Truman Show

Truman Show

Media is a medium that affects and influences the daily lives of people. Individuals post on different social media platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, and Tumblr.  These people post various events occurring in their lives, such as the places they visit, what they are eating, wearing, and pictures of their friends and relatives. There is the exposure of almost every aspect of people’s lives to the world, and anyone can access them. The Truman Show is about a man called Truman Burbank whose life is a non-stop television show. He is not aware that his whole town is a studio set run by a director named Christof. The people Truman thinks are his neighbours are actors from Hollywood, and even his wife is a contact player in his fake life. These people know that his life is false, but they do not tell him; instead, they exploit him.

In Truman’s hometown, the media was used to display his life for everyone to see. Everybody saw and had knowledge of his marriage to Meryl, although he was in love with Lauren. Also, his morning routine was evident to everyone who watched the television show. His morning routine consisted of (“Good morning, and in case I don’t see ya good afternoon, good evening and good night !”) What Burbank eats, and the magazine he buys from the newsstand is exposed for the audience to see.

Additionally, in the Truman Show, the media is used for hyper commercialism. Everybody around Truman Burbank aided in the concept of ‘product placement.’ This is evident when Christoff, the producer, says that everything in the show was for sale – from the actor’s clothing, foodstuff products, and the houses the actors lived in. It is evident in people’s daily lives because, for instance, when a person sees a person wearing a particular item or owns something that attracts him or her, the individual goes and purchases the same item.

It eventually leads to an endless cycle where people have become active members of product placement of some particular things and consumers for others. In the course of the movie, hyper commercialism is evident and becomes more and more prominent. For example, Truman begins to suspect that his reality is being altered when Meryl his wife talks to him about making him a Mococa drink. Meryl then continues by saying, ‘Cocoa beans from the upper slopes of Mount Nicaragua.’ When Meryl finishes saying that, she strategically places the Mococa product in front of the camera for the people watching the television show to see. In a person’s daily life, contrary to Truman’s Show witnessing a friend or neighbour with a nice suit or shoe brings about peer pressure because it is because of product placement. People do not realize the media’s involvement in their lives. Thus, when a person buys an item, they fall in the same cycle, the audience from the movie had when they were watching the Truman Show.

Christof used the media to monitor and control Truman’s life. He altered Truman’s anxieties by killing his father by drowning him in the ocean. The incident made Truman have a lifetime fear of water, thus imprisoning him to his hometown of Seahaven. Additionally, Truman’s beliefs and fears are controlled by a god. This is evident in our societies when our ideals, ambitions, fears and dedications are altered by the media. It is because what people see and experience can control and change people’s lives permanently.

Furthermore, there is an alteration of some scenes in the Truman Show, and Christof uses the media to manipulate a real-life moment in a way where there is no evident truth in it. The media manipulated the feelings and emotions of the people watching the television show through gaining reactions and higher ratings. An example is how Christof directs the moment when Truman meets his ‘father.’ He picks specific scenarios and cuts out some scenes, thus eliminating the truth of what happened.

Question 1

• The main idea in the film is Utopia/ Dystopia. Christoff created a utopia called Seahaven. Christof wants Truman to stay in Seahaven so that he can continue to control every aspect of his life. Also, Christof tries to convince Truman that Seahaven is better than the outside world; however, Truman has not seen the outside world and thus is not able to come up with a conclusive decision about Christof’s opinion. Despite what happens in Truman’s life, he continues to search for the truth, and as the film progresses, it is clear that Truman’s intentions are escaping Christof’s grasp and finding out what exists beyond the horizons of his world. Thus Christof’s utopia is Truman’s dystopia because it is an environment that is fake and undesirable to him.

Question 2

• The cameras are used expertly and placed in strategic locations. For instance, Truman is introduced to the viewers as an image on the television screen with a live broadcast showing him talking to himself in the mirror. The camera is assumingly inside the mirror. The scene progresses with interviews from the cast who describe their opinions about working on the show. These shots are in such a way that they appear like they are behind the scenes documentary. The previews enable the viewers to understand what happens in the film making industry and an inside view of how Truman’s Show was going to be.