Look Closer

I had always liked this movie for its captivating performances by the phenomenal cast of Kevin Spacey, Annette Benning, Chris Cooper, Thora Birch, Wes Bently, and Mena Suvari. Each one representing, what i feel, are opposite ends of personality spectrums: Carolyn Bernham, (Benning) is anal retentive; Frank Fitts (Cooper), is a military man; Angela Hayes (Suvai), is shallow; Jane Bernhan (Birch), is misguided; Ricky Fitts (Bently), is incredibly profound and smart; and then there is Lester Bernham (Spacey) who is going through what those around him would call a mid-life crisis, but what he would call a great awakening. The quality of these breath-taking performances will never fade, but as i begin to look at this film with a more inquisitive eye I find a great artist hidden behind the screen: the director, Sam Mendes.

The extraordinary fact that this was Mendes's directorial debut only adds to the amazement that one experiences while watching this masterpiece. Gently woven into the fabric of the film are symbols of each characters mental state: Carolyn has the precise nature of her dining room table, Jane is constantly upset with her body, and Ricky is surrounded by his attempts to capture natural beauty through a lens. The symbolic nature in this movie is so vivid, and yet so subtle at the same time.

Then there are the roses. Practically the calling card of this movie, roses and rose petals are a ubiquitous presence throughout the film. However, they are most important to Kevin Spacey's character of Lester Bernham. Half-way through his life, Lester never learned to stop and smell the roses - now he is engulfed by them. Every time he thinks about Angela roses appear. They are the symbol of the Beauty that was missing in his life.

What is beauty? That is the focal point of the story, one could argue. It is my belief that this movie tries to break any sort of confinement that beauty might have and say that beauty truly is in the eye of the beholder. For Ricky it was Jane, even though she would be by most standards plain, for Carolyn it was her furniture, even though Lester only viewed it as stuff, and for Lester it was Angela, even though some might see her as shallow and fake - he saw her beauty.

The lesson of this movie is indeed its trademark line which is: "Look Closer."