American Beauty (18)

It won five Oscars, made the top-five UK box-office and is officially our Best Film Of The Year. It represents one of the strongest ever directing debuts - from Sam Mendes - and it finally made Kevin Spacey a bona fide leading man, with his tragicomic portrayal of crushed suburbanite Lester Burnham somehow standing out from a movie packed with stand-out turns. Think this review's too gushy? You obviously haven't seen it...

DVD Extras:

American Beauty: Look Closer... behind-the-scenes featurette, commentary with Sam Mendes and writer Alan Ball, storyboard presentation with Mendes and DoP Conrad Hall, two theatrical trailers.Surprisingly, this disc isn't as beautiful as it could have been. The Look Closer... featurette, for example, is merely one of those half-hour, made-for-TV affairs, which features more clips than it does interviews. Still, at least Mendes' audio revelations help make up for it, with the amiable helmer revealing how he inserted various visual themes (like Lester's many "cells") and what happened to the infamous cut scenes that feature an original subplot (Jane and Ricky on trial for Lester's murder). Although it's a real shame that we couldn't actually get to see them as deleted scenes...

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