American Beauty character analysis

Angela


Background
Angela is a teenage girl, that attends college in america. She is asthetically beautiful and thinks very highly of herself. Her best friend and seemingly only friend is Jane. Angela is Lester's midlife crisis crush and she plays a pivitol role in the story.

Beggining
At the start of the film She seems to some up a stereotypical 'plastic blonde' american girl. she is portrayed as this young, confident and attractive character. She regularly brags about her 'amazing' sex life and is very big headed and full of herself, she also seems very bitchy, and treats Jane like she is a piece of carpet.

Ending
However by the end of the film she has been 'found out' and although she seemed so perfect at the start, she is anything but that at the end. She falls out with Jane, as Jane realises how much of an ugly person she really is. She realises that looking past all of the makeup and bleech blonde hair, Angela is nothing but a pathetic little school girl. Ricky has a massive part to play in the down fall of angela, the first time Ricky met Amanda he didnt even look at her, it was as if he looked straight through her, he was fully focused on Jane, and he saw past Angela's fake personna and straight in to the inner beauty of Jane. As Ricky and Jane's relationship progressed Angela was rapidly losing control over Jane, and it was as if Ricky had pulled the cotton wool from over her eyes and made her see Angela for what she really is, weak and ugly. This is Ironic as the title of the film is 'American Beauty' and Amanda, the so called beautiful girl, was found out to be actually not very beautiful at all. The ironic relationship of the title and the ongoings in the film start to make the audience wonder wether this 'American Beauty' and the american dream of having a big house, a well paid job and a happy& secure family is really all that it is cracked up to be.

Scene analysis (2nd from Last scene, Angela and Lester 'sex scene')

There is diegetic music playing in the music player in the living room (Niel Young - Don't let it bring you down.') The music is very romantic and works parallel with the scene. Also
the rain is belting down on to the windows and is creating an intimate atmosphere.
The camera slowly zooms in to a close up shot, when the scene is at it's most intimate point, when Lester says 'So... are you gonna tell me, what do you want?' During this close up the camera uses the cuttaway technique and keeps cutting the angle of which you view the intimacy from (behind Lester, then behind Angela.