American Beauty (1999)

This movie is about an American suburban family, the Burnhams. Lester (Kevin Spacey), the dad, is a writer who quit his job and is going through a mid-life crisis. Lester's wife Carolyn, is a real estate agent and is competing against Buddy Kane the King of Real Estate. Lester and Carolyn's teenage daughter Jane is a quiet, awkward, and somewhat disturbed teenager. Lester and Carolyn seem to basically hate each other, barely speak to each other, and never have sex. Jane hangs out with the most popular girl in school, Angela Hayes, both of whom are on the high school cheerleading squad. A new set of neighbors, Colonel Frank Fitts, his demented wife, and his super creepy son Ricky Fitts, have moved in next door to the Burnhams.

After Lester quits his job, he realizes how much his daughter hates him and how absent he's been in her life. He tries to make amends by going to watch her cheerlead at the high school boys basketball game. This is when Lester sees Angela Hayes for the first time and is absolutely obsessed with her. Every time Angela comes over he makes a fool of himself. He overhears her say that she would sleep with him if he was in better shape. Lester decides it's definitely time to get in shape.

Jane develops a crush on super creepy Ricky next door and they end up sleeping together. They seem to understand each other. Ricky is a drug dealer, something that he has to hide from father, who beats him when he suspects Ricky's been dealing again. Ricky gets Lester hooked on drugs, and Lester pays him a ton of money for the "good stuff". Frank Fitts is a real tough army guy who punishes his son with a heavy hand.

Carolyn is trying her best to compete with Buddy Kane for her share of the real estate market in the neighborhood. When she meets up with Buddy at a work social event, she is in awe of him. They end up becoming lovers. She despises her husband even more so now that she has a lover.

The key moment in the movie comes when a number of events are occurring around the same time. 1) Jane invites Angela to spend the night, 2) Carolyn has had enough of Lester and contemplates killing him, she has a gun, and she listens to "inspirational" tapes, telling her she shouldn't be a victim anymore, 3) Lester calls Ricky for some drugs, and Frank sees Ricky giving Lester the drugs, only it looks to Frank like Ricky is actually giving Lester a blow job and getting paid for it, 4) Frank beats Ricky for selling sex... , 5) Ricky runs over to Jane's house and they decide to run away together 6) Jane and Angela get in a fight because Jane wants to run away with Ricky, 7) Lester tries to seduce Angela, but he stops from having sex with her when he finds out she's a virgin, 8) Frank comes over to Lester's house, and tries to kiss him... ?? What, Frank is gay???, 9) Carolyn decides to kill Lester, 10) Frank comes back over to Lester's and actually does kill him, 11) Carolyn comes home, with gun in hand, and finds Lester is already murdered.

This was a strange and really terrible movie. It's like everything that could possibly be wrong with the typical American family amplified. I have to say I thought it was pretty awful. The only good point in the movie was that Lester was probably an ok guy. At least we knew he loved his wife and daughter, and he didn't end up sleeping with Angela. Everybody just wanted to kill him. The material, selfish, do-what-ever-you-feel-like attitudes of all the characters in the movie is really depressing. I get that the movie is calling attention to how screwed up American families can be and that is probably much more prevalent than we imagine, but I have to say I didn't enjoy the movie at all.