Bowenian Perspective of American Beauty

The Burnham family consists of Lester, the husband of Carolyn and father of Jane. Lester is experiencing a mid-life crisis and his family exhibits crisis due to him throwing away his career and beginning a new life aimed at reinvigorating him with the hope, optimism and sex appeal of his youth. As he announces, ôI feel like IÆve been in a coma for the past twenty years. And IÆm just now waking upö (Mendez, 1999). Lester fears growing older, losing the hope of true love and disrespect from those closes to him. He feels unloved by his daughter, ignored by his wife, and unnecessary at work. At the opening of the film, he informs us in voiceover narration, ôIÆll be dead in a year...In a way, IÆm dead alreadyö (Mendez, 1999

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hear a story in which one person is victim and the other villain, youÆre being invited into a triangleö (141). We are invited into such a triangle in American Beauty, where Lester feels like the victim of his wife and daughter with his wife playing the villain. Carolyn, in turns, so much as admits she refuses to play ôvictimö. One of their most heated emotional exchanges demonstrates the high level of fusion and undifferentiation that exists in the Burnham family system: Lester: I am sick and tired of being treated like I donÆt exist. You two do whatever you want whenever you wand to do it and I donÆt complain. Carolyn: Oh, you donÆt complain?!! Then I must be psychotic then! What is this?!! Yeah, letÆs bring in the laugh-meter and see how loud it gets...ö (Mendez, 1999) The anxiety shared between Lester and Carolyn is transmitted to their daughter Jane, adding to her lack of differentiation and increasing her emotional fusion. As Nichols (et al., 2001) ôThe less anxiety is focused on the children, the more likely they are to grow up with greater differentiation than their parentsö (143). Carolyn is so focused on not being a victim, her Italian silk upholstered furniture and her career ambitions that she has little obje
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Some common words found in the essay are:
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Approximate Word count = 1572
Approximate Pages = 6 (250 words per page)