# Pleasantville (1998)

### reviewed by
Adam Godfrey

    A Review By Adam Godfrey
    PLEASANTVILLE
    Starring Tobey Maguire, Reese Witherspoon, Joan Allen, William H. Macy, Jeff
    Daniels, J.T. Walsh, Don Knotts
    Written & Directed By Gary Ross
    Grade: A-

Recently I read 4 reviews of Pleasantville-one from Entertainment Weekly, one from a newsgroup, and two from different online resources. Each review compared this film to The Truman Show. Why? The only reason people compared Pleasantville to Truman is due to the fact that their lives are on television. Other than that, the two movies are completely different from each other. Reviewers seem to love to pick one movie (i.e. The Truman Show), obsess over it, and make it a guideline for other movies. When Pleasantville and EDtv opened, all critics seemed to treat the two films like they were subjects of King Truman. The same goes for The Thin Red Line, as well. When it opened in Decemeber, probably 98% of reviews compared it to Stephen Spielberg's Saving Private Ryan, giving Thin Line no chance whatsoever. Critics loved Private Ryan so much, that they automatically decided no movie is good enough to reach its standards. This is why I think Pleasantville was underrated. If The Truman Show had never been made, Pleasantville probably would have received better reviews, done better at the box office, and would be remembered after it's long been on the video store shelves. Sure, it wasn't perfect, and it wasn't very believeable, but neither was The Wizard of Oz or Star Wars, and there stands two of the most prominent movies in history. With the exception of Don Knotts as the annoying "TV repairman" the film is cast perfectly: The Ice Storm's Tobey Maguire is David in real life; he watches the old 50's sitcom "Pleasantville" to escape from his feuding parents. His twin sister, Jen (Reese Witherspoon) is a popular slut who (steriotypically) smokes and wears revealing clothes. But what makes her character believeable is the dialogue-those excessive 90's terms such as "like", "whatever", and "cool" make her sound like the total dimwit she's supposed to be. The twins, with a little help from a TV repairman (casting Don Knotts in this role was obviously a cameo-esque cast rather than a true acting one), are sucked into Pleasantville by a magical new remote. Their new parents, played by William H. Macy and Joan Allen, are perfect in every way. Their new names are Bud and Mary Sue, and right away they start to corrupt the town of Pleasantville. After the siblings fit comfortably in their new roles, the movie begins to take form. It's just like watching a sitcom in itself; you don't want it to end. "Mary Sue" has sex with her date, the school basketball champion; when he tells all his friends about it, they stop preforming perfectly at basketball, and things start to take color. Soon we learn that these people don't know how to express true emotions, and when they learn to do so, they eventually turn into color. This eventually sparks a racial war between the "coloreds" and the "black & whites." Entertainment Weekly reviewer Lisa Schwarzbaum claims the movie has, "none of the depth, poignance, and brilliance of The Truman Show..." Yes, The Truman Show was maybe a little more intelligent. But the racial setting-intensified by the forcing of the coloreds to sit in the upper box of the courtroom-certainly classifies as deep, considering it's what I least expected. Gary Ross did not try to create an intelligent, award masterpiece-he just tries to convey moral messages within his work. Take for example Big and Dave, his past films. Big-be careful what you wish for. Dave-Good or bad lying is still lying. Did these movies win big awards? No, but they won the heart of millions. Pleasantville could have done that too, if it wasn't for snotty reviewers who set precedents with preceeding films. Pleasantville: A- Ad2am "I almost lost my nose...and I like it. I like breathing through it." -Jack Nicholson, Chinatown

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