Imaginarium
1.Introduction
Truman Show and Pleasantville are both movies which involve TV shows, both are made in 1998 and both in their own way say something deep about life in general but very differently. Both are daringly original although on the surface maintain the Hollywood formula and surprisingly both had a budget of US $ 60 million (The Numbers). Truman Show has an IMDb rating of 8.1 (IMDb) whereas Pleasantville scores 7.5 (IMDb). Rotten Tomatoes gives Truman Show 94% (Rottentomatoes.com) and Pleasantville 84% (Rottentomatoes.com) respectively.
2. Summary of Plots
Truman Show is about an insurance agent named Truman Burbank (played by Jim Carrey) who spends a very ordinary life in a small seaside town called Seahaven. Suddenly one day he begins to observe very unusual things happening. Something like a very large stage light drops from an airplane which almost hits him, he happens to hear a radio signal which suggests that his movements are under surveillance and his wife seems to advertise products during normal conversations. His suspicions about everything grows which eventually leads to the conclusion that his every movement is aired live 24×7 in a TV reality show and every other person except himself are actually actors in that show (including his wife Meryl and childhood and best friend Marlon). The show is directed by a man called Christof (Ed Harris) and is in its 30th year beginning from Truman’s birth. Every effort is made so that Truman does not find out the truth about this reality. Sylvia (Natasha McElhone), an extra of the reality show falls in love with Truman and tries to explain to Truman about the reality but whisked off quickly by the producers. Truman has intention to explore the world and go to Fiji but every flight gets booked for one month and even when he tries to go to some other place by car his wife Meryl (Laura Linney) tries best to dissuade him and ultimately his journey is stopped by a road block caused by “a leak in the Seahaven energy plant”. He asks his friend Marlon (Noah Emmerich) to tell the truth but he tells him that nothing is wrong. Truman had a fear of water caused by a childhood accident when his father got “drowned” in sea during a storm. His father makes a sudden reappearance in the set and Truman finds his father “alive” once again. As he tries to approach him, his “father” is taken away forcefully by other people. As Truman gets more and more sceptical about everything, Christof tries to bluff Truman about the father by making him come back to life. However Truman manages to get off from the show and sails off from Seahaven (he has lost his fear of sea because now he knows his father’s death was faked). As he escapes from eyes of the cameras the show is paused for “technical glitches”. However, soon Christof finds out that Truman is out in the sea and tries to stop his escape by creating artificial storm in the sea and putting Truman’s life in mortal danger. Truman fights valiantly and ultimately storm subsides and Truman manages to get into the boat and calm waters. At this point Christof speaks to Truman himself and says all the good things about the life he has created for Truman and tells him to comeback. Truman finds that the beautiful sky is actually painted. As he finds the exit door of Chritof’s world he says that he is going to get out of it in his usual morning greeting and escapes from the “reality show” for good.
In Pleasantville the chief protagonists are a high school boy named David (Tobey Maguire) and his sister Jennifer (Reese Witherspoon) who live in the present era. Tobey is troubled by all the problems in the present world and the pessimistic about the dark future as painted by the teachers in his classroom. As a result he takes refuge to a late 1950 sit com called Pleasantville where everything is peaceful and perfect. He actually lives every moment of the TV show. One day his mother is in trouble and she lives David and his sister. David is starting to watch his favourite show when her aggressive sister says she also wants the TV for the date she has with her boyfriend. The remote control of the TV breaks during fight that ensues between the brother and sister. A mysterious TV repairman appears without calling and offers them a new remote control which is far more “advanced”. As they switch on the TV with the remote they are suddenly transferred actually to the world of Pleasantville without much prospect to comeback in the “present”. They are both aghast at this development. However David knows all about this world and gets used to very easily whereas Jennifer wants to leave this world immediately until an attractive looking boy asks her for a date. As it happens in the pristine black and white of Pleasantville there is no real problems, no desire for change and everything is peaceful and sex is not discussed about. Jennifer and Tobey begins change all this when Jennifer makes her boyfriend to have sex with her in “Lover’s Lane” and Tobey brings to the local Cheeseburger shop owner Mr. Johnson (Jeff Daniels) a colored art book which Mr. Johnson likes immensely. Jennifer’s boyfriend and Mr. Johnson for the first time in their life sees color and anyone who experiences anything new which is out of Pleasantville’s almost emotionless world becomes colored. Emotions of love anger and act of sex which was unheard hitherto are slowly experienced by many people and those who do that become colored. People experiences rain, thunderstorm and fire for the first time. This change causes commotion in Pleasantville. It is no more pleasant and there are many people who want to stop this “unwanted” change and there are meetings and violent protests against the colored things. Mr. Johnson is in love with David’s mother and he paints her nude. People are shocked. David’s father loses his once docile wife. A public meeting is called to stop all these and rules and laws are promulgated to stop changes. However the change is so inherent and pervasive that it attacks all including those who want to stop change. Soon there is nothing black and white. The peaceful world of Pleasantville is gone but now people see changes every time. There is love, anger, hatred and expectancy but the blandness of life is gone forever. David comes back to the present and like a grown up man consoles his distraught mother who has returned home.
