I was reading Syn's post about hated things, and she/he mentioned seeing American Beauty as a film that portrays life as hopeless. I've also read OSC's opinion that agrees with this, but I don't see that. I didn't want to derail Syn's post, so I started this one.
OSC describes the film as one of
quote: the "edgy" movies, the cynical ones that see only darkness
After reading comments like that, I thought it would be perfect for a paper about Hollywood movies that attack the nuclear family. But when I watched it, I recieved a completely different message from the film. The message that I recieved was how easily people slip into a groove and take the relationships and beauty in their life for granted and forget what is truly important in life. This leads to heartbreaking pain and emptyness. Instead, the movie suggests that people need to embrace the beauty around and within them. I found this extremely hopeful, beautiful, and true.
I don't really understand why people found the message of the film to be the opposite. Perhaps they thought that Lester was supposed to be a hero when he embraced an irresponsible life style? I thought that he was supposed to be an even worse creep. The film shows how his attempts to find fulfillment in empty ways bring him an empty joy and simply bring more harm. Not until the last five minutes of the film, when he realizes the potential beauty in the relationships and life around him, the beauty that he has taken for granted and failed to cherish, does he become truly happy. His voice over at the end seems to cystalize this message.
Those who found the film to be hopeless and an attack on the suburban family, could you please explain why you felt that way?
Posted by Synesthesia (Member # 4774) on :
I should have been a bit clearer... OSC seemed to view the movie that way. But I liked the movie a lot, and wondered if that was true... If there are people who live in suburban life feel this way. I liked the guy with the video camera and reefer. He understood more about life than anyone... I loved when he talked about the how life was filled with beauty... But I agree that Lester was so... immature. A friend of mine thought he was attracted to his daughters friend (which was revolting) because she reminded him of his wife and how she was when she was young. The guy with the video camera (don't remember his name) was so much more mature than Lester was. Despite all the abuse he had endured, he still could see the beauty in the world the way his girlfriend couldn't until she met him. And why is it whenever I watch that movie with a large group of people they get more repulsed by the kiss between two men than Lester pawing all over that girl?
Now, if OSC REALLY wants to get offended by a movie he should watch Happiness. Happiness is COMPLETELY hopeless. Every character (except the child molester ironically) is pathetic and unaware of what LOSERS they are. I wonder if life is really like that... If life REALLY has to be like that? Dull jobs, a boring existence... Perhaps I'm an idealist...
Posted by fallow (Member # 6268) on :
Amanacer,
I agree with you, but I also agree with that quote from Card.
Sure, a character, even a central one, doesn't have to maintain likeableness as s/he undergoes a development "arc". On the other hand, some of the "darkness" of the film was completely implausible and heavy-handed (the divide between the neighbor father and son was ridiculous)
fallow
Posted by Lalo (Member # 3772) on :
American Beauty's a god of a film.
And that's really as far as I like to go into discussing it. Whenever I try, my attempts are always skewed from my actual understanding of the film.
Yeah, it's that good.
Posted by fallow (Member # 6268) on :
lalo,
no. no it's not.
28 days later, however, is as good as all that.
fallow
Posted by Amanecer (Member # 4068) on :
Syn-
quote: I wonder if life is really like that... If life REALLY has to be like that? Dull jobs, a boring existence...
I don't think it has to be like that at all; I believe that is the message of the film. Embrace beauty, embrace joy, embrace life! Perhaps I'm an idealist as well.
Fallow-
quote: On the other hand, some of the "darkness" of the film was completely implausible and heavy-handed (the divide between the neighbor father and son was ridiculous)
In my opinion, the darkness was not implausible. Many people truly are very, very unhappy and overlook the beauty in their lives. I can see what you are saying about the film dwelling on this, but I think that was necessary to get across the message that such lives won't bring happiness. How else would it convey the message?
Posted by Theca (Member # 1629) on :
I thought that movie was utterly revolting.
I've never wanted to leave a movie theater so badly in my life. But the person I was with thought it was great and didn't want to leave so I got to watch the whole thing. Posted by Frisco (Member # 3765) on :
Sometimes the thing that hurts the most is having someone point out a weakness you knew was there the whole time.
Posted by Rappin' Ronnie Reagan (Member # 5626) on :
I loved American Beauty. I don't know how to describe it. It was just... good.
Posted by Rakeesh (Member # 2001) on :
Card does have a point, however-that there are many mass-media films that portray the traditional suburban-type life (stereotyped as that is anyway) as really just a facade, while more progressive stereotypes are usually not portrayed as such.
