American Beauty

Rating: Null/10 (4 February 2010)

The movie American Beauty is an emotional and quite disturbing film for any audience to view. The story is based on a man that is experiencing some major life crisis that will indeed send him into a major depression. Lester Burnham is living with his wife and daughter that seem to totally disrespect him in more ways than one. Lester And Carolyn seem to have this fantasy life style that his wife Carolyn is obsessed with and will work herself into a frenzy to accomplish what she wants for herself and completely not considering her mate Lester Burnham. Theme
The theme of the movie had a lot of interesting points that makes perfect sense in the real world of adult hood and adolescence. Carolyn had the type of personality that she wanted to interpret that she was financially stable and her career was stable. With all this being said she was putting a significant amount of pressure on her husband to be something that he was not.
Another theme of the movie that with all of the emotional stress in the Burnham's home it caused their daughter to feel emotional stressed as well. The movie had some low points as well as good points. I felt as though Lester should have maybe fantasized about someone his own age or maybe even someone a bit younger; not a child that was just not acceptable.
The name American Beauty can mean so much to a person; in my opinion it means "Beauty is in the eye of the beholder" meaning it is not just the outside of a person, it is there insides as well. The director had various ideas of beauty in my eyesight. The character Ricky was viewing beauty as filming and everything that surrounded him, the smallest things meant a lot to him.
Color/Insight
The color scene for the movie was very dark and made the movie more relevant to its characters. The characters played dark roles; so the director may have thought that if the roles are dark maybe the colors should not be bright. The writer and director wanted colors and the schemes to represent how shallow and depressing the characters was and how the lives were in shambles.
The costumes and makeup designs were followed with great character as well. The look of Carolyn was just as most would think; very business like with a touch of High Class style and perfection. Lester Burnham was very low maintenance and did not need very much to make him happy. His wardrobe consisted of suits when was working for the advertising firm. After Lester was released from the advertising job he then preceded into the attire of jeans and t-shirts, much laid back attire.
The overall concept of the movie was very much disturbing and quite amusing at some points in the film, but my opinion of the film is very modest. I think the writer/director wanted the audience to really see how things are portrayed in the life of average working people and to prove that money can not buy happiness at any means.