Essay on Interpersonal conflict in film “American Beauty”
Each and every family cannot be complete without conflicts between children and parents. Moreover, there is absolutely nothing wrong in that as “right” conflicts help to relieve the tension between the participants and give the opportunity to find a compromise solution without compromising the interests of any family member. As a result, such conflicts help to strengthen the relationships. Though, all this is truth only in respect of reasonably resolved conflicts. Much more often disputes and quarrels may become the reason for suppressed resentment, psychological complexes and may even cause split of a family.
In this essay it will go about the interrelation conflict that has been shown in such popular movie as “American Beauty”. Namely we would like to talk about the conflict between parents and their children. Lester, father of the family, is a typical representative of the middle class who faces the midlife crisis and drags out miserable and worthless existence. He is sick and tired of everything; his wife and daughter think that he is a worthless loser. He thinks that he has lost something and does not know what. His wife, Caroline, hates him and treats her daughter as a slave. She is hysterical and obsessive with the external trappings of prosperity hiding her inner ugliness and emptiness. Their only daughter is Jane – a typical teenager who is easily vulnerable and notorious. She despites her parents and wants them to disappear from her life. It can be seen from the very first scenes of the movie when Jane says that she does not want to have such a father. Further, she says to her friend Angela “why can’t my parents have their own life without me?”
From the first glance, it may seem that it is a perfect American family that has common interests, but, in fact, all of the family members hate each other. Both of the parents are totally concentrated on their own lives and problems (mother with her lover and father with his crisis and passion to a young girl). They totally ignore their daughter and show no interest to her life and opinion and that is a great mistake as normal, friendly and trusting relations are very important in every family. Jane is an already formed personality with her own principles and beliefs, but her parents do not understand that while hiding over their own interests in life.
Despite the fact that from time to time parents of Jane try to show some interest in her life (for instance, when Lester tries to become closer to her through her young friend Angela), Jane still hates them. Mother with her obsession with material goods only for some time forgets about them, she still returns to the materialistic values she appreciates the most.
To my opinion, the conflict between parents and Jane resulted right from the conflict between Lester and Caroline who could not handle their problems, forget about their own interests and concentrate on the most important – their daughter. One may think that father still understood his fault at the end and, thus, the problem could be solved. Still, this movie shows the problem that is characteristic to many families all around the world. Parents should interest more in their children, support them and respect their opinion and beliefs.
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