History Film / AmericanBeauty

* BurgerFool: Lester becomes one voluntarily and, [[SubvertedTrope unlike his co-workers, seems to enjoy it.]]

* BareYourMidriff: On the poster. Oddly, the belly button in question doesn't belong to any of the movie's stars.

* ADateWithRosiePalms: Lester.
** "Look at me, jerking off in the shower. This will be the high point of my day; it's all downhill from here."
** His wife also catches him in bed. "Lester, are you masturbating?!"

** Ricky Fitts (see above).

* ShamelessFanserviceGirl: Angela to Lester, in his dreams.

* WhyDidYouMakeMeHitYou: Subverted. Carolyn hits Jane but actually ''stops'' crying and apologizing as she does so, as Jane was having none of her mother's emotional blackmail.

* VagueAge: The age of Mena Suvari is not specified in the film nor somewhere else, however, considering the context, it may be under 16, the average national age of consent of the United States, or under 17, the age of consent of Illinois, where the film apparently takes place, although the film was filmed in California, where the age of consent is 18.

* NoodleIncident: The sycamore tree that Carolyn cut down.

* BaitAndSwitch: Two instances of it in the circumstances leading to Lester's [[spoiler: murder. In the opening scenes of the film, we hear Lester saying that he'll be dead in less than a year, as well as Jane seemingly seriously discussing murdering her father with help from her boyfriend Ricky, which leads us to assume that Lester would eventually be murdered by his daughter and her lover. We later find out that the conversation wasn't serious. Later on, we see Carolyn deciding "not to be a victim" by taking out her gun with the presumed intention of murdering Lester. Minutes later, we see a gun pointed to the back of Lester's head in the kitchen and he's shot to death. We assume that it's Carolyn, but later discover that the murder was actually committed by Col. Fitts.

* DysfunctionJunction: Pretty much everyone except Ricky is horribly insecure, and even he may not be quite right in the head.

* HeKnowsTooMuch: [[spoiler:Col. Fitts]] kills Lester, to keep [[spoiler:his homosexuality]] a secret...or out of shame for having [[spoiler:tried to kiss him]]...or because he thinks he's a pedophile who [[spoilers:rejects the advances of grown men]].

* {{Corpsing}}:
** Lester and Ricky laughing when Carolyn finds them smoking weed was Kevin Spacey and Wes Bentley actually cracking up. The director just left it in.
** The scene where Lester rattles off a list of euphemisms for masturbating had to be re-shot several times, because Kevin Spacey kept shouting out different euphemisms and Annette Bening was collapsing into hysterical giggles. Even in the take they used in the film, you can tell she's just barely holding her laughter back behind a feigned look of shock and disgust.

** Carolyn sings Music/BobbyDarin's version of "[[Theatre/FunnyGirl Don't Rain on My Parade]]" in the car.

** The scene where Lester rattles off a list of euphemisms for masturbating had to be re-shot several times, because Kevin Spacey kept shouting out different euphemisms and Annette Benning was collapsing into hysterical giggles. Even in the take they used in the film, you can tell she's just barely holding her laughter back behind a feigned look of shock and disgust.

* ADateWithRosiePalms: Lester. "Look at me, jerking off in the shower. This will be the high point of my day; it's all downhill from here."

** When he's working out after Carolyn's lecture: ''"That's...what...you...think!"''
** During the violent dinner: ''"Don't Interrupt Me...honey."''
** After his (truncated) romantic moment with his wife: ''"IT'S! JUST! A! COUCH!"''
** When he finds out [[spoiler:she is cheating on him]]: ''"No, no. '''You'''...don't get to tell '''me''' what to do...ever...again."''

** At the beginning of the film Carolyn mentions how the [[Theatre/{{Death of a Salesman}} Lomans]] moved away when she had their tree cut down.

** ''Film/LittleChildren'' could be considered a unofficial SpiritualSuccessor, as it shares the same theme of the dark root of suburbia, albeit with less BlackComedy, and also is scored by Thomas Newman.

* YouAreWhatYouHate: [[spoiler:Col. Fitts and Angela]].

* LoadsAndLoadsOfCharacters: Lester Burnham, Carolyn Burnham, Jane Burnham, Colonel Frank Fitts, Barbara Fitts, Ricky Fitts, Angela Hayes, Buddy Kane, Brad Dupree, Jim Olmeyer, and Jim Berkley. No, none of these are just filler characters--each of them plays a crucial role in the plot, or in someone else's characterization.

