The Truman Show Analysis

Everything in my realitythe activities I engage in, the friendships I acquire, the family I love, the be deceitfulnessfs I form ( almost art, politics, religion, incorruptity, the after smell)argon predicated upon the premise that my career is truly and authentic each(prenominal)y mine to live, not something spurt or staged. I am the author that gives meaning to my reality. I am, so to speak, the star of the show. In Peter Weirs motion-picture show closely the ultimate reality TV show The Truman Show (1998), the ever ominous what is real question begs the assumption that the lives we live are really ours.It is an important text to have with respect to those other difficult questions we all beguilem to either explore or avoid Who am I? Why am I here? Whats it all ab place? Am I living in a wangle world where my choices ultimately bear no significance? If so, is a meaningful life til now practical? These are crucial questions that pertain to valet de chambre, ones that The Truman Show seeks not necessarily to answer directly simply classa explore by means of speculation, inquiry and character/plot subtext.They are also questions that lead us to consider how Trumans awakening into the real is a type of our take awakening, and why opting for reality oer bearing is something worth striving for. The salient difficultness of the film regards the term reality1). What it means in consideration of Trumans world, 2). Christofs world, 3). The audience-within-the-films world, 4). The watchers who watch the films world, and 5). The overall statement Weir is making ab by reality in general. That is v different realities, each which carry delicate nuances about its semantically difficult nature.Indeed, spectators are left to question like Truman does when he discovers the fabrication of his existence, Was nought real? Well, what is real in The Truman Show? Who or what social forces construct his/our reality? Weir seems to intentionally leave splay ga ps in answers to these types of questions to admit spectators more in the process of constructing the films textual meaning. He also seems to posit a real world of some sort beyond Trumans manufactured one, moreover is un make believe as to what that real one is and why Truman/spectators should want it.The ambiguous challenge of the film thusly inevitably forces us to dive into the precarious realm of metaphysicsthe realm where we ponder what reality is like. It is in this realm where Weir asks us to sour metaphysicians in coiffure to explore what this nebulous term reality even means. One film theorizer whose ideas can help dissect the subtle nuances of how reality is played with in The Truman Show is Nick Browne. To hand over a brief caveat on Brownes theories, it is pertinent to understand that he explores the ship canal in which film form (camera angle, mis-en-scene, dialogue, etc. ) relates to film content (theme, moral order, etc. . He views the managing director as a narrator who invites the spectator into the text to par dramatise of a certain relationship not only between the characters and their beliefs, but also the director and his beliefs.According to Browne, certain narrators have been known to countermand the traditional meaning of filmic codes (e. g. IMR) by utilize formal methods to make a statement about the films moral order. In what he calls the power of the wish, the narrator demonstrates that the person who holds the most powerful point-of-viewor gazeover another character, according to the traditional codes is, in fact, wrongfulness in his/her judgment.Browne therefore emphasizes the narrators manipulation as using the conventional language of film against itself in order to make a provocative statement about the films content (13). Peter Weir plays the role of what Browne calls the narrator-in-the-text, one who has invited us to ascertain the moral order of the film. The moral order of The Truman Show pertains to the five aforementioned levels of reality and how spectators are to interpret them.Using Brownes updated version of formalism, the essay go forth get by how Weir steps into the text using dialogue and camera angle to present the great moral order of the filmthe issue of what it means to see reality truly. Aspects of Brownes power of the gaze lead be useful to bolster the fact that although spectators identify with Truman throughout the film, their identification with him cannot help but be predominantly filtered through Christofs all-powerful, watch-tower gaze a sight that Weir-as-narrator-in-the-text is ultimately going to argue, using neo-formalism (e. g. specifically camera angle), as being wrong in judgment.In particular, the essay will grant concrete examples from the film of how Weir uses shifting camera perspectives of how spectators view Truman, whether through Christofs autocratic gaze (what I will argue as the despotic perspective) or through the omniscient perspective that fr ees Truman from Christofs intricate vane of hidden cameras (TS). The shifting camera perspectives will create what Browne labels the plural subject areathe notion that forces/leads/or guides spectators not only to identify with certain characters, but also to be at two places at once, where the camera is and with the depicted person (127).As applied and will be argued in this paper, the filmic spectator is the plural subject that is consistently sutured or locked between the despotic and omniscient perspective when think Truman, thereby creating a double structure of viewer/viewed (127). These structures inevitably challenge spectators to wrestle with how reality is envisioned in The Truman Show and how the varying lenses of representation