Though the roses are a representation of love, they are the only part of the room that suggests anything to do with the emotion. That is, they are a representation of love, not a symptom of it. In this scene Lester's point of view therefore suggests that the roses do not symbolise love present but love extinct. The second stage of love symbolised by the roses is that of actual love, or so Lester's point of view suggests. These scenes are most frequently those with the nubile "American Beauty- Character, Angela. Lester's lust for this teenage icon of beauty is confused with the emotion he is so deprived of; love. The scenes with Angela are (or like that of) a fantasy in which forbidden passion can be explored as a form of love. The roses in these scenes are often not just in a confined vase but are free, floating and flying around the room with a magical energy. In the scene where Angela is dancing in the high school gym watched only by Lester she opens her top up top up to reveal a flow of roses flying out her top and towards Lester.
Lester's view in this scene suggests that this girl is love. The form of love he has for so long been denied, sexual love. But regardless of its context, the roses symbolise love and its dominating presence in the scene. Without this heavy and often complex symbolism of love ,through roses, the emotions of the film, and more specifically Lester, could not be understood so fully by the audience.
A photograph is a piece of time frozen, caught on a piece of film and processed for the world to see. A stolen' measure of space of when perhaps better circumstances existed or better things existed. Photographs are used to be a reminder of those times, and along with it's own hidden messages; the film American Beauty upholds this common rationale.
Photographs are present in three scenes in the movie, that is to say they are used as a narrative technique in three scenes, the first of which is after the first dinner scene where Lester and Jane have there first conflict of the film, which leads on from the scene in the dinning room where the fight begins.