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Interpersonal Conflict in Film
American Beauty (Spacey, Bening and Birch) is a 1999 Film with many interpersonal conflicts that are never resolved. Basically a comedy and drama about Lester Burnham's mid-life crisis but also showing the personal crisis of every other major character, the movie shows a father-daughter conflict between Lester and Jane Burnham that could have been resolved. Communication, time and their common characteristics are three factors that could have resolved Lester's and Jane's interpersonal conflict, if Lester had lived longer.
Everybody in Lester Burnham's life, including Lester and his daughter, Jane, think that he is a "loser." The conflict between them is shown early in the movie, at dinner. Lester, Carolyn and Jane Burnham are having their family dinner at home, Lester asks about Jane's school day and she eventually says sarcastically, "It was spectacular." Then, when Lester discusses his job problem and Jane does not seem interested, he asks, "You couldn't possibly care less, could you? Jane says, "Well, what do you expect? You can't all of a sudden be my best friend just because you had a bad day. I mean, hello, you've barely even spoken to me for months." He does not disagree with her. She gets up from the table and walks out of the room. Also, later in the movie, Jane complains about Lester's mid-life crisis crush on her girlfriend and even asks her new boyfriend to kill him and "put him out...
In the first place, they used to communicate, Lester is still trying to communicate with Jane and there is still the possibility of future communication: after Jane walks out on her parents during that first dinner, Lester goes to her privately and says, "Janie, I'm sorry that I haven't been more available…you know you don't always have to wait for me to come to you." Jane says, "Oh, great. So, now it's my fault." Lester says, "I didn't say that. It's nobody's fault….Janie, what happened? We used to be pals." She does not disagree. Also, the characters still interact with each other through the movie, so there is still a possibility of communication. That little exchange of dialogue and the fact that they still interact show that was past communication, Lester is still trying to communicate and there is still a possibility of communication between them, all showing that this interpersonal conflict could eventually be resolved.
A second reason that their interpersonal conflict could be resolved…
Works Cited
American Beauty. Dir. Sam Mendes. Perf. Kevin Spacey, et al. 1999. DVD.
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