American Beauty's Comments on Society
What Comments is ‘American Beauty’ Making About Modern Society?‘American Beauty’, directed by Sam Mendes, is simply a study of a dysfunctional American Family which reveals the nature of modern suburbia with wit, precision, and invention. Allan Balls script continually explores ideas about what constitutes ordinariness in our lives and what ‘beauty’ truly is, and why people who have everything, live ‘lives of desperation’. Far more importantly, though, is what the film has to say about the American Dream – or rather the American Nightmare. American modern society (not too different from New Zealand’s own society), is constructed around the notion that happiness is found through material success: a lucrative job, a nice house in a quiet neighbourhood, fancy cars etc. ‘American Beauty’ doesn’t expose this lie – it shows how hideous this lie could be. Screenwriter Alan Ball, says “ On of the movies themes is how we have preconceived notions of things, but the truth often turns out to be something we never even considered – where you find beauty might be in the place you least expect it.” Kevin Spacey (Lester) and Annette Benning (Carolyn) play a couple
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Some common words found in the essay are:
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Approximate Word count = 861
Approximate Pages = 3 (250 words per page double spaced)
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