Expanded Topic Paper
Scene Analysis Critical Perspective: The Truman Show
In 1998, Jim Carrey starred in one of the most conspicuously provocative films of all time. The Truman Show, while also being the title of the film, is a continuously running reality television show circling around the constructed life of Truman Burbank (Jim Carrey). His entire life has been formulated; composed by a creator known as Christof (Ed Harris), who has built an entire arcological dome, inhabited by actors and filled with thousands of unique hidden cameras, to observe the life of a man in a fake world. The movie follows a thirty-year-old Truman who, through a series of tantalizing fractures, increasingly becomes aware of his exploited reality. Truman’s wife, parents, and best friend are all scripted actors helping to manipulate the fabric of Truman’s life in order to keep the show running. A planned sailing death, of his father, was orchestrated in order to traumatize Truman to never leave the island. When asked about why Truman has never discovered the nature of his life, Christof responds “We accept the reality of the world with which we are presented; it’s as simple as that.” Director Peter Weir and writer Andrew Niccol plainly and vividly push the existential buttons in our brains that get us to ask so many questions. The importance of the final scene lies in the encapsulation of the themes of order and chaos and a cry to question our reality because much like Truman, we too live in a controlled system.
Starting with a stage light falling from the sky continuing up to his wife breaking character, breaks in reality have pushed Truman passed questioning his life into devising a plan to sneak away and sail off from Sea Haven, the town he has never left in thirty years. The final scene shows Truman, after surviving a controlled hurricane, sailing off into the unknown on a boat titled the Santa Maria. Aptly named after Columbus’s ship that brought him to discover something unintendedly. An inspiring score slowly crescendos and great beams of sunlight and a calm expansive sea, representing his controlled, safe life, are behind him. Truman, like most of us, take sunshine to mean freedom, but this idea completely crumbles as the final break in his reality is a literal break in the wall of the studio. This break is signified by a loud crashing noise and an immediate break in the music. A close-up centers Truman, one hand wrapped on his ship to the left, and the edge of his universe on his right. The focus shifts to his hand which hesitantly puts itself on the wall. This is the moment Truman’s reality is completely shattered. This is the alarm clock to his deep sleep. Waking up is not depicted as enlightenment but suffering.
Peter Weir juxtaposes the popular depictions and symbols associated with liberation and freedom by showing the chaos of “real” reality. When Truman reaches the wall, he tries to break it frantically and as he comes to grips with his reality, he breaks down crying. Every great memory, everything he has ever loved, all his hardships were a construction. Truman has had clues his entire life about his manufactured existence, but it is in this moment he finally lets himself see. To have assessed these situations before would have meant for him to recompose his entire thought process and that would have been beyond painful. As he touches the wall, music is initiated, and it takes an uplifting tone foreshadowing Truman’s later decision to leave his world.
Filled with fear of the unknown, Truman decides to let go of his boat and step out to the edge of his universe. This is symbolic of the story of Peter, afraid of a great storm, needing faith to let go of his boat and walk on water to Jesus. A long low shot of Truman shows as if he literally is walking on water as he makes his way. Only when he stops fighting the pain and chaos of his cracking reality is Truman able to let go of the boat. A crane long shot shows Truman ironically walking along the edge of his flat universe, similar to how I would imagine Christopher Columbus would have reacted, if the myth of him searching for the edge of the world and discovering it wasn’t, was true. Eventually, Truman makes his way to a flight of stairs which lead to a door, a small dark hole in the wall. The small dark shadow is the representative of liberation, contradictory to the light at the end of the tunnel; while order and safety are the shining positive world Truman is leaving behind. It is the small black yin circle in the large white yang half.