** And it is itself arguably a SpiritualSuccessor of such famous "middle-aged adultery" comedies as ''Film/TheSevenYearItch'' and ''[[Film/{{Ten}} 10]]'', albeit much darker than them, as well as melodramas from TheFifties such as ''Film/BiggerThanLife'' (also a film about an American patriarch who feels jaded with ConspicuousConsumption and a mid-life crisis).

* ContemptibleCover: If you know nothing about ''American Beauty'', you could be forgiven for thinking it was a porn or a typical chick flick, given the title, the "Look closer" {{Tagline}} and the prominent picture of a woman's midriff and the red rose. Then again, [[FridgeBrilliance this was probably the designer's intention...to look closer and not judge anything by its cover, since the film's most prominent theme is that things are rarely ever as they seem on the surface]].

* TantrumThrowing: Lester throwing a plate of food against the wall.

* TookALevelInBadass: Lester after quitting his job, begins working out...and standing up to his wife.

** InUniverse is Lester yelling "sit down!" when Jane tries to leave the dinner table. She and Carolyn are shocked that Lester actually raised his voice.

* WorldOfSymbolism: The first shot of Lester at work he's reflected on a computer monitor. The text looks like jail bars. That's just ONE example. The film is ripe for Media classes.
* WouldHurtAChild: Both Jane and Ricky get hit by their parents in the same scene with the other watching. Carolyn slaps Jane in a moment of rage while Colonel Fitts barges into Ricky's room to hit him for opening his private cabinet.
* YouAreWhatYouHate: [[spoiler:Col. Fitts, Angela]].

* StalkingIsLove: Played straight with Ricky, although he means no harm, and really does love Jane.
* StepfordSmiler: On the surface, Carolyn is a successful Real Estate Agent with perfect hair, clothes, and makeup who is perfectly cheery. In reality, she strips her husband and daughter of their self-esteem while being immensely unhappy with herself for failing to reach her own expectations.

* StraightGay: The two Jims. [[spoiler:Col. Fitts]], a raging homophobe who is actually deeply closeted, doesn't even realize they're gay at first.
* SuburbanGothic: Lester's marriage is unhappy, his daughter resents him, and he's trapped in a dead-end job that he hates. Also, all of his family members are planning to kill him.

-->'''Lester:''' You don't get to tell me what to do...ever...again.

* NippleAndDimed: It ''is'' an R-rated movie. Subverted by Thora Birch's topless scene, however, which emphasizes her vulnerability over her sexuality. More so with the other eventual nipples on display.

* NotWhatItLooksLike: Col. Fitts spies on Ricky and Lester getting high, but their unfortunate placement and movements make it look like something sexual from Col Fitts' POV.

* OneDialogueTwoConversations: PlayedForDrama. When [[spoiler:Col. Fitts]] wanders over in the rain, Lester's dialogue confirms his (mistaken) perception that Lester is, like [[spoiler:Fitts himself]], a closeted gay man. This leads to the shooting at the end.
* OrbitalKiss: Lester and Angela kissing in the kitchen.
* PomPomGirl: Angela is of a good nature and can get people into cheers, she's self-obsessed when not on the job. Jane is affable even when she's not acting as a cheerleader but even though she's enthusiastic she's not very good at it. Carolyn mentions how dedicated she is to her routines as well.
* PosthumousCharacter: Lester is shot at the end of the film, providing a PosthumousNarration.
* PowerHair: One of Carolyn Burnham's numerous ways of "projecting an image of success at all times." Notably in flashbacks to her younger days - where Lester describes her as happy - her hair is longer.

** When he's working out after Carolyn's lecture: ''"That's. What. You. Think!"''
** During the violent dinner: ''"Don't Interrupt Me. Honey."''

** When he finds out [[spoiler:she is cheating on him]]: ''"No, no. '''You'''. Don't get to tell '''me''' what to do. Ever. Again."''
* RedHerring: Throughout the movie we are led to believe that [[spoiler:Carolyn (or maybe Ricky)]] killed him.

* SexlessMarriage: Lester and Carolyn. As Lester says it: "This hasn't been a marriage, for years, but you were happy as long as I kept my mouth shut. Well guess what, I've changed! And the new me whacks off when he feels horny, because you're obviously not gonna help me out in that department!"

* SkewedPriorities: Lester chews Carolyn out for being more concerned about beer getting spilled on the couch than having an intimate moment with him.
* SoulCrushingDeskJob: Lester Burnham works a boring desk job that, along with his troubled marriage, he believes is killing him. As part of his midlife crisis, he blackmails his boss, quits his job, and goes back to flipping burgers, which he finds far more satisfying.

