your best bet is to compare this to something like Fight Club or Office Space. They all tackle the same "white-collar boredom," but they do it with a lot more bite and a lot less pretension.
Take a look at the 2000 Oscar nominees list. Compare Lester Burnham to the other characters of that year. You’ll see pretty quickly why this movie won—and why it has struggled to stay on top ever since.