“Angela really does come on to Lester ... In a series of savagely written scenes, he misbehaves all over the place, insulting his wife and telling off his boss, while devoting himself with monastic discipline to creating a body that a teenager will desire.
In separate ways, husband and wife are representative nineties Americans, whipping themselves into frenzies of narcissistic will ... Carolyn [is] a joyless perfectionist and a phony --- her politeness could freeze Martha Stewart in her tracks ...
Angela, teen queen, .. believes in projecting success all the time, and she terrorizes Lester's daughter, Jane, with her erotic expertise, insisting that she's pleased that grown men like Lester want to sleep with her, "because it means I have a chance of being a model." In her Valley Girl way -- she speaks the bullying, media-wise teen idiom -- Angela holds herself to corporate standards of presentability.
All these characters know about self-actualization; they believe in the gospel of selfishness, and they love the jargon of personal triumph, but underneath they feel bereft, as if there true selves had gone unrecognized.”
ellipted; from a review of 'American Beauty' (1999; directed by Sam Mendes)
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