Let's Talk About Movies: Pleasantville (1998)

Directed by Gary Ross

Note-A Level 3 Spoiler Warning is in effect for the film Pleasantville. If you haven't seen this film before, and you plan to, maybe wait until after that before you read this.-End Note.

Alo Party Peoples.

Why? Nothing came out this week and I need to fill a slot in my schedule.

Gary Ross' Pleasantville is one of my favorite movies. It might actually be my favorite movie. I don't think it's the best movie, or that nothing can come close, but it happens to be my favorite. It came out the year I was born, and I didn't see it until I was at least seven when it showed up on cable, but I remembered it fondly.

Years later, I remembered the name and searched for it to be sure I didn't hallucinate it. Sure enough, I saw that it did exist, and soon got a second hand DVD to watch it again. When I did so, not only was it still good, as good as I remembered it, it got better now that I could appreciate the subtext. I even tried to write a review of it last year in October, but I don't think that piece does it justice. I wasn't exactly a great writer at the time, and this movie deserves better.

Why do I love this movie? I love it because it dared to aim higher. It's premise of a pair of 1990's twins trapped in a 1950's sitcom called Pleasantville easily could have been just a silly comedy, that would have been enough. It would have still been a good movie. However, what makes it my favorite is that it chooses to explore this concept more, it decides that their modern sensibilities would cause serious problems in the utopia of Pleasantville.

The fictional Pleasantville is a 1950's sitcom about a suburban town of the same name. In this town, life is simple, the weather is always 72°F and the skies are always clear, the basketball team never misses a shot, it's a nice place. Tobey Macguire plays David, a massive fan of the show that ends up getting a magic remote from a mysterious TV repair man. He ends up trapping himself and his sister Jennifer inside the show, and from there the opening act plays out as what the film was sold as, a light toned comedy about 1950's sitcoms.

Then things get interesting. Jennifer was always the rebellious type, and in Pleasantville there's nobody to reign in those urges, so she ends up sleeping with Skip, the star of the basketball team. After this experience, while driving home, Skip notices a rose, it's red, really red. This ends up spreading to the point where the town is split between the monochrome traditionalists and those that embraced these changes and ended up in technicolor.

Margret: "Go on, try it."

That's the thing about the town of Pleasantville, it's name is quite descriptive. As Mr. Johnson, the owner of the soda shop puts it "it never gets any better or worse". Which leads me to the big allegorical touchstone of this movie. Around the end of act two, David has begun to accept some of the changes in Pleasantville, and he takes a technicolor girl named Margret out to Lovers Lane, which has become entirely technicolor because of all the, changes, brought on by Jennifer, while there she spots an apple.

She gets the still monochrome David to eat the apple, and this causes the first rainstorm in Pleasantville. This understandably freaks out the towns inhabitants, and David calms them down with a line that sums up the films message.

"It's rain. It's okay, it's fine, nothing to be scared of. Here, I'll show you. It's just rain, it's okay. It's fine, come on out."                                                                                                                                                                David/Bud, Pleasantville

In case you didn't get the symbolism (and how could you not), Pleasantville is the garden of Eden. The siblings arrival disrupts that paradise, they are the serpent. The TV repairman, who pops up from time to time to check in on the twins, is not happy that they've been causing changes in his little utopia, he's God. However, since some people, understandably, think the film is glorifying sin, I have to say something. The film is more complicated than that. As my evidence, I point to the character of Jennifer. Like I said earlier, she was always the rebellious type, she drinks, smokes, and all that stuff. She is the one to introduce change in Pleasantville, in her words, "[She's] had about ten times as much sex as any of these girls, and I still look like this. [monochrome]." It's only when she decides to study, instead of going out to Lovers Lane again, that she becomes colorful.

The Town Council doesn't exactly like these changes. After a riot at the soda shop over a painting of a nude woman, they institute rather strict rules in response. Lovers Lane and the town library are closed off, paint colors besides black, white and grey are banned, music of a non pleasant manner is also banned. People start putting up "NO COLOREDS" signs in businesses. This film isn't exactly subtle with it's message. That change isn't something to be feared, that it's a natural part of life, and that trying to stifle it causes more problems than it solves.

In general, I love this movie. It's creative, funny, and it tries for some big ideas. Sure, it's about as subtle as being kicked in the face by a florescent blue donkey, but that's not a big issue with me. Because it easily could have been just a silly comedy, that would be fine, but it tries to be something more. I respect that about the movie, and it's especially good for a first directing job. Besides that, it's well written, there isn't a bad performance to be seen, and Randy Newman's musical score is just amazing.

Have a nice day.

Greg.B