Comparison Between "Citizen Kane" and "American Beauty"

"American Beauty". If one saw this name n a cover of a movie, that person might decide to watch it because the name sends this message about America, which is that it's beautiful, on top of all the other messages perceived from people about America and social media. However, the titles can be deceiving because this movie at first may seem like your typical American suburban neighborhood (because of it's opening scene, which is an overview of the perfect little town) with its typical  American citizens inhabiting the neighborhood but there's much more to this movie than what it seems. During the opening , the main character Lester Burnham talks about how he's going to end up dying at the end of the movie and this is the story of his life basically and how it all happened. The movie goes into depth about his life as a boring, unrespected husband of a perfectionist wife named Carolyn, and a distant father of his moody teenage daughter Jane. Lester works in an office and Carolyn is a real estate agent, while Jane attends a local high school with her best friend Angela. The whole family's life turns around when new neighbors the Fitz's move in next door. It is a family of three, a teenage boy named Ricky Fitz who is a part time drug dealer and is also attending the same school Jane is. He is the son of an abusive, strict, ex marine who hates all gay's especially gay men, and his mom is distant from reality in her own world. Ricky eventually corrupts Lester with his "I don't care, I do what I like" attitude and Lester becomes a changed man. He begins smoking drugs, quits and blackmails his job as well as treats to his family by actually standing up to them and begins acting on his sudden interest in Jane's best friend. Carolyn has an afair with another real estate agent and Jane falls in love with Ricky. Th entire structure of their family seems to be falling apart, yet Lester is finally happy and in the end he gets murdered by Ricky's dad, who kissed  him. Not the exact typical version of the "American Dream" that comes along with the title. "Citizen Kane" is about a wealthy, lonely, love lost, but love bound older man who passed away, and on his deathbed he says the word"rosebud". So a reporter is on a mission to find out what rosebud stands for by interviewing other people on the life of Kane. In the end the audience sees a view of a sled that was used in Kane's childhood, before he was taken adopted his first home, with the word "rosebud" painted across it, burning in the flames of his fire of his furnace. Sounds like a great citizen, maybe not so much but it is a turn out from what the movie sounds like it would've been about, because he's a citizen of America, you would think him to have a great life, especially of a wealthy citizen.

Both movies have this overall theme of this search for something that both main characters lost and wish to regain desperately. In "American Beauty", Lester is on this journey to regain his youthful sense because that was a time of his true happiness, while in "Citizen Kane" Kane is on a journey to find love and be loved, also regain that youthful feeling from when he was a child. These themes are emphasized throughout the two films in many ways. For example in "American Beauty" Lester Burnham begins working out and there are multiple scenes of him doing things like jogging with the gay couple, bench pressing in his garage and doing chin-up's in his garage. There's also a scene when Lester goes to buy drugs from Ricky and the camera zooms in on his face as he discusses with Ricky, his job when he was a kid and even though Ricky thinks it sounds horrible, Lester says it was actually great as he stares of at nothing with a smile on his face. Working out, working at a fast food restaurant and having a posession of a cool car are stereotypical things that "typical teenage boys" want to do or usually do. So, by Lester doing all of those things, even taking it upon himself to go out and get another fast food job, symbolizes him going after his youth and trying to regain what he lost hold of. In "Citizen Kane" Kane holds a campaign running for governor with the word "love" heavily reinforced in the campaign, he also forces Susan to sing in a theatre that he built for her and he disregards her  opinion towards her career about stopping it because he wants the audiences to love what he created, which was Susan's singing career. By Kane yearning for this endless love from his audience it symbolizes what he's going after which is the love that he felt he had as a child.

Though the two films have much in common there is one huge difference. Both main characters crave that youthful feeling, but Kane craves that as of a child, while Lester craves that of a teenage boy. In "Citizen Kane" a reporter's main goal is to try and find out what Kane's dying words "Rosebud" meant, and the people never finds out what it is but the camera zooms in slowly on Kane's old sled he used as a boy when it snowed heavily, with the word Rosebud painted across it, also in his hand before he dies, is a snow globe which is significant. Since Kane was adopted by the bank as a child and taken from his hometown and parents, he never fully had that childhood with a mom and dad who loved him very much, all he had was owners of a bank to be there for him and he didn't have that mother, father and son relationship that other children at that age had. So, he craved love from everyone else around him as an adult by "buying" their hearts through ways his campaigning, owning his newspaper which he says at first is representing the people so they can feel love for him. Even keeping Susan in the house when she wanted to go out places with him, was symbolizing him keeping her heart and wanting her to love him. In "American Beauty" Lester does things like buying a new car, working out, getting a "stereotypical teenage kid's" job, and lusting after a teenage girl showing that he yearns youth, just a different kind.

In conclusion, both of these films showcase the commercialism of people's lives and an outlook on different peoples yearnings, or reasons for what they do in life. These films show great examples of society and how it shapes the way we all live and how it takes away our happiness, which is want most of the universal population wants.Kane used what society gave him, (money) to have power, and therefore he tried to utilize these to the best of his ability which he thought would give him what he wanted; happiness. Lester lived a boring, unhappy life because society says you have to get married, have a family, and die with your significant  other, but then he broke out of that and went after what he thought was his true happiness. In the end Kane died without having something that Lester had, an epiphany. Realization that he had all he ever wanted and by then it was too late because he was murdered, but still, it teaches all audiences to do what truly makes you happy and not by ways of society.