3. Messages of the Two Movies
Both the movies are highly symbolic and have layered messages. The first movie Truman Show is actually a science fiction although its reach goes beyond science to philosophy. Apparently it tries to show the influence of TV in our life and how consumerism of TV ads can go to the distance where it makes the whole life of an individual a TV show to earn money. All his private emotions and acts are made public to generate advertisement revenues and even his best friend and wife are involved in this mercenary conspiracy. Also media is so pervasive in life that it intrudes every field of life (like the internet is doing to our most private mails) and we are made to believe what media is saying. TV shows which are actually staged drama make us believe that that is the reality. The effect of the movie on the audience was quite extraordinary. A new kind of mental syndrome was found out by psychiatrists that made patients believe that there were lives were actually TV shows (Newsweek.com). When twin towers of World Trade Center were destroyed by the terrorists some even checked whether it was just another staged TV show. The evil of consumerism is gripping every stage of life and when one tries to escape it this world the commercial world is trying every effort to stop that and lure one back to its fold. However if one sees the falseness of the commercial world one can eventually free itself from it although sometimes at great cost.
But beyond this easily understandable message there is another more fundamental message that is ingrained in the movie. And that message can be found when one mulls over the movie more introspectively. Perhaps this can be better explained by the Hindu concept of “Maya” or “Devil” in Christianity. Upanishads (Hindu philosophical concepts written in ancients books) says that actually the world we see through our senses are unreal and actually a “Maya” or “veil” so that we don t perceive the presence of the “Self” or God all the time and everywhere in this universe. It says as if this world is a movie show which is running in our consciousness. As soon as we realize that the real outside is “unreal” and the veil or Maya drops and we find our real “Self” which is God. That is Devil or Maya prevents us all the time to reach divinity. When we realize this and try to escape from “Maya” or Devil it makes every attempt to foil our efforts through worldly temptations. But if we are determined enough we can be free and realize our divine “Self” or “Heaven”. In the movie Christof, the director of the reality show says prophetically “We accept the reality of the world with which we're presented. It's as simple as that” (Truman Show). In a sense he is saying that although we all continue to live in a false world we accept it as real. At another time he Christof says “I am the Creator - of a television show that gives hope and joy and inspiration to millions” (Truman Show). Effectively the film tries to tell you that our Creator makes us live in a false world providing temptations all around. But we can be free if we are determined enough. We are bonded because actually we prefer this bondage. Christof says “He could leave at any time. If his was more than just a vague ambition, if he was absolutely determined to discover the truth, there's no way we could prevent him. I think what distresses you, really, caller, is that ultimately Truman prefers his cell, as you call it” (Truman Show). His name Christof is also has a double meaning. Christof can be easily broken to “Christ off” or against Christ. In the mask of a TV show director he is actually creator of our false world but also like real Creator he gives us hope of liberation if we are determined.
