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American Happiness
Science in the screen runs American Beauty
Photo: (from left) Annette Benning, Thora Birch, Kevin Spacey
“We can take big ideas like happiness, the important stuff that has engaged human beings for at least the last two thousand years and look at them objectively,” he has said. “You can’t take a picture of happiness. But that doesn’t mean you can’t approach it scientifically by creating operational definitions, by creating experiments with control groups, by measuring lots of people who have randomly selected. That’s what my life has been an attempt to do.” So says Daniel Gilbert, professor of Psychology at Harvard University. Gilbert will appear at the Coolidge Corner Theatre’s Science on Screen Series discussing the Oscar winning film American Beauty (1999).
On Monday, December 5th, Gilbert will be present for a pre-screening talk that broaches the subject of the human search for happiness. American Beauty, equal parts biting satire and inquisitive tragedy seems the perfect fit for this topic. The film follows the loveless marriage and mundane life of Lester Burnham (played to perfection by Kevin Spacey) as he discovers the reigniting of happiness in the all-out revolt of his daily existence. Once a mundane family man, Lester’s fascination with his teenaged daughter’s friend (Mena Suvari) lead him to quit his job, buy a car and change his lifestyle. But while Lester’s personal happiness seems to grow, his choices have a seemingly negative effect on his domineering wife (Annette Benning) and moody daughter (Thora Birch).
The talk featuring Daniel Gilbert will begin at 7:00 pm, followed by the film. For more information and to purchase tickets, please visit www.coolidge.org.