** In many ways, ''American Beauty'' is a spiritual successor to ''Literature/{{Babbitt}}'' by Creator/SinclairLewis. Both stories explore the shallowness and boredom of middle class American life through the experience of a white-collar worker who seems to be living well, but casts off his previous existence for something more rebellious but proves not to be as meaningful as he thought, and comes back enlightened and ready to make a more serious change.

* MaddenIntoMisanthropy: Lester's CharacterDevelopment arc goes through this and out the other side before being tragically cut short.

** Jane. Could be a play on Plain Jane, but as Ricky points out, she is beautiful. Opposite of Angela in that she isn't a conventional beauty.

** Who used to live next door to the Burnhams, eventually hiring Buddy Kane to sell the house, resulting in the Fitts moving into the neighborhood? The [[Theatre/DeathOfASalesman Lomans]].
* MistakenForGay: [[spoiler:Lester]] by Col. Fitts, [[spoiler: who has the hots for him]], he turns him down gently.
* MomentKiller: Lester and Carolyn start having their first romantic and intimate moment in ages...until Carolyn warns Lester not to spill beer on the couch.

-->"I had always heard your entire life flashes in front of your eyes the second before you die. First of all, that one second isn't a second at all, it stretches on forever, like an ocean of time. For me, it was lying on my back at Boy Scout camp, watching falling stars. And yellow leaves, from the maple trees, that lined our street. Or my grandmother's hands, and the way her skin seemed like paper. And the first time I saw my cousin Tony's brand new Firebird. And Janie...and Janie...and...Carolyn."
* NakedPeopleAreFunny: Welcome to America's Weirdest Home Videos.
* NightmareFetishist: Ricky's obsession with "beauty" extends to gazing with fascinated detachment at Lester's corpse lying in a pool of blood.

* TheBadGuyWins: [[spoiler:Col. Fitts not only gets away with murdering Lester, but also tearing apart both his and Lester's families.]]

* InformedAttractiveness: Ricky says Jane is interesting, as opposed to Angela who is boring and "totally ordinary," though while onscreen, Angela's character, an aspiring model, is much more day-seizing and dynamic (or at least her stories are) than Jane, who mostly just complains about her parents or serves as an audience/conversation partner for Ricky. Anyone who likes thin, chatty, materialistic blondes over curvy, quiet, thoughtful brunettes will be rather flabbergasted by Ricky's claim. However, anyone attracted to sensitive types don't need to be informed of Jane's attractiveness or Angela's lack of appeal. Jane clearly appreciates depth and artistry in a person with the way she finds Ricky so fascinating and asks him questions to understand him rather than blindly judging him outright based on hearsay, while Angela is a lot more shallow, focused on the material surface level of things, and judges people based on rumors she hears.
* InMediasRes

* KarmaHoudini: [[spoiler:Col. Fitts]] after murdering Lester.
* KnightTemplar: Col. Fitts, who subjects his own son to urinalysis drug screening.

* LiterallyLovingThyNeighbor: Jane and the new neighbor boy Ricky fall in love.
* LoadsAndLoadsOfCharacters: Lester Burnham, Carolyn Burnham, Jane Burnham, Colonel Frank Fitts, Barbara Fitts, Ricky Fitts, Angela Hayes, Buddy Kane, Jim Olmeyer, and Jim Berkley. No, none of these are just filler characters--each of them plays a crucial role in the plot, or in someone else's characterization.
* LonersAreFreaks: Ricky Fitts. Ironically, he is probably the most normal person in the movie.
** Also an Ironic MeaningfulName: Ricky does ''not'' fit. It's not a coincidence that the movie starts when his family moves in next door.
** Ricky's backstory is that he had a fit (flying into a rage and attacking another kid) that landed him in a mental hospital, and his father had a fit when he though Ricky was servicing Lester.

