Talk:Pleasantville (film)

References to use

Please add to the list references that can be used for the film article.

• Holmwood, Chris (2005). "Trouble with Paradise: Pleasantville". In Fiddes, Paul; Clarke, Anthony (eds.). Flickering Images: Theology and Film in Dialogue. Regent's Study Guides. Smyth & Helwys Publishing. ISBN 978-1-57312-458-4.
• King, Mike (2008). "Pleasantville". The American Cinema of Excess: Extremes of the National Mind on Film. McFarland. p. 211. ISBN 978-0-7864-3988-1.
• Walters, James (2008). "Rehearsed Space: Pleasantville (Gary Ross, 1998)". Alternative Worlds in Hollywood Cinema. Intellect Ltd. pp. 191–212. ISBN 978-1-84150-202-1.

Music

Just wondering, what is the jazz music that is playing in the backround in the scene where the teens ask Bud what's outside Pleasantville?- B-101 1 July 2005 14:40 (UTC)

It's playing right now on TBS in the other room. I don't know what scenes they are in, but I have heard both "Take Five" from Dave Brubeck's Time out and "So What" from Miles Davis's Kind of Blue. Taco Deposit | Talk-o to Taco 21:26, July 9, 2005 (UTC)

Yes, it is Take Five from Dave Brubeck. Pils 20:49, 16 August 2005 (UTC)

Pleasantville was set in 1998; however, Take Five was not a hit until 1959. 216.179.123.146 00:08, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

Fantastic film. Do you know what the music is when they're looking through the art book? It plays again when they look at the mural. Oh, and do you think the colour-divided scenes are more based on the film of To Kill a Mockingbird, as the article currently states, or the book, or even the basic ideas and practices as brought to many young, modern people's attention by the film?

The final song is also a big surprise. Covers are usually worse than the original and covering a Beatles song is an especially dangerous thing to do, but this version of 'Across the Universe' is even better than the original! DirkvdM 09:41, 19 January 2006 (UTC)

Social comment?

I changed Technicolor to Multicolor as Technicolor is a Company name whereas Multicolor is the type of coloring done in the film.

I just moved the tagline up because it's not really a spoiler and actually a good indication of the kind of film it is for people who consider watching it. And for those who are put off by the start, which is rather tacky and gives the wrong idea about what kind of film it is. But isn't there more social comment than just the colour thing and resistance to change? It comments on US society, and I don't know too much about that. But isn't there also something about the prosecution of 'communists' by McCarthy? And I can't remember now, but I noticed several other things while watching the film.

By the way, the buildup is a bit like Fidel (film), just in reverse. Both start in one mode and then switch to the opposite. 'Fidel' starts off very pro-Castro and ends very anti-Castro. In Pleasantville that isn't as strong, but I suspect there might be the intention to catch the interrest of people who liked the 'atmosphere' of the 50's that others find so oppressive and then exposes the bad aspects of it. Or am I reading too much in this? DirkvdM 09:41, 19 January 2006 (UTC)

There is definitely social comment, and while it's a pretty good film, the message is a rather dubious countercultural myth that doing things like having fun or getting angry are 'subversive' activities that disrupt the 'system.' This is debunked very nicely in the book The Rebel Sell, where the authors comment specifically on this film. 38.112.113.242 23:00, 24 January 2006 (UTC)

Ehm, having fun and getting angry are presented as disrupting the system, yes, but not in a negative way, as your wording suggests (although you don't really say it, it's just the way it sounds). Quite the contrary, it brings colour into their lives. DirkvdM 08:41, 27 January 2006 (UTC)

No, the changes are viewed as positive in the movie, no question. But this mode of thinking -- that the system can't 'handle' small localized actions and crumbles as a result -- is very outdated 1960s thinking which has long been disproven. 64.231.208.136 13:00, 30 January 2006 (UTC)

I thought it was more about them becoming complete people. After all 'Mary Sue' had to start studying and developing her mind before she became a 'full colour' person. It's about there being more to life than just pleasantness, and not being able to stop things changing because everyone changes all the time. And yes, there are parallels drawn with various situations in America in the past, but situations that are now in the past and pretty much uniformly agreed were bad. It's not just about counter-culture, it's about every way of being a fully rounded person, living every part of themselves. Or at least, that's how I saw it. 16:35, 8 February 2006 (UTC)

Yeah. It's not about rebeling against the system. They come color when they become more than two dimensional archetypes and become "real" people, in that they become well-rounded. Mary Sue had to explore her intellectual side, Toby McGuire's character had to learn that being angry was alright. Etc.

