PleasantvillePeople look back fondly on the past with nostalgia--that sensation which casts some parts of yesteryear in a flattering light. But suppose that you were to walk into the past--or at least an idealized interpretation of it; would it live up to your expectations? Or would you find yourself compelled to impart your own values onto it? That is the basic premise of Gary Ross' Pleasantville, where two teenagers from the Nineties--the nerdy David (Tobey Maguire), and his snotty sister, Jennifer (Reese Witherspoon)--are whisked away into a Mayberry-esque town from an old TV show from the Fifties of the same name: "Pleasantville". In short order, David and Jennifer come to understand that what someone considers "pleasant" isn't always true for everyone else.
|
|
Many films have used the contrast between black-and-white and color to represent a change or transition, or even a newfound insight. Examples go all the way back to The Wizard of Oz and The Purple Rose of Cairo to films from around the same era in which Pleasantville was made, such as Schindler's List. Although film colorization had existed before, this was typically done solely to adapt black-and-white films for color televisions without giving thought to the larger implications or impact on the film experience by the likes of Ted Turner. Pleasantville was revolutionary in the way that the footage was digitally scanned as a means to manipulate the color, helping to pave the way for similar visual flourishes in movies today. This technical achievement is at the core of the movie, and is its defining characteristic. Through this, Pleasantville uses color to signify the discovery of a broader worldview, the cinematic equivalent of Plato's Allegory of the Cave, and it applies not just to the residents of Pleasantville, but to David and Jennifer as well. Pleasantville is hardly subtle with its message about the perils of letting nostalgia brainwash you into mindless subservience. The prologue of the movie is almost a caricature in and of itself. Consider how each classroom lecture is about how horrible the world is and how much worse it is predicted to become, and also in how vapid and superficial everyone seems at David and Jennifer's school. For David, binge watching reruns of the vintage TV show "Pleasantville" is his escape from this world, including being rejected by a pretty girl at school and his mother's griping over the phone about the visitation rights of her kids. It's not hard to envision why people flee from their problems into a safe and sanitized realm where every problem is solved within twenty-two minutes. Of course this isn't what the real world is like, and as teenagers, David and Jennifer are learning this, and are subsequently confronted with reevaluating their priorities. This formative time in their lives, I think, is the catalyst for the changes that come to Pleasantville during their brief tenure there. Neither actually want to be dragged away from reality--even though they are by an overzealous, semi-supernatural TV repairman, played by Don Knotts in some very pointed casting--but they are forced to cope and grow up because of it, becoming more than the superficial stereotypes we were introduced to at the start of the film by its conclusion.
Once David and Jennifer enter the TV world of "Pleasantville", they are "cast" in the roles of "Bud" and "Mary Sue", the teenage children of cliché Fifties mom and pop, Betty Parker (Joan Allen), and her husband, George (William H. Macy). George always comes home from work by announcing "I'm home", and Betty always greets him with a martini. Betty always makes absurd amounts of food, and the two sleep in separate beds, because...TV. Virtually every odd era-specific element from Fifties TV shows gets lampooned in Pleasantville, and subsequently subverted by David and Jennifer's incongruous presence. David may understand the "rules" of behaving in this two-dimensional pseudo-reality, but Jennifer rankles under the protocol quickly, and swiftly works to undermine these rules by having sex with handsome classmate, Skip Martin (Paul Walker), after she drags him to Lover's Lane. As others have observed, things like premarital sex, violence, and provocative literature sure did exist in the Fifties (and long before that), but not in Pleasantville, because Pleasantville isn't real; it only represents an interpretation of reality. The message is clear after David and Jennifer's influence resonates throughout the town. Before long, Bud's all-too simple boss at the local soda fountain, a man named Bill Johnson (Jeff Daniels), suddenly finds himself attracted to art, realizing that there is so much more to self-expression than he could have ever considered if his ideas were never challenged. Betty comes to realize that there is more to life than just being a servant to George, and George is challenged to recall just why he fell in love with his wife in the first place, suddenly adrift with his routine being shattered. Before long, there is an ideological divide in Pleasantville, where people who have realized that there is more to life become "colored"--a pointed choice of word deliberately used to emphasize inequality between two peoples. There is book burning and the smashing of windows by those who proclaim that such ideas are "dangerous". And this is followed by unequal laws being passed by those in charge ostensibly to uphold "traditional values" for their own sake by the likes of "Big Bob" (J. T. Walsh), head of what passes for government in Pleasantville. This leads to a trial where David delivers an argument in favor of change, recalling films like Mr. Smith Goes to Washington. There is a revolution of the mind happening in Pleasantville, and no revolution is bloodless. But what the film asks of us is whether we bleed red or gray, whether we are willing to accept that there is another world out there full of ideas that can enrich our view of reality, or if we're unwilling to leave the cave, forever tied to a screen that tells us what the world "should" be like rather than letting us decide for ourselves.