* HowWeGotHere: The film opens with a scene towards to end of the story where Jane declares she wants to have her dad "[[DeadlyEuphemism put out of his misery]]". We are then shown the events leading up to this scene.
* HurricaneOfEuphemisms: When Carolyn catches Lester masturbating: "Oh, all right! So shoot me, I was whacking off! That's right, I was choking the bishop, chafing the carrot, you know, saying "hi" to my monster!"
* HypocriticalHumor: Janine says the slogan, "Smile! You're at Mister Smiley's!" without a trace of a smile on her face or enthusiasm in her voice. Ricky's mom's apology for the look of the (immaculate) house also counts.
* INeedAFreakingDrink: Lester. Right after giving his wife a HeadTiltinglyKinky kiss, to boot!
* IWantMyBelovedToBeHappy: Played with regarding Lester's attitude toward Carolyn's affair with Buddy. Lester ultimately seems rather indifferent to the affair itself, and wasn't so much happy for his wife finding happiness with someone else as he was delighted at being able to experience a bit of ''schadenfreude'' at seeing his wife, who had adopted a superior-than-thou attitude towards him and pretty much everyone throughout the movie (at least in public) being brought down a peg or two in a rather publicly humiliating fashion through being exposed as an adulteress in front of him and everyone he worked with.
-->'''Lester:''' You don't get to tell me what to do ever again.
* IdealizedSex: Averted. The sex scene between Buddy and Carolyn is hilariously awkward and over-the-top. ("Fuck me, your majesty!") The sex scene between [[spoiler:Lester and Angela]] comes closer to the trope, but [[spoiler:it ends up ending not with sex, but with Lester backing off and comforting Angela instead, after learning that she's still a virgin]].
* IfYouCanReadThis: There's a sign in Lester's cubicle at work that simply reads "Look Closer." This was just something the set designer just felt like decorating the set with. Director Sam Mendes noticed this after seeing the footage in the editing room, and the phrase "Look Closer" would eventually become the movie's {{Tagline}}.
* ImagineSpot: You'll never hear "Broadway" the same way again.
* InformedAttractiveness: Ricky says Jane is interesting, as opposed to Angela who is boring and "totally ordinary", though while onscreen, Angela's character, an aspiring model, is much more day-seizing and dynamic (or at least her stories are) than Jane who mostly just complains about her parents or serves as an audience/conversation partner for Ricky.

* AuthorAppeal: Most Alan Ball scripts feature gay characters, this one included.

* GoodIsBoring: Invoked with Jim and Jim. In reference to once seeing the most "bland and boring" heterosexual couple who wore the same clothes, writer Alan Ball said, "I can't wait for the time when a gay couple can be just as boring." The Jims were intentionally meant to be the least interesting characters in the film.

* HaveIMentionedIAmSexuallyActiveToday: [[spoiler:Angela]].

* HeKnowsTooMuch: [[spoiler:Col. Fitts]] kills Lester to keep [[spoiler:his homosexuality]] a secret.
* TheHeroDies: Lester, himself at the end.

** The scene where Lester rattles off a list of euphemisms for masturbating had to be re-shot several times, because Kevin Spacey kept shouting out different euphemisms and Annette Benning was collapsing into hysterical giggles.

* CreepyGood: Ricky films people without their knowledge, as well as dead animals (and people), and speaks in a rather quiet, low voice, with a permanent intense stare, and is a drug dealer to boot. But he's actually a good guy (notably, he stops filming as soon as Jane asks him to, and clearly means no harm), and is probably more well-adjusted than most of the cast.
* ADateWithRosiePalms: Lester. "Look at me, jerking off in the shower...This will be the high point of my day; it's all downhill from here."

* ElderEmployee: Lester quits his advertising job and takes up working at the local burger joint (explaining he wants "the least possible amount of responsibility"). He's easily 20+ years older than the other employees, including the managers, and has to defend his prior fast food service experience because it was decades earlier.
* EveryoneLovesBlondes: Angela Hayes.
* {{Fanservice}}: Mena Suvari naked on a bed of rose petals. "Spectacular", indeed.
* FauxYay: Ricky sarcastically claims to be a prostitute who services other men when his father tells him that he would rather him dead than homosexual.

* FirstLawOfTragicomedies: While not completely unserious, the movie begins with a somewhat lighthearted / sarcastic nature, but the film starts to develop a more serious tone later on.

* ForegoneConclusion: The opening narration reveals that Lester will die in the end.

* {{Cloudcuckoolander}}: Mrs. Fitts. When Frank kicks Ricky out and Ricky is about to leave to run away with Jane, he bids his mother goodbye. She responds, "Wear a raincoat." Which is...good advice.
* ContemptibleCover: If you know nothing about ''American Beauty'', you could be forgiven for thinking it was a porn flick, given the title, the "Look closer" {{Tagline}} and the prominent picture of a woman's midriff and the red rose. Then again, [[FridgeBrilliance this was probably the designer's intention...to look closer and not judge anything by its cover]].