Lester Burnham is a man who appears to live the ideal American dream. His life includes a career, a family, and a suburban home. Beyond that facade, he is a man who is bored to death. Lester narrates American Beauty, the story of his once boring life and subsequent rebirth, from beyond his grave. The story is set in the last year of Lester's life. He is forty-two years old and faced with his mid-life crisis. By all accounts, including his own, he's a loser. He is in a passionless marriage to Carolyn, a materialistic perfectionist who is only concerned with the outward appearance of their lives. It is very important to Carolyn that the family appears close and prosperous. She even tells Lester how to behave in social situations. Lester's teenage daughter Jane sees her father as an embarrassing loser who drools sexually over her friends. She hates her father to the point of wishing he was dead. Lester has held the same boring job as an advertising exec for fourteen years. He has come to the conclusion that his life is just an endless spiral of boredom and monotony. He feels as though he's living life in a coma. The highlight of his day is masturbating during his morning shower. Sparked by a friendship with his new teenage neighbor, Rickey, and fueled by sexual fantasies of his daughter's girlfriend, Angela, Lester begins a search for self-contentment that is successful albeit at the very end of his life.
             Through his relationship with Ricky, Lester begins to realize that he has considerable control over his fate and transforms his attitude about and approach to living his life. The two first meet at a party Lester was attending with his wife where Ricky was working as a waiter. Lester is surprised and intrigued at Ricky's invitation to get high with him by smoking marijuana. They are smoking outside behind the building when Ricky's boss finds them. He boss attempts to scold Ricky for not being...