The film American Beauty, written by Alan Ball, is story based on the restless and routine lifestyle of middle class Suburbia. Kevin Spacey plays Lester Burnham the especially pathetic father whose mid-life crisis will suddenly wake him. This crisis, however, is not the subject of the film. The true focus of this story are how all of the characters come together to form this dysfunctional community, or to form the "structure" that is Lester. Each character contributes to the suburban insanity, as well as Lester's personality. One particular character, a Colonel Frank Fitts, holds a huge symbolic piece of the puzzle and because of the nature of the movie, the symbolism behind the characters may be interpreted in different ways.
             One representation may be that Frank is the controlling and dominating part of society of Lester's life. This may be true, with the assumption that all of the character somewhat represent an earlier part of Lester's life, and that Ricky Fitts represents Lester in his earlier childhood years. In one scene, Ricky is explaining to Jane how his father put him in a mental institution and drugged him up. Symbolically, in the beginning of the movie, Lester states, "I've lost something. I'm not exactly sure what it is, but I know I didn't always feel this... sedated," as if he had been drugged and thrown back into his own life. Frank, a retired colonel, guards his family with an iron grip, having made his wife a quasi zombie and not hesitating to raise his son on the correct path with a few punches. This discipline is so severe that it led to the rebellion of his son, as well as leading up to Lester's death. This represents a side of Lester that he had hated most: being dominated and controlled without being able to live how he wanted to live.
             Another representation is that Frank may be the part of Lester that hid that could not change, because he was afraid, making...