American Beauty by Sam Mendes Essay -- Film Movies

American Beauty by surface-to-air missile MendesThis essay has problems with formatingIn American Beauty, 1999, directed by Sam Mendes, we are confronted with thepermeating shapes that train consumed mainstream American life. Mendes exploits theseimages as constructions that we created around ourselves as a means of hiding our true selves. Mendes is able to implicate us in the construction and make us active viewers by exploiting our voyeuristical nature. In American Beauty Mendes uses the voyeuristic tendencies of the mantrap to concede the permeating constructed images. Mendes, through the use of narration, the mise en scene and cinematic techniques implicates the spectator in to using their voyeuristic tendencies to deconstruct the images in modu previous(a) to light upon the true image. From the start of the film the construction of images is evident.American Beauty begins with the transparent constructed shot, shown through the use of avideo camera, of a young young girl . The narration reveals that she wants her father dead. The image portrayed around her is constructed as an evil, uninvolved youth. The next scene is of a high angle shot, with a voice-over narration. The voice-over goes to justify that this is Lester Burnhams speaking and he is already dead and the following is a construction of the relevant events. This scene holds relevance for two reasons. First it constructs an image that the young teenager in the previous scene is the killer. And as we forget learn by the end of the film this image is not all(prenominal) that it appeared to be. This is a reoccurring theme throughout the film, that these are constructed images, and to notice that there is more than to the story then what appears on the surface. The high angle spanning shot of Lesters street also holds significance for the spectator. This opening shot is quite analogous to that of Alfred Hitchcocks opening scene in Psycho. The similar themes is the spectators being the voy eurs. In each we are looking into the private sphere of the character. However, in American Beauty our voyeuristic nature is not shameful. The narration that accompanies the scene is allowing our voyeuristic desires to enter into theprivate lives without guilt or shame. Mendes as does Lester asks the spectator to be the voyeur. As well the sign on Lesters cubicle besiege is not a coincidence. Mendes is again soliciting t... ...ng against thejumbled blinds of the sliding door. The perfect bilaterally symmetric image within the mise en scene iserased in order to portray the failing images in Carolyns life.In American Beauty, Mendes constructs his images in order to ask the spectator todeconstruct, by looking closer. This film represents the darkness that we have allowed to interpretpinto American culture. We have allowed ourselves to be overly concerned with the centering we wantto be or told we should be represented. There are excessively many cases of the individuals soul bei nglost behind a snarl of faulty images. Mendes begs the spectator almost in desperation to try tosee the beauty that this world has to offer. However, he is not pessimistic in his conclusions. standardized the flower the film is named after we can still bloom late and the appreciation for thebeauty will last for eternity. Yet to reach a point to appreciate the beauty we must strip away the mingled layers which we have surrounded ourselves with. This is Mendes point, the need todeconstruct the permeating ideologies within our culture. BibliographyAmerican Beauty. Dir. Sam Mendes. Dreamworks /Warner Brothers, 1999.