AMERICAN BEAUTY [1999]

... Look Closer

[Jane Burnham]: I need a father who's a role model, 

not some horny geek-boy who's gonna spray his shorts whenever I bring a girlfriend home from school. 

What a lame-o. 

Someone really should just put him out of his misery. 

[Ricky Fitts]: Want me to kill him for you?

[Jane Burnham]: Yeah. Would you?

[Ricky Fitts]: It's like God's looking right at you, just for a second, 

and if you're careful... you can look right back.

[Jane Burnham]: And what do you see? 

[Ricky Fitts]: Beauty.

I feel like I've been in a coma for the past twenty years. 
And I'm just now waking up. 

[Lester Burnham]

It's a great thing when you realize you still have the ability to surprise yourself. 

Makes you wonder what else you can do that you've forgotten about.

[Lester Burnham]

Remember those posters that said, 'Today is the first day of the rest of your life'? 

Well, that's true of every day but one - the day you die. 

[Lester Burnham] 

You better watch yourself, Jane, 

or you're going to turn into a real BITCH, just like your MOTHER! 

[Lester Burnham]

You ungrateful little brat! 
Just look at everything you have. 

When I was your age, we... lived in a duplex! 

We didn't even have our own house!

[Carolyn Burnham] 

My company sells an image. It's part of my job to live that image. 

[Carolyn Burnham]

There happens to be a lot about me that you don't know, Mr. Smarty Man. 

There's plenty of joy in my life. 

[Carolyn Burnham]

Welcome to America's weirdest home videos. 

[Ricky Fitts] 

She's not your friend. 

She's just someone you use to feel better about yourself. 

[Ricky Fitts]

I can't believe you don't know how beautiful you are.

[Ricky Fitts]

It was one of those days when it's a minute away from snowing and there's this electricity in the air, you can almost hear it. Right? 

And this bag was just dancing with me. 

Like a little kid begging me to play with it. 

For fifteen minutes. 

That's the day I realized that there was this entire life behind things, and this incredibly benevolent force that wanted me to know there was no reason to be afraid, ever. 

Video's a poor excuse, I know. 

But it helps me remember... I need to remember... 

Sometimes there's so much beauty in the world, I feel like I can't take it, and my heart is just going to cave in. 

[Ricky Fitts] 

I don't think that there's anything worse than being ordinary. 

[Angela Hayes]

If people I don't even know look at me and want to fuck me, 

it means I really have a shot at being a model. 

[Angela Hayes]

[at the dinner table]

[Carolyn Burnham]: Your father and I were just discussing his day at work. 

Why don't you tell our daughter about it, honey? 

[Lester Burnham]: Janie, today I quit my job. 

And then I told my boss to go fuck himself, 

and then I blackmailed him for almost sixty thousand dollars. 

Pass the asparagus. 

[Carolyn Burnham]: Your father seems to think this kind of behavior is something to be proud of. 

[Lester Burnham]: And your mother seems to prefer that I go through life like a fucking prisoner while she keeps my dick in a mason jar under the sink. 

[Carolyn Burnham]: How dare you speak to me that way in front of her. 

And I marvel that you can be so contemptuous of me, on the same day that you LOSE your job. 

[Lester Burnham]: Lose it? I didn't lose it. 

It's not like, 'Whoops! Where'd my job go?' 

I QUIT. 

Someone pass the asparagus, please. 

[Lester Burnham]: I am sick and tired of being treated like I don't exist. 

You two do whatever you want, whenever you want to do it, and I don't complain. 

[Carolyn Burnham]: Oh, you don't complain? 

Then please, excuse me, I must be psychotic, then! If you don't complain, what is this? Yeah, let's bring in the laugh-meter and see how loud it gets. 

[Lester Burnham, throws asparagus plate to wall]: Don't interrupt me, honey!

 Oh, yeah, and one more thing, from now on we're going to have alternate dinner music because frankly - and I don't think I'm alone here... 

[looks in Jane direction]  

I'm tired of this Lawrence Welk shit!

[Angela Hayes]: Jane, he's a freak! 

[Jane Burnham]: Then so am I! 

And we'll always be freaks and we'll never be like other people 

and you'll never be a freak because you're just too... perfect! 

[Jane Burnham]: I don't think we can be friends anymore.

[Angela Hayes]: You're way too uptight about sex.

[Jane Burnham]: Just don't fuck my dad, all right? Please? 

[Angela Hayes]: Why not?

[Lester Burnham]: I figured you guys might be able to give me some pointers. 

I need to shape up. Fast. 

[Jim Olmeyer]: Are you just looking to lose weight, 

or do you want increased strength and flexibility as well? 

[Lester Burnham]: I want to look good naked! 

[Brad Dupree]: ...so I'm sure you can understand the need to cut corners around here. 

[Lester Burnham]: Sure. Times are tight, and you need to free up cash. 

Gotta spend money to make money.

[Brad Dupree]: Exactly. 

[Lester Burnham]: Like when our editorial director used the company MasterCard to pay for a hooker, and then she used the card number to stay at the St. Regis for, what was it, three months? 

[Brad Dupree]: That's unsubstantiated gossip.

[Lester Burnham]: That's fifty thousand dollars. 

That's somebody's salary. 

Somebody who's probably gonna get fired because Craig has to pay women to fuck him! 

[Brad Dupree]: Jesus. Calm down. Nobody's getting fired yet. 

That's why we're having everyone write a job description, mapping out in detail how they contribute. 

That way, management can assess who's valuable and who's... 

[Lester Burnham]: Expendable. 

[Brad Dupree]: It's just business.

[Brad Dupree, reading Lester's job description]: 'My job consists of basically masking my contempt for the assholes in charge, and, at least once a day, retiring to the men's room so I can jerk off while I fantasize about a life that doesn't so closely resemble Hell.' 

Well, you have absolutely no interest in saving yourself. 

[Lester Burnham]: Brad, for 14 years I've been a whore for the advertising industry. 
The only way I could save myself now is if I start firebombing. 

[Brad Dupree]: Management wants you gone by the end of the day. 

[Lester Burnham]: Well, just what sort of severance package is management prepared to offer me? 

Considering the information I have about our Editorial Director buying pussy with company money - which, I think, would interest the I.R.S., 
since it technically constitutes fraud; 

and I'm sure that some of our advertisers and rival publications might like to know about it as well. 

Not to mention [grin] Craig's wife! 

[Brad Dupree, crosses his arms]: What do you want? 

[Lester Burnham]: One year's salary, with benefits. 

[Brad Dupree]: That's not going to happen.

[Lester Burnham]: Well, what do you say I throw in a little sexual harassment charge, to boot? 

[Brad Dupree, chuckles in disbelief]: Against who? 

[Lester Burnham, chuckles right back]: Against YOU. 

Can you prove that you didn't offer to save my job if I let you blow me?

[Brad Dupree]: Man, you are one twisted fuck.

[Lester Burnham]: Nope; I'm just an ordinary guy with nothing to lose. 

*****