Pleasantville

“Pleasantville” revolves around the inspirational adventure of modern day teenagers, David and Jennifer, who become part of the black and white 1950’s TV show, Pleasantville and are forced to play along as Bud and Mary-Sue. The first major conflicting perspective arises when David, who understands that not playing along “could alter their whole existence”, argues with Jennifer, who believes that Pleasantville should be exposed to aspects of the real world. On the other hand, Frontline centralizes around the host of a news show, Mike Moore and the main reporter, Brooke Vanderburg, who is a superficial and career-driven presenter. Viewpoints mainly clash between reporters and executive producer, Brian Thompson who is only interested in the station ratings and profits. Unlike the real world, Pleasantville presents a utopian society free from adversity or negativity which contrasts the actual events of the 1950’s. Conflicting perspectives arise within older responders who may choose to remember the 50’s in this manner or for its negative aspects such as the continued prevalence of social marginalisation of women and black individuals and/or various conflicts such as the Korean War. This intentionally perfect world is depicted through scenes such as Bud and Margret driving the old-fashioned car to Lover’s Lane where the pink petals are falling from the tree, accompanied by Etta James’ “At Last”. Furthermore, film analyst, Robert McDaniel, rightly described Pleasantville as a “perfect place” as “it never rains the highs and lows rest at 72 degrees” “and the basketball team never misses the hoop”. Similarly, in “Add Sex and Stir”, the executive producer, Brian and reporter, Emma argue over where the priority lies within a story; the unfair dismissal or that the woman wasn’t a lesbian. In the end, after Brooke completes the interview, she changes the question to publicly ridicule the supposedly ‘lesbian’ sports team without the woman’s consent in order to create controversy. Likewise, the initial invasion of Iraq was due to the possibility of the “Middle East (being) overrun by terrorist states and radical dictators armed with nuclear weapons”. Such statements by George Bush were presented via the media to evoke fear and in turn support for America’s cause in the war even though nuclear weapons were never found. This created division within America over whether the invasion is justifiable. That is why it can be seen that conflicting perspectives in relation to fictional and real life representations of the same topic can influence perceptions.