Recommended for: Fans of a thought-provoking and technically accomplished fantasy that overtly mocks (and, at times, sympathizes with) the idea that things "used to be better", when that isn't uniformly true. Pleasantville may beat you over the head with its message, but it's an impassioned plea for us to respect differences of opinion about right and wrong, and allow ourselves to experience the world beyond our self-imposed limits.
Once David and Jennifer enter the TV world of "Pleasantville", they are "cast" in the roles of "Bud" and "Mary Sue", the teenage children of cliché Fifties mom and pop, Betty Parker (Joan Allen), and her husband, George (William H. Macy). George always comes home from work by announcing "I'm home", and Betty always greets him with a martini. Betty always makes absurd amounts of food, and the two sleep in separate beds, because...TV. Virtually every odd era-specific element from Fifties TV shows gets lampooned in Pleasantville, and subsequently subverted by David and Jennifer's incongruous presence. David may understand the "rules" of behaving in this two-dimensional pseudo-reality, but Jennifer rankles under the protocol quickly, and swiftly works to undermine these rules by having sex with handsome classmate, Skip Martin (Paul Walker), after she drags him to Lover's Lane. As others have observed, things like premarital sex, violence, and provocative literature sure did exist in the Fifties (and long before that), but not in Pleasantville, because Pleasantville isn't real; it only represents an interpretation of reality. The message is clear after David and Jennifer's influence resonates throughout the town. Before long, Bud's all-too simple boss at the local soda fountain, a man named Bill Johnson (Jeff Daniels), suddenly finds himself attracted to art, realizing that there is so much more to self-expression than he could have ever considered if his ideas were never challenged. Betty comes to realize that there is more to life than just being a servant to George, and George is challenged to recall just why he fell in love with his wife in the first place, suddenly adrift with his routine being shattered. Before long, there is an ideological divide in Pleasantville, where people who have realized that there is more to life become "colored"--a pointed choice of word deliberately used to emphasize inequality between two peoples. There is book burning and the smashing of windows by those who proclaim that such ideas are "dangerous". And this is followed by unequal laws being passed by those in charge ostensibly to uphold "traditional values" for their own sake by the likes of "Big Bob" (J. T. Walsh), head of what passes for government in Pleasantville. This leads to a trial where David delivers an argument in favor of change, recalling films like Mr. Smith Goes to Washington. There is a revolution of the mind happening in Pleasantville, and no revolution is bloodless. But what the film asks of us is whether we bleed red or gray, whether we are willing to accept that there is another world out there full of ideas that can enrich our view of reality, or if we're unwilling to leave the cave, forever tied to a screen that tells us what the world "should" be like rather than letting us decide for ourselves.
Recommended for: Fans of a thought-provoking and technically accomplished fantasy that overtly mocks (and, at times, sympathizes with) the idea that things "used to be better", when that isn't uniformly true. Pleasantville may beat you over the head with its message, but it's an impassioned plea for us to respect differences of opinion about right and wrong, and allow ourselves to experience the world beyond our self-imposed limits.