American Beauty Review.

American Beauty is a drama involving a dysfunctional, middle class, family living in the suburbs of an American town. It focuses on the father, Lester, and his struggles with his wife, Carolyn, and his daughter, Jane. With Lester fed up of his controlling wife demanding what he does and doesn't do in his life he finally decides it's time to fight back and make his wishes come true instead of pleasing his wife. When he becomes involved with his new military neighbour's (Frank) son (Ricky) his life takes another turn for the worse. With Lester exploring recreational drugs and bonding with Ricky, his homophobic military father becomes suspicious and eventually, when Frank finds footage of Lester on Ricky's camcorder he confronts Lester. Lester also becomes involved with his daughter's friend Angela, eventually almost having sex with her. In the movie Carolyn has an affair and eventually Frank kills Lester, fearful of him being gay and trying to have sexual contact with his son.

One of the highlighted themes in American Beauty is the American Dream, which is portrayed brilliantly within the film. Lester's dream is to be able to relax and not have to put up with the day to day suffering he deals with in his family life. At one point this dream is completed offering the protaganist a happy ending which he deserves. He's got a simple job, his dream car and is starting go towards his happy life, but then in the final scene, his life ends, him fairly complete and to an extent living his dream, with the final image before his death being him smiling at a portrait finally content with life. Only to have it cruelly taken away from him by Frank. The use of destroying this dream is able to build another chapter within this family and of course Ricky's as now the door has been opened for their development, with his father the killer of his girlfriend's dad there is a lot of unseen drama which could easily occur. This is a great move by the writers as it allows the audience to think about the family's future and create and build theories upon the ending.

There's also an interesting theme of sexuality used within the movie, shown through the eyes of the sexually frustrated main character. This allows him to blossom into an interesting and oddly dynamic relationship with his daughter's best friend. His sexual frustration is obvious from the start where he begins his day by masturbating in the shower, this shows the lack of romantic intensity between the couple and suggests the marriage may not be what it seems. Another key theme exploring sexuality within the protaganist is when he is masturbating whilst laying in bed next to his wife. This shows how desperate he is for sex and knows she won't do anything with him and needs to masturbate so as to relieve his sexual tension. This is great as it allows the set up and the director plays this fairly subtly at first but when he begins with his fantasies about Angela the theme of sexuality is cleverly involved again by showing a side to his American Dream.