The message is definitely not that having fun is disruptive to "the 'system'". And though people gaining color is an obvious symbolic device, it is not the only one in the movie and I would suggest not even pointing to the most important theme. And as far "that the system can't handle small localized actions and crumble as a result" being outdated thinking and disproven...please read some history of the 1960s. It happened...and the movie is a microcosm of the U.S. moving culturally from the 50s to the 70s.

I suggest that it takes several thoughtful viewings to get to what the author and/or director and/or actors are trying to say. Consider the idea that some systems appear wonderful on the surface but when challenged show to be motivated by selfishness and fear. Or, that change is hard, but especially hardest to those who have the power in any society. And try to identify the various ways other than sexuality or anger that characters become become fully colored. :) Whiskeyricard (talk) 22:47, 6 February 2008 (UTC)

The movie explicitly depicts conservative values as evil and progressive values as enlightened and good. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.247.164.117 (talk) 21:52, 5 October 2023 (UTC)

When is a plot summary not a summary?

When it recounts the plot in minute and rather tedious detail, I would suggest. I can see that a lot of effort has gone into this by the anonymous user, but in my personal opinion it does little for the article. I'm not sure whether I'm suffering from a personal prejudice here, which is why I haven't reverted it, but I'd appreciate the views of others, even if only to disagree. --Stephen Burnett 13:42, 25 June 2006 (UTC)

A simple compromise would be to write a shorter, less detailed summary (perhaps copying and pasting from the existing one) and placing it before the current summary under a new heading. Perhaps the old summary could become a new section- Detailed Plot Summary or something to that extent. This wouldn't spoil the plot for those who haven't seen the movie yet and would still retain the "CliffsNotes" sort of mentality used by the original author.

The plot summary takes up the majority of the article, when so much more could be said to tell readers about the film. More effort should be spent on what the film is about, rather than relating what happens. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.194.141.121 (talk) 07:47, 10 November 2007 (UTC)

I had the same thought while reading the article. The summary is too detailed. Whiskeyricard (talk) 22:21, 6 February 2008 (UTC)

I've trimmed it down so the length more manageable. Could still use some more cleaning up though. Benstrider (talk) —Preceding undated comment was added at 07:47, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

The summary is written wierdly and misses many imoportant parts. Also the symbolism should be removed from the summary and added to a new section.--JDDJS (talk) 20:56, 25 May 2010 (UTC)

Wow, is this a long summary. It violates the basic Wiki rule that summary sections should be between 400-700 words in length. This summary is a whopping 960 words long. I think it needs more work to revise it down to max 700 rule. This summary also has a problem I see in other summaries where it puts spoilers in the summary before it actually happens in the movie. The whole point of a summary should be to reveal plots points as they happen and not telegraph information to the reader before the movie actually reveals it.Aspenguy2 (talk) 13:37, 4 August 2019 (UTC)

Not really a plot hole

"*There are children in the town, but apparently no one has sex or knows where babies come from. Even when told about sex by Jennifer/Mary Sue, Betty Parker states that "your father would never do anything like that.""
I removed this line from the "trivia" section. It's not so much a plot hole/goof, as it is an example of the 2D life lead in the town. Things don't have reasons, or explanations. Kids and Teens just.."happen". It's the same principle that justifies the town not needing toilets; nobody ever questioned those things when you watched the show. The viewers would make all those assumptions, the characters would never think about it.

I also removed the school fact, since we aren't supposed to know that. --MasterA113 15:30, 13 January 2007 (UTC)

Visual effects shots

I don't have a reliable citation, but I am certain that the current statement that this film has more effects shots than The Phantom Menace is inaccurate. Rather, it held the record, briefly, until TPM was released. I am changing the article to correct this, but, it's a statement that should be cited, so I am also marking it with the {{fact}} template. --Steve-o Stonebraker 22:59, 27 May 2007 (UTC)

What year?

