I think I can quote more lines from this movie than any other. Not bad for a film that came out when I was 5. I remember vividly the first time I heard the line, "Plastics," and it was laugh-out-loud funny. Poor Benjamin. So lost. And the rest of the world is trying to catch him up. Even as he sees the plastic-ness of the lives all around him. What movie was it that called the appearance-oriented girls the "plastics?" (Mean Girls?)

Plastic allowed for things to be made cheaply, which (along with cheap shipping and transportation costs) helped helped fuel the mass-produced, consumer culture that exploded in the second-half of the 20th century. Suddenly, Americans had a lot more money and time on their hands, but they didn't have more meaning or depth to their lives. Boredom, malaise, and ennui, those side-effects of people having too much time, too much money, and not enough meaning, are what Benjamin is acutely suffering from.