Both excellent, both in my top 100 all-time. American Beauty gets the nod in my book for its originality. The "bag dancing in the wind" scene was one of the most awe-inspiring scenes in cinema history for me - simple but ultimately effective. (It must be very subjective, because I've spoken to some who just don't get it.)
Performances and direction were excellent in both films, but Alan Ball's original screenplay for AB was nothing short of brilliant. (And I agree that Stephen King's story was also excellent, and the conversion to screenplay was very good, but IMO the comparison is unfair because Ball had the opportunity to write the film from the ground up, and he nailed it.)
I wish they would come out with a "writer's cut", in which they put back the original beginning and ending (where the kids get fingered for the murder using the videotape they made in jest), but I guess writers just don't get the same clout that directors get with the studios. And besides, I think I read somewhere that Ball was ultimately satisfied with the final product, even though Sam Mendes chopped it up a bit. I love the movie as is, but I'd still like to see it the way Ball originally wrote it, more out of curiosity than anything.
If you liked American Beauty, see Crash and Magnolia, both multifaceted movies that intertwine characters together in unique and thought-provoking ways (and both excellent movies as well).
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liutenantsalt
15 years ago
>>American Beauty gets the nod in my book for its originality.<<
American Beauty is about as far from being original as it gets.
There are roughly about 5 million other movies, books and plays that deal with the same themes of suburban dissidence that this movie struggles to, the exception being that many of them actually have decent writing, acting and directing, aren't manipulative critic bait (ie; the insepid bag scene, which along with it's terrible tagline supply endless fodder for the "you don't get it!" crowd. sorry, but the ability to see right through that paper-thin self inflation indicates they "get it" far more than you) and manage to stand on their own merits instead of being as hollow and derivative as American Beauty was. Damn, but this movie is awful.
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CorumJI
14 years ago
The above poster is so wrapped up in his own brainless foolishness that he has no grasp of how worthless his opinion is. He's too busy trying to find some way to poop on an excellently done movie that he doesn't even see he's making his own sh** up to do it with.
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American Beauty, by more than a Green Mile.
TGM is an excellent movie, but there were several films that year that were far better than TGM -- 1999 was probably the best year for movies in history, certainly far better than any since, and probably better than any before.
That's not saying there aren't better movies than AB -- it's saying that the sum of movies for that year was flat out amazing -- Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels, The Sixth Sense, The Matrix, Fight Club... you can go on for quite a while about the movies released that year. And AB was one of the best, esp. when you consider "constraints" about all-around appeal. There's a reason all these movies made a buttload of money AND had widespread critical appeal.
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