As he opens the door, Christof, who is almost always shown from a low-angle to depict power, talks to Truman. Truman is freaked out, shown from a high angle to seem vulnerable and powerless, and then a perspective shot of the shining sun and blue sky as the booming voice echoes; allegorical of God speaking to Moses. Truman then asks the two existential questions we have probably all asked at one time or another, “Who are you?” and “Who am I?” The biblical imagery in this scene is too overwhelming to miss. The creator informs Truman of the truth behind his existence and goes off into a short monologue trying to convince Truman to stay. Every time we see Christof, he is depicted as god-like: consistent low-angle close ups, close-up of his hand petting Truman, and long shots of him leaning over his tablet with a miniaturized model of his world next to him. Christof is the figurehead of order, he is the epitome of the controlled society, “but for all the power that Christof commands, success always hinges on Truman himself. It could only work if Truman believes in it” (NerdWriter1, 2016). As he pleads for Truman to respond, the uplifting music cuts and Truman answers with his catchphrase, “In case I don’t see ya, good afternoon, good evening, and goodnight.” Truman outstretches his arms, like the crucifixion of Jesus, and it is the first time in the conversation that does not show Truman from overhead. He is the prodigal son who is now leaving the world, and in doing so, the system he has been a part of crashes. “At that moment, the curtain of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom. The earth shook, the rocks split” (NIV. Matt 27:51). Truman has given himself into the chaos instead of fighting it, and in this instance, he truly becomes free.
Even though The Truman Show seems to take place in the contemporary late 90s, the town of Seahaven is reminiscent of 1950s America; a time when conformity and American patriotism peaked because of inflated cold war propaganda. VFX supervisors Craig Barron and Michael McAlister purposely created this hyperrealist town through overabundant fill lighting and a bright color pallet to illustrate this perfect society; even citing fifties post cards as their inspiration. This ideal American society is used by Peter Weir to exemplify the system and Truman, the society who conformed for 30 years just only to have, of recently, begun to notice just how farcical it truly is. The Truman Show is “prophetic about so much through the vantage point of 1998. The ubiquity of mass television, the rise of mass surveillance. It keyed in perfectly to my parent’s generation of Cold War paranoia; being watched or bugged. And my own generation of narcissism where is bugs us not to be watched” (NerdWriter1, 2016).
Watching this movie as a younger child, many of these themes were clear, but it was not until a recent viewing that I have begun to understand the relationship between Seahaven and our current political and social climate today. Like Truman, we are currently experiencing breaks in our reality. Personally, growing up the United States was taught to be the embodiment of a perfect society. Through education, the clear atrocities and my increasing awareness of them, have broken down this view. As a society, our current political and social climate are seeing more ruptures than ever: the Iraq wars, corrupt justice system, economic collapse of 2008, deceitful media, shootings of young black men (or the recognizing of it), a childish president. We are trying to, similar to Truman, wake up. We have come so far in terms of social strides and ubiquitous equality, yet society and culture feel more at each other’s throats than ever. Our realities are breaking so constantly that our society no longer knows what to believe. As we continue on the path of liberation we dive deeper into chaos.
Many of the main themes of The Truman Show are conspicuous but many of us still miss the incredible knuckle-sandwich-to-the-face that Peter Weir truly drives home at the very end. The scenes of the various Truman Show viewers are an ironical slap of our own inability to notice and break the constructions governing our own lives. We understand the irony and hilarity of the final shot of the two security guards who quickly search for another television show after they had, presumably, spent a majority of their lives glued to the Truman Show. Yet, it is still hard for viewers to realize how The Truman Show is yelling directly at us to realize our own hypocrisy. We so easily see the flaws and breaks in other’s realities yet fail to realize them in our own. Peter Weir is symbolizing the viewers as us, and Truman as the man we ought to want to be. In this final shot, Weir notes the human tendency to fall victim to the same fallacies as some of the most radical ideologues. His use of the Taoist world view of an eternal balance of order and chaos clearly show Truman’s struggle to break free as an allegory to our lives. If Andrew Nichol and Peter Weir were going to spell out the advice they give to society through this movie, they would use the motto of the Royal Society: Nullius in Verba. Roughly translating to “take nobody’s word for it.”
Works Cited
“Faux Finishing: The Visual Effects of The Truman Show.” IMDb, Paramount Picture Home Entertainment, 2005, www.imdb.com/title/tt0476773/.
Puschak, Evan, director. What the Truman Show Teaches Us About Politics. Youtube, NerdWriter1, 31 Aug. 2016, www.youtube.com/watch?v=cLJAXu5OD-c&t=296s.
“The Truman Show (1998).” IMDb, IMDb.com, www.imdb.com/title/tt0120382/?ref_=nv_sr_1.