Don't worry, you won't miss it -- you could drop in at random anytime during the movie's 125 minutes and instantly get your fill of the emotional -- but Life as a House is vaguely ambitious so it's worth a shot. In fact, it's particularly nebulous about all of the characters, which makes watching it a different beast altogether. Whereas American Beauty was all about watching a gang of clear-cut stereotypes work their way through emotional problems -- and the fun came in watching their worlds collide -- Life as a House is closer to real life. Director Irwin Winkler (At First Sight) doesn't spell everything out, and the fun here comes in guessing just exactly who these people are and what they're up to.

      Kevin Kline is the centerpiece as George, a lifelong architect whose workaholic ways have pushed him away from his family (his wife is a dreary fortysomething who feels life has passed her by, and is apathetic about their aerosol-sniffing, pot-smoking, sexually ambiguous sixteen-year-old son) and in the end, put him out of a job. He takes a generous severance package but is soon after stricken with terminal cancer. George cashes in his chips, collects his wayward son, and with only months to live, begins work on his dream house.

      His son Sam (Hayden Christensen) and wife Robin (Kristin Scott-Thomas) complete the triangle of resentful family members. Robin has divorced George and since remarried, but her new husband is no better; Sam gets his money for drugs by performing sexual favors for older men. In a lot of ways, these antisocial, dysfunctional characters are similar to those in American Beauty, and the plot's structure of a midlife crisis with a productive result isn't entirely new, either. But strong performances from Christensen, Scott-Thomas, and Kline give the game a whole new face.

      Kline, in particular, is wonderfully mellow, capturing the blissful state of mind that a man in his position must surely feel. He has his ghosts to exorcise -- in particular, the love-hate relationship with his own deceased father that he now sees playing out between Sam and himself -- but the clichéd sense of urgency that might come from the clock set by a terminal illness is thankfully absent. It isn't do or die for George, it's do and die, and once he realizes that, life's priorities are quickly rearranged. Kline orchestrates the transition brilliantly onscreen, and for that it's easy to forgive his melodramatic lapses.

      Complementing his superbly underplayed performance is Hayden Christensen's over-the-top delivery as Sam. Visually, Christensen is the likeness of Wes Bentley, who had a similar position as the dramatic catalyst in American Beauty, but Christensen's portrayal of Sam is loud and obnoxious and entirely effective. The viewer hates him from the start, and even though his character arc is entirely predictable and the audience knows they'll love him at the end, it doesn't detract from the way Christensen plays him. If anything, the script sells the character short, transforming him from societal deviant to faithful son too quickly. But the original Mark Andrus screenplay is a schmaltz-fest to begin with, and not exactly a prime example of the English language.

      Andrus does get a few things write, as when he calls Kristen Scott-Thomas the "most beautiful woman in the world." In point of fact, she is, in an elegantly graceful sort of way that embodies the aesthetics of the movie. If another actress were in the role, her Southern California tan and chic sandy-blonde highlights might define her as one of the "beautiful people," but Scott-Thomas transcends such a label, just as the movie's countless views from the cliffs above the Pacific refuse to be defined as abusively sentimental.

      Instead, the film's setting comes to symbolize the rebirth that takes place in the film, simultaneously embodied in the construction of George's dream house. Two full-time metaphors in one movie is about two too many, especially after Sam and Robin begin work on the house with George, but for the most part, director Winkler manages to keep things on the up-and-up. While it's no use denying the movie's love of the symbolic device, it's at least a relatively aspirin-free devotion -- Winkler refrains from thumping the viewer over the head with the obvious.

      To make things interesting, Andrus and Winkler toss in some subplots that eventually resolve themselves in an improbable sexual triangle, including George's next-door neighbor, Colleen (Mary Steenburgen), and her teenage daughter, Alyssa (Jena Malone), but ultimately it distracts from the movie's purpose. Kevin Kline is enjoyable to watch in the lead, and the movie should focus principally on his parting redemption. Sam making good on a lost childhood isn't as interesting, nor effective.

      But the good news is that Life as a House, bloated metaphor that it may be, is delightful effective. Interestingly, the construction of George's dream house, which is so central to the plot, transpires almost in the background -- subtly, subconsciously, the house rises from the ground above the ocean and likewise, so does the once lost and now-repaired family. Not everything is as expected in the end (further proof that the movie is not entirely tearjerking trash), including the result that viewers may find themselves liking this film more than they expected.

Craig Roush, 2001