regarding reality carry certain implications under the despotic perspective, and as well under the omniscient one.Understanding how Weir uses these ambiguous camera perspectives (i. e. structures) will help us further see how reality operates according to the films five aforementioned realities. They will also help polish off what Browne means when he says such structures, which in shaping and presenting the action prompt a vogue and indeed a path of reading, convey and are closely allied to the guiding moral input of the film (131-132).Certainly The Truman Show is complex and incertain, one that demands a sensitive read. We will therefore scram with a brief plot synopsis of the film, move towards the evidence that shows how Brownes neo-formalist theories of the power of the gaze and plural subject relate to Weirs use of despotic and omniscient camera perspectives, and overall railroad tie how these ideas pertain to the five levels of reality in the film.The Truman Show depicts the life of Truman Burbank (Jim Carrey), the first child legally espouse by a corporation for the purposes of filming his whole life recorded on an intricate network of hidden cameras, and broadcast live and unedited twenty-four hours a da y, seven days a hebdomad to an audience around the globe (TS). Christof (Ed Harris), the shows creator, lives in a reality governed by idiot box ratings and media hype. He convinces Truman that he inhabits a benign and ordinary world, but little oes he know that everything he does is monitored, controlled and manufactured under the totalitarian gaze of Christof.While the world he occupies is virtually counterfeit and wide- put off of actorseven his wife Meryl (Laura Linney) and best friend Marlon (Noah Emmerich)Truman is unaware that his life is being use to entertain humanity in a non-stop reality program. Audiences within the film glue themselves anxiously to the screen wondering How will it end? a slogan captured on buttons, T-shirts and posters purchased by fans of the show.Their reality revolves around watching Truman live out his happy cliched existence in the idyllic hometown of Seahaven until gradually certain events cause him to question the perceptual experience of his alleged reality camera lights fall from the sky, actors fail to follow their cues, backstage set dressings are exposed, etc. These curious events begin to awaken Truman to the constructs that have sought to blind him his good life. He realizes that something is wrong and goes to great lengths to break free from his contrived world that was invented by Christof and the scheming media.At the climactic end of the film, Truman reaches towards an open door that will lead him into another world, but is cautioned by his Creator not to leave for venerate that he will not like what he finds (TS). In the end, Truman rejects his counterfeit heaven and chooses an authentic, although unknown and presumably difficult, life as substitute. Using certain aspects from Brownes theories, let us now consider how Weir-as-narrator-in-the-text guardedly crafts the meaning of Trumans, Christofs, the audience-within-the-film, and the audience outside the films reality.The film opens with Christof talking directly to the camera in Brechtian style to the spectators in the theater. He admits that while Trumans world is in some respects counterfeit, he assures us that theres nothing fake about Truman himself. No scripts, no cue separateIt isnt always Shakespeare but its genuine. Its a life (TS). Christof suggests here that while Truman has been duped to view he is living a real life he has chosen for himself, the life he has apt(p) Truman is better than what he later calls the sick real worldthe one outside Trumans studio apartment.Paradoxically, he claims that there is nothing fake about Truman himself yet in the same breath admits that the reality he occupies is counterfeit. For the Marxist critic, Christofs philosophy might beg the question of how a person can be authentic or real if human identity is nothing more than a product of the scotch environment he/she lives in. In fact, Marxs statement that mans social existence determines his understanding seems to expose the very fl aw of Christofs viewpoint that Truman is somehow a true-man despite living a social sham.Nevertheless, backstage interviews with Trumans perky wife, Meryl, and best friend, Marlon, are then juxtaposed together that honor the paradoxical nature of Christofs philosophy, Its all true, its all real. Nothing here is fake, nothing you see on this show is fakeits just merely controlled (TS). Upon the closure of these lines, we immediately cut into Trumans phony world where Christofs pervasive surveillance equipment watches his every move. Using Brownes power of the gaze, we can see how spectators are thus sutured into Christofs powerful, Big Brother gaze over Truman.In fact, spectators cannot help but see Truman through Christofs point-of-view throughout the majority of the film since the studio cameras record and reveal everything he does. However, even though we might be forced into Christofs POV, it is tough whether Weir is asking spectators to agree with his schemes as morally laudab le. For instance, given Christofs demeanor of totalitarian spectatorship over Truman, the spectator watching The Truman Show the film might musical note unsure if whether to trust his perspective whether he/she is comprehend truly through his perspective.After all, Christofs reality is centered on the fabrication of Trumans entire reality his childhood, his job, even his marriage. He even goes as far to manufacture his fears, like his fear of water, which is used to keep Truman from escaping the studio of