Pleasantville gives us different philosophical messages and it is in fact opposite of what Truman Show tries to convey. Its broad message is that although we think that the “old world” was a much more peaceful and happier times the truth is different. We always see the present world in a bleak light and doomsday predictions in every field makes our vision filled with pessimism. However at no time this was completely different. At every point of history people were confronted with problems and were afraid of new things cropping up and challenge our “peaceful” existence. There always was an urge for change and that change always happened and there was resistance to that change. There was always a group who embraced changed and liked it. The others always thought that these changes will degrade and distort our lives and there were meetings, violent resistance to change. Yet change happened because change is an inevitable process of living and although each new change brought new hopes it also brought new type of difficulties. We cannot stop changing because another name of life is change. The world would have been calm and peaceful like the black and white Pleasantville if there was no desire, no competition, and no urge for novelty. Life would not have changed if in the first place we did not eat the proverbial “apple” in the Garden of Eden and life would have been pristine. However if we did not eat that apple life would have been colorless and without any spice and not worth living for. In a very significant moment the mysterious TV repairman who actually sent David and his sister to Pleasantville complains that they have destroyed the peace of the imaginary sit- com’s peace and have “eaten” the banned “apple”. The TV repairman is actually God who reminds us we are not happy with whatever we get and desire different things and this desire causes all the problems with the life. The point movie makes is that we will always eat the apple and see changes. That change will bring new things to our lives, new joys (like rain and sex) that will also bring new troubles (like fire etc.). But if we resist that change by not desiring anything, not sinning and not touching the apple proffered by the devil we will be in a world where there is no pain but any pleasure or joy either. To live we have to eat the apple and experience joys and pains and accept it as normal. In fact the movie urges us to seek the change by eating the “apple” and sinning. It does not say like Truman Show to be free from the inevitable bondage but says that it is the normal thing, it never has been different (although we may think so) and accept this bondage and enjoy its pleasure and pain without being pessimistic.
4. Production and Direction
Both the production cost much more than an “artistic” movie should cost. In the garb of a Hollywood slickness and extravaganza the movies are sublime. The set designs, camera work are superb. The most important thing is that both use digital imaging very freely which was new at that time. Lot of hard work has been done to make things black and white and colored in a single shot in Pleasantville. Buildings of Truman Show were computer generated. In both the movies story telling are brilliant. In Truman Show characters come close to the camera and advertise for products because the director Peter Weir wanted to remind the audience it was a television commercial show (Rudolph).
Gary Ross, the director and story writer of Pleasantville said "This movie is about the fact that personal repression gives rise to larger political oppression. That when we're afraid of certain things in ourselves or we're afraid of change, we project those fears on to other things, and a lot of very ugly social situations can develop.” (Johnson-Ott). There is a shot in the movie where it is written in front of an entrance “No Colored People Allowed”(Pleasantville). This at once signifies the non acceptance of people in the movie where people became colored who undergone change as well as the non acceptance of the colored races in general in US. In this way in both movies many things are set up in such a way that a single thing can signify more than one thing.
Paintings are used in Pleasantville very craftily. David shows Mr. Johnson the book of art brought from Library. The first painting is The Expulsion from the Garden of Eden by Masaccio to signify the moral torment every one of us experience in this world. We are all expelled from the illusory Garden of Eden and pine for that pristine world.
5. Performance
In both the movies there were some memorable performances by the actors. Ed Harris as Christof gives a sterling performance and he was nominated for academy awards although he did not win the prize. Jim Carrey, the star of the Truman Show also in his elements as Truman Burbank. Tobey Maguire got Saturn Award best performance award for a young actor for Pleasantville
6. Awards
Truman Show was very highly acclaimed critically and got several nominations for 71st. Academy Awards including Best Director, Best Supporting Actor, and Best original Screenplay (Andrew Niccol) (Imdb.com). Although it did not win any of these it won several awards in British 52nd Academy Film Awards including Best Production and Best Screen play (Imdb.com)
Pleasantville did also won or got nominated for any major Academy or Bafta award but got nominations for Best Costume Design and Best Music and Original Dramatic Score (IMDb).
7. Conclusion
The two movies are comparable in many levels. They are made in the same year, with almost the same budget with plots around TV shows. They both use digital computerized techniques widely among other things. But they are comparable most in the sense that they both are not restricted to the superficial appearance of the movie and try to be sublime. Both are more enjoyable (particularly Truman Show) when you view it for the second time and grasp the movie in its entirety. Every other aspects of the movie are of high quality and the movies will not be forgotten easily because of their multilayered wisdom.
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