I've seen it once and I enjoyed it, but it wasn't epic or anything. Gimme the (old) Spartacus for that. (Stupid freaking remake!)
Posted by plaid (Member # 2393) on :
Can anyone find a quote from the writer or director that says that this film is MEANT to be an attack on the suburbs?
There seems to be a tendency to assume that any film that's set in the suburbs and that's negative is an attack on the suburbs. People don't seems to have the same reaction to negative films set in the city -- no one criticizes a movie for being anti-city or anti-NYC or whatever...
Posted by KarlEd (Member # 571) on :
quote: (the divide between the neighbor father and son was ridiculous)
This statement mystifies me. Granted, it's been awhile since I've seen the film, but I recall the father/son relationship being very realistic, given the personalities of the characters involved. (We are talking about the characters portrayed by Chris Cooper and Wes Bently, right?)
Though I guess you could consider yourself lucky if you've never known of any real-life father/son relationships that were so divided. But trust me, they do exist.
Posted by mr_porteiro_head (Member # 4644) on :
Nobody (well, almost nobody) making a movie attacking middle-class America would come out and say that's what they are doing. That's their payroll.
Posted by Ayelar (Member # 183) on :
I'm with KarlEd... sure, the relationship portrayed probably isn't ubiquitous, but it's certainly not ridiculous.
Posted by Alexa (Member # 6285) on :
quote:The message that I recieved was how easily people slip into a groove and take the relationships and beauty in their life for granted and forget what is truly important in life. This leads to heartbreaking pain and emptyness. Instead, the movie suggests that people need to embrace the beauty around and within them. I found this extremely hopeful, beautiful, and true.
I 100% agree. I also consider it one of the best movies ever made. I thought every character was completely realistic. The only thing that bothered me is how Hollywood portrays stalking behavior as noble.
Whether it is the kid in American Beauty or Sam in City of Angeles, movies portray creepy guys with stalking behavior as a little more romantic then the rest of the general population. Yuck!
The whole attracted to the daughter thing just emphasized how pathetic Lester had become. Notice when he realized what is beautiful and transformed into a more healthy man, all temptation for the friend went away.
Posted by Proteus (Member # 794) on :
You want some fiction with a pathetic and at times utterly unlikable 'hero'? - read the Chronicles of Thomas Covenant.
I sort of emphasised with him at times but many people i've talked to, like with Lester, seemed to despise him.
Posted by plaid (Member # 2393) on :
Agree with Alexa re: the stalker bit, that creeped me out too.
I actually didn't LIKE the movie much -- for most of the movie the characters were really pathetic and annoying, and it was only in the last half hour that the movie became more interesting as the characters started to grow.
So it's not that I'm fond of the movie, and I never want to see it again... but I don't like the argument that the film is necessarily an attack on the suburbs, since unless someone can show me otherwise, it seems to be more of a movie about messed up people that happens to be set in the suburbs, and it could have easily been set in the country or in the city...
Posted by skillery (Member # 6209) on :
Hated it. I don't know anybody who would fantasize about a silly teenage cheerleader while lying in the sack with Annette Bening. I would buy a muscle car if Annette Bening dumped me however.
Posted by plaid (Member # 2393) on :
On a tangent -- re: the whole suburbs vs. city thing -- a report just got published comparing teenage behavior in the suburbs and in the cities, and it found that suburban teenagers had as much sex and did as much drugs/alcohol as city teenagers:
quote:For the last several decades American middle-class families have been fleeing from the US cities to the suburbs, in part because many parents see the suburbs, and suburban public schools in particular, as refuges from the disorder and social collapse that appears to them endemic to America's urban school districts. Parents believe that suburban public schools provide children with safer, more orderly, and more wholesome environments than their urban counterparts.
A new report by the Manhattan Institute, a New York-based conservative think tank, finds that those perceptions are unfounded.
The report’s authors Jay Greene and Greg Forster analyzed student survey data collected from the same group of students in three waves, from 1995 to 2002. The survey, which included an estimated 20,000 students, was sponsored by the US National Institute of Child Health & Human Development and other US federal agencies.
Using hard data on high school students from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health, one of the most comprehensive and rigorous studies of the behaviour of American high school students, the Manhattan Institute report points out that suburban public high school students have sex, drink, smoke, use illegal drugs, and engage in delinquent behaviour as often as urban public high school students. Students also engage in these behaviours more often than most people realize.
Posted by Storm Saxon (Member # 3101) on :
Plaid is making an attack on the middle class! Oh, no! *faint*
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