Seahaven, escaping from his false self. As Kimberly A. Blessing observes, Everyone, including his adoring television viewing audience, is complicit in the lie (5-6). One possible meaning that we can extract here is that Weir is crafting Christofs reality in a way that challenges the publics perception of how the media operates.The media, like Christof, would have us live inside a fictitious world governed by commercial glamour that fuels their sales, ratings, product placement, e tc. Just as the creators of Trumans world commercialize his life with product placement ads, like when Meryl showcases the wonders of a new kitchen utensil to Truman but is really advertising it to the millions of viewers watching, so too is Weir making a satirical commentary on how the creators of media attempt to commercialize our lives by getting us to buy their products.The question becomes, then, whether a person who lies even for an allegedly noble cause can be trusted. How noble are Christofs intentions anyway if he is deceiving Truman in order to receive higher television ratings? There seems to be no escape from Christofs questionable morality or autocratic gaze, but it is here that Weir carefully steps into the text and shows us through camera angle and plot progression that Truman and spectators alike can escape from Christofs ambidextrous schemes.No sooner when the camera light falls from the sky and Truman begins to sense something is wrong with his reality that Weir i ntermediately switches from Christofs camera perspective (the despotic perspective) to the omniscient perspective when viewing Truman. The omniscient perspective is void of the studio cameras processs that remind spectators they are sutured into Christofs POV. Instead, the omniscient perspective is transcendent, clear and fledgling as it frees Truman and spectators from Christofs gripping surveillance, but it also is transient.Just as it will take the entire film for Truman to realize the extent to which he is being deceived, it will also take the entire film for Weir to gradually overwhelm the despotic perspective with the omniscient one. As a result of these double-shifting, ambivalent camera POVs, we can see by using what Browne calls the plural subject that Weir is asking us to be at two places at once where the camera is and from whose perspective were seeing Truman from.The difficulty here is that although spectators are implicated into Trumans life and naturally yearn to ide ntify with him, it is imperative to immortalize that the logic of the framing and our identification with him has already been subjugated primarily through a liars look (Braudy & Cohen 127). Consequently, it becomes tricky to discern whether were ever actually identifying with the real Truman or just Christofs deceitful version of him. But of course, this is what the film is about.It is about asking us what it means to see with eyes truly, whether were all being duped inside Christofs matrix so to speak, and whether it is possible to awaken from counterfeit reality to something truly authentic. The presentational structure of the film argues that although we identify with Truman through a liars eyes, we do not have to accept that POV as morally commendable, but can reject and feel liberated from it when viewing Truman omnisciently.Because of these presentational structures that Browne argues convey a point of view and are primaeval to the exposition to the moral idea of the film, Truman, like spectators, must achieve awareness of their constructed or controlled-by-anothers kind of existence, and choose to embrace a reality that is not manufactured by another individual or economic system (131-132). In several instances of the film, Truman tries to gain this awareness by escaping from Seahaven.He drives his car to the edge of the forest and sails through a massive typhoon but gets blocked at every turn. Christof, like the media, has pin down Truman inside his false reality and does not want him to leave. Truman even receives help from certain cast-members of the show who picture to reveal the truth to him, whether flying over head with signs reading, Truman, youre on television, or jumping out of present boxes screaming the same.Weir-as-narrator-in-the-text is telling us, as Ken Sanes argues, that we too have to take a tourof mindand distance ourselves from this media landscape, if we want to secure our freedom (Sanes). The strategy of despotic/omniscient perspective in particular helps Weir establish these moral orders by focusing on the relationship between Truman and Christof, truth-seeker and pseudo-truth giver, for it seems as though he subverts the traditional IMR codes of who spectators are supposed to identify with.Again, despite seeing the majority of Trumans life from the despotic perspective, the sparse use of the omniscient one is where Weir is actively engaged in the text and in the lead us to accept Trumans final choice of rejecting his manufactured reality as indeed the discipline choice. Weir uses the cinematographic apparatus to lead spectators to see the truth about Truman, to become more aware about their own susceptibility to false ealities and in doing so uses the conventional language of the film as Browne would argue against itself by reversing the traditional meaning of form to make a statement about content. He shows through the despotic perspective that although Christofs version of pampered reality for T ruman might hold noble intentionsindeed, Christof is convinced he is actually helping Truman by sheltering him from the sick real worldhe is in fact wrong in his judgment because reality, even if unknown or sick, must be preferred to some counterfeit version of it.