American Beauty vs The Great Gatsby

Upholding the American Dream means standing by the belief that if one is determined and pushes beyond the limits then they will achieve success and happiness. However, this so- called American Dream is a delusion that is tainted with self-seeking, narcissistic values and lies that can lead toward melancholy.  The reason why Americans have been so obsessed with the desire to become happy lies within the famous line from the Declaration of Independence: “the pursuit of happiness.” Because of this slogan, Americans are given the right to pursue happiness however, this “happiness,” to many Americans, means the perfection and flawlessness of one’s looks, body, possessions, and life Many goals in the pursuit of happiness are based on the “ideal of the body beautiful” (Bordo), meaning that Americans are obsessed with attaining the “perfect healthy, nonobese body” (Bordo).

In Sam Mendes’American Beauty, Lester Burnham is a 42» year—old man suffering from a midlife crisis and starts working out after hearing his daughter’s friend Angela saying that “if he worked out a little, he’d be hot.

” This shows that the pursuit of happiness has “given way to rampant narcissism and misplaced perfection” (Huffington). These egocentric intentions suggest that one way to achieve happiness in the American Dream is to selfishly attain a flawless self To Lester Burnham of American Beauty and Jay Gatsby of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s Great Gatsby, achieving happiness in the American Dream means reliving the past. Since Lester is suffering a midlife crisis, he tries to turn his life around by reliving his paw—getting his dream car, a 1970 Pontiac Firebird, taking employment by serving fast food, and smoking marijuana bought from his daughter’s boyfriend Ricky Fitts.

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When Nick Carraway, one of the characters from The Great Gatsby, asserts that Gatsby can’t repeat the past, Gatsby cries incredulously, “Can’t repeat the past? Why of course you can!”. Gatsby tries to relive his past by trying to get the golden girl Daisy Buchanan to be with him again, just as they were in the past. Gatsby is shown to be so obsessed with the idea of being with Daisy again that Nick mentions that “[Gatsby] talked a lot about the past, and I gathered that he wanted to recover something, some idea of himse. lf perhaps, that had gone into loving Daisy”. Ironically, Lester’s and Gatsby’s method of getting their hands on happiness in their American Dream causes their deaths. If Lester wasn’t associated with Ricky in the first place, Ricky’s father wouldn’t have killed Lester. If Gatsby wasn’t obsessed with the idea of pursuing Daisy, he wouldn‘t have taken the blame for running over Myrtle Wilson that caused her husband George to shoot and kill Gatsby.

These events imply that repeating the past is not a road to take in order to secure happiness. The path to happiness can lead to melancholy, which shows that the American Dream is a delusion Americans see the American Dream as the idea “to push beyond frontiers” (Kurzweil). This means that pursuing the American Dream is doing whatever it takes to achieve one’s goali Gatsby does everything he can to get Daisy’s attention and win her back–becoming rich despite coming from a poor family, lying about being an “Oxford man,” and throwing extravagant patties, However, when Gatsby tells Daisy that they can’t see Daisy’s home because of the mist across the bay and that “[she] always has a green light that burns all night at the end of [her] dock,” Nick asserts that “[Gatsby] seemed absorbed in what he hadjust said.

Possibly it had occurred to [Gatsby] that the colossal significance of that light had now vanished forever“. This suggests that even though Gatsby and Daisy got together, Gatsby‘s dream disappears and doesn’t achieve happiness. Through this quote, Fitzgerald implies that the American Dream isn’t so great to begin with. In American Beauty, behind this beautiful, ideal American home and seemingly picture-perfect family, is the unhappy Lester Burnham who claims that the American Dream is a falsehood. This shows that the American Dream is actually a lie that will lead to dissatisfaction, even if one does everything he or she can to achieve happiness. For example, in his essay adapted from his book Against Happiness: In Praise of Melancholy, Eric G. Wilson mentions that he has done many things in order to attain happiness.

In other words, he “pushed beyond frontiers,” such as purchasing books on how to be happy, contemplating on getting a dog, doing yoga, and going to psychiatrists and getting some drugs. However, despite his efforts, Wilson comes to the conclusion that “his basic instinct is toward melancholia” (“Born to the Blues”). This implies that the pursuit of happiness leads to melancholy Altogether, Lester, Gatsby, and Wilson and their stories indicate that pursuing the American Dream is lie that can lead to unhappiness.  Although the American Dream is based on the ambitious idea that one will attain happiness and success through hard work and determination, it is proved to be a falsehood Despite one’s effort to selfishly create a flawless self, to win the love of another person, or to relive the past, pursuing happiness can lead to dissatisfaction. This suggests that the American Dream is corrupted with narcissistic values and delusions, proving that it is not a dream, but a nightmare.