Does anyone know what specific year is the TV show set in? All I know is it's the 1950s; but what year? MHarrington 17:54, 30 August 2007 (UTC)

1958 (There's a calendar shown.) 98.196.193.51 (talk) 04:18, 12 June 2009 (UTC)

Staying behind

does the real life mother not realise that her daughter has disapeared from the face of the earth? i mean come on —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.51.82.61 (talk) 00:47, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

And what about the TV characters that were replaced? Did they end up in the real world? If Toby Maguire's character replaced someone in Pleasantville, did the TV character go to the real world? When Toby Maguire's character went back to the real world, did the character he replaced go back to Pleasantville? I didn't seem like it. Is Reese Witherspoon's character saying in the TV world a cop-out? I'm probably over-thinking this. Just like if the townspeople couldn't think of what was outside of town, then how did the basketball team have a visiting high school team to play. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 199.96.38.41 (talk) 23:06, 12 October 2023 (UTC)

Symbolism

In response to, "Another symbolic aspect to consider is the assumed connection between colors and lost of innocence," I would suggest that colors is more directly linked to change. That is, loss of innocence is only a secondary effect to all the characters that experienced some kind of significant change in awareness. Mary Sue/Jennifer has more sex than anyone in Pleasantville but doesn't gain color until she abandons her established 'slut' persona for her newfound love of books and intellectualism. Bud/David doesn't colorize until he outgrows his shy/submissive persona and becomes willing to risk himself for what he cares about – saving Betty. In this light I think the 'paradox' of the reasons for people changing to color disappears and it's beautifully explained by, simply, change. Even the mayor doesn't colorize until he's forced to let go of his enforced 'pleasantness' and fully embraces his rage, or is rather overtaken by it. It's a small but significant point that I think should be mentioned in the symbolism section. 66.245.212.174 (talk) 11:48, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

The Giver

Is it just me, or was this movie awfully similar to The Giver by Lois Lowry, which came out 5 years earlier? Except instead of "The Distant, Sci-fi Future" it was "a TV show set in the past"? Has anyone else noticed this? Was there ever some sort of plagiarism case?? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.80.165.113 (talk) 08:04, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

In Grade 7 English we read The Giver and after that our teacher decided we should watch the Pleasantville movie because it is similar in many ways. So yeah it is sort of the same. Jubjub (talk) 00:24, 27 April 2008 (UTC)

Regarding: Mary Sue

Has anybody noticed the connotations of the name "Mary Sue"? Because, you know, if you read the Wikipedia article on the term, it is clearly known that Mary Sue has the external meaning of an overly perfect character. Um, so, what could this mean?

Angelica K (talk) 01:11, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

It probably means that the producers and writers of the film didn't spend a lot of time researching fanfiction slang terms.MythicFox (talk) 05:55, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

On the contrary, the writers knew exactly what this name implies. The "original" Mary Sue of the TV show is a "Mary Sue". 192.145.8.237 (talk) 22:36, 15 October 2021 (UTC)

Book Q&A

What is the Book that D. H. Lawrence that Jennifer reads calling?

Original Research

The "Symbolism" and "Utopian Views" sections seem to be original research. There need to be citations for those sections. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.164.192.236 (talk) 04:54, 1 January 2009 (UTC)

I agree with this. 75.22.57.0 (talk) 06:42, 4 January 2009 (UTC)

I also agree. I've removed the majority of the content in "Symbolism" and "Utopian Views" and compressed the remaining cited passages into a smaller "Themes" section. It can be expanded with citation. —Erik (talk • contrib) 17:36, 4 January 2009 (UTC)

Hi Honey, I'm Home.

Is it possible that this movie was inspired by or partly based on this short-lived early 90s TV series from Nick -at_Nite? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.17.118.100 (talk) 11:53, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

Soundtrack

Since we already have a soundtrack article, why do we have such an extensive soundtrack section in this article? It is basically a word-for-word repetition of the other article. There is really no need for this. ---RepublicanJacobite_TheFortyFive 15:54, 26 September 2011 (UTC)

Hershman death and lawsuit

A passage I added about the death of cinematographer Brent Hershman and subsequent lawsuit against the Pleasantville production has been removed by TheOldJacobite (talk · contribs) as "Not relevant to film". I think a death allegedly from the production conditions, and subsequent litigation about it, is material to an article about the film. The mention was short; any more would be, I think, WP:UNDUE; but I do believe it should be included. Obviously, TheOldJacobite disagrees. What is the consensus? TJRC (talk) 22:55, 30 August 2013 (UTC)

Thanks for posting here rather than starting a tedious edit war. It seemed to me that this was a simple case of a guy wrecked on his way home from work, rather than having died on the set (say, like Vic Morrow), and I could not see the relevance. It just looked like a coincidence. But, I could be wrong, and I welcome other user's comments. ---The Old Jacobite_{The '45} 01:33, 31 August 2013 (UTC)

Just poking my head back in to see if anyone else has opined, and I see not. For convenience of discussion, here are the references:

• Polone, Gavin (May 23, 2012). "Polone: The Unglamorous, Punishing Hours of Working on a Hollywood Set". Vulture. Retrieved August 6, 2013.
• O'Neill, Ann W. (December 21, 1997). "Death After Long Workday Spurs Suit". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved August 6, 2013.

