Pleasantville

...nor is it The Bicycle Thief, Casablanca, or Taxi Driver. But it's a damn nice modern take on Capra.

The reviewers here that're trashing this film are completely missing the point - they either know nothing about film, or way too much. It's a fable, folks, and if there's lapses in logic or some smarmy moments, well, deal with it. It's a marvelous, well constructed flick and an enjoyable way to spend a couple hours.

There's no blood, or explosions. A bit of sex, but nothing gratuitous and it's essential to the plot. Cue up a copy and prepare to smile.

It's keen...!

PLEASANTVILLE had to be one of the biggest surprises I've ever had at the movies. This superbly mounted and completely winning fantasy starred Toby Maguire and Reese Witherspoon as a contemporary teenage brother and sister who are magically transported into a black and white television show called "Pleasantville", a show similar to "Leave it to Beaver" or "I Love Lucy", where everyone in the town knows each other, where the fire department only saves cats from trees and never put out fires and where there are no pages in the books or toilets in the bathrooms. Maguire's character is a "Pleasantville" trivia expert so he knows everyone there and everything that's going to happen but sis Witherspoon is a stranger in a strange land whose introduction of 1990's sensibilities to the citizens of this town brings about extraordinary changes. The film is beautifully made with a very smart screenplay and superb performances, the best of which is by Joan Allen, who is luminous as Betty, the mother in the sitcom who is shocked at first but learns to accept the 1990's coming to Pleasantville. Yes, it may borrow from other movies, but there is a freshness and originality to this movie that is most engaging and anytime with Don Knotts is time well spent.

David (Tobey Maguire) is a geek in high school. Real life is diminishing expectations, family divorce and no female companionship. He's obsessed with an old TV show Pleasantville. While watching a Pleasantville marathon, he has a fight with his twin sister Jennifer (Reese Witherspoon) and they break the TV remote. TV repairman (Don Knotts) shows up and give them a special remote which sends them into the show. They become George (William H. Macy) and Betty Parker (Joan Allen)'s kids Bud and Mary Sue. She's not happy until she sees her new boyfriend Skip Martin (Paul Walker). Bud is working at Bill Johnson (Jeff Daniels)'s soda shop. He falls for Margaret Henderson (Marley Shelton). The kids' interactions start changing the strange purity of Pleasantville and colors seeps into the world.

At first, this is a gimmick that has some cute aspects. Don Knotts adds to that sense of a cheap laugh. It has some good fun with Maguire and Witherspoon budding head. Then the deeper profound message seeps into the movie. It is gentle and yet undeniable. A couple of times, I feared the movie would push too hard like calling the people "color". It manages to maintain some distance and follow through on the message without overpowering it. This is quite a film.

I thoroughly enjoyed "Pleasantville" from the 'Once upon a time' through the film fading to black.

The acting was top notch all around, as was the use of special effects; in very few films has colour been used so effectively that it can convey a story seemingly without help from dialogue or music.

I can see how some people would perceive it as merely another mouthpiece of liberalism, but I watched it twice, and I only noticed it attacking bigotry and censorship. What was wrong wasn't that these people were living according conservative values, but that they didn't really choose those values in the first place!

I like the fact that the film was bold, and that it made its point as directly as it contrasted the black and white with the splotches of Technicolour. While "Pleasantville" had little subtlety in its allegory, it was, like any good fairytale, beautiful in its simplicity.

Nine out of ten =)

i wish i had the ability to put into a 1000 words what this movie impressed upon me. sadly enough, i am a verbose person, inclined to write and write and write, following a train of thought that never ends. however, i shall certainly give it a try, without botching it up. after having viewed this movie, i sat a while in my chair, watching the end credits play and listening to the music as it played along. not until the tape rewinded did i fully realise that i had watched a really good movie again, one that spoke on more levels than the simple obvious ones.

if i were to speak of one of the main things in this movie that are so incredibly important, it's the fact that it speaks about people and society, and the patterns inherent in them. in the beginning, you see reese witherspoon in a normal 90's class situation, following what is a 'normal' situation in that environment. then she is dropped into pleasantville, and what happens? she loses all reference points towards a life that seems right to her; she misses her pattern in life. the first thing that happens is she tries to enforce it again, resulting in the start of the major happenings of the movie, and somewhere along the line, softly swerves away from it and finds another pattern. once she reads a book, and stays put reading in it while she could have gone out to 'do it', you know things have changed.

william c. macy shows the same thing when he gets home, and his wife isn't there to greet him, and i could go on for ages to point to this, but i'd be overstepping my boundaries of these 1000 words, and definitely spoil someone elses movie experience. fact is, almost every single storyline in this movie is about change, change brought about because someone is stuck in a pattern and feels something is wrong, or through the self discovery that is inherent in every single one of us. not only that, it also shows how fear of breaking established patterns can bring out the worst, or get the upheaval that the major starts with his 'concerned citizens'. but even beyond all this, all the explanations and thought provoking issues that it brings up, if alone for the beauty of it and for the precious score that is attached, one should at least consider seeing it. i am personally a very jaded person concerning movies, having seen more than probably even a professional movie reviewer has seen taking my age as his career.

even with that in mind, i thank my lucky stars for picking this up on a whim and getting a look at something that has taken me in more than most of the movies this year. several of the scenes are priceless, and as someone before commented, the drive through a black and white scenery with coloured blossom weaving through the soft winds will leave you breathless.

in short, if you feel like watching a wonderful movie, catch this one and be impressed; try to follow the patterns every character exhibits and think about what the colour means in that sense, how it brings life back, how change is life.