American Beauty Essay Example 23

Just imagine dying, and in a split second, seeing your short life flash before your eyes. You would then have the chance to fully comprehend and evaluate your life. Were you truly happy with your life or were you completely miserable? The film American Beauty, written by Alan Ball and produce by Bruce Cohen and Dan Jinks, takes a closer look at two ordinary American families. The film exposes your typical, middle-class suburban American home and slowly uncovers all of the abnormalities that lie within. The two families, and their relationships with friends, neighbors, and co-workers are analyzed very closely. The film also takes a closer look at every individual as one and the purpose of their lives as individuals. The film focuses on one character, Lester, who feels like has no control over his life and no say in his family. Lester has many people who affect his life: Carolyn the wife, Jane the rebel teenage daughter, Ricky the next-door neighbor, Ricky's dad Frank, the ex-marine, and Jane's cheerleader friend Angela. As the film progresses, it is seen how these individuals' personalities intervene in each other's lives and by the end their real persona comes out, instead of the false individual they had pertain to be. The movie begins with camcorder footage of a teenager reclining on bed, complaining about her father, who is socially weird and ordinary. The man with the camcorder then asks, "You want me to kill him for you?" The teenager girl pauses for moment, and then says, "Yeah, would you?" The film then begins with Lester, the narrator of the film and father of the teenage girl complaining about him at the beginning. "In less than a year," he says to the audience, "I'll be dead. Of course, I don't know that yet. And in a way, I'm dead already." The beginning of the film hints at the mess in Lester's family and the death that is going to occur. Lester and Carolyn Burnham are on the outside, a perfect husband and wife, in a perfect house and in a perfect