TheOldJacobite, I can see why you didn't see the relevance in the sentence I'd included ("Cameraman Brent Hershman died when he fell asleep driving home after a 19-hour workday on the set of the film."). It doesn't make clear the connection to the film itself. I don't want to add too much text, because while I feel it's worth a mention, I don't think it's worth a great deal of detail; but I agree the connection to the film itself should be made more apparent, so it does not look like a simple case of a guy wrecked on his way home from work. The factors that make it seem to me to be worth mentioning is that it resulted in a lawsuit against the filmmakers; and reportedly is the event that spurred Haskell Wexler's advocacy to change filmmaking working conditions. What would you think of something along the lines of "Cameraman Brent Hershman's death, when he fell asleep driving home after a 19-hour workday on the set of the film, resulted in a wrongful death suit, claiming that New Line Cinema, New Line Productions and Juno Pix Inc. were responsible for the death as a result of the lengthy work hours imposed on the set." Again, I'm a little wary of crossing the WP:UNDUE line, but this at least makes the connection. TJRC (talk) 20:24, 11 September 2013 (UTC)

Now 21apr15 the last sentence of a short lede of Pleasantville (film) reads:

"This film is dedicated to the memories of camera assistant Brent Lon Hershman, director Ross' mother Gail, and actor J. T. Walsh, all of whom died before the film's release."

There is currently no other mention of the lives of these three people, or why their deaths may be relevant to this film and worth mentioning, so prominently. It seems like this sentence should be moved down, or left out.

The previously suggested sentence:

"Cameraman Brent Hershman's death, when he fell asleep driving home after a 19-hour workday on the set of the film, resulted in a wrongful death suit, claiming that New Line Cinema, New Line Productions and Juno Pix Inc. were responsible for the death as a result of the lengthy work hours imposed on the set."

has the advantage of more apparent relevance. I guess I am voting for a short paragraph along these lines, much later in the article.

If there were a separate article for Brent, the circumstances of his death could be explored there, and we could just link to that -- but he does not seem notable enough for this to be a likely solution.

This seems like a case of a messy little aspect getting minimalized to such bland emptiness that it no longer makes sense to mention? Please improve this aspect of the article.-71.174.183.177 (talk) 13:22, 21 April 2015 (UTC)

I think 18 months is a sufficiently respectable amount of time to have waited. I've made the edits; [1]. TJRC (talk) 00:38, 24 April 2015 (UTC)

Is Christian Answers criticism notable?

Christian Answers seems like a minor outlet. Should we have as lengthy criticism based on this review here? I think it may be WP:UNDUE. --Hanyangprofessor2 (talk) 02:58, 18 April 2016 (UTC)

Interesting youtube video may be added to external links?

"The Great boomer deception"

Nspacemonkey (talk) 14:23, 1 January 2019 (UTC)

$10,000 prize reference

Shortly before and during the film's release, an online contest was held to visit the real Pleasantville, Iowa. Over 30,000 people entered. The winner, who remained anonymous, declined the trip, and opted to receive the $10,000 cash prize instead.

I expect this did happen, but all of those references point back to this Wiki article which in fact doesn't have an actual reference. The only reference I found was in the Pleasantville, Iowa article, but that reference is no longer valid at this point. It would be nice if we could get a reference to the New Line Cinema press release on the contest, but I can't find the right combination of words for my Google search to actual find a verifiable reference on this production note. I've reached out to New Line Cinema to request a verifiable reference for this production note.Aspenguy2 (talk) 14:09, 4 August 2019 (UTC)

Budget - $60 million

I updated the budget with a verifiable reference since other places I saw all placed the budget at $60M, not $40M.Aspenguy2 (talk) 14:41, 4 August 2019 (UTC)

Cast references

I added IMDB cast references for 3 cast members as they don't have their own Wiki entries.Aspenguy2 (talk) 14:42, 4 August 2019 (UTC)

After theatrical release sales?

What were that VHS/DVD sales numbers after the theatrical release of this film? I recall this flick being very popular where I lived; so I was surprised to read that it actually lost money. My family purchased the movie in DVD the day of release. LinnXi (talk) 03:01, 3 June 2022 (UTC)