Satire and the Truman Show

  I watched “The Truman Show”, a film by Peter Weir about a man called Truman Burbank (played by Jim Carey) who lived an entire life watched by everyone in the world on his own TV series. His life experiences are controlled by a higher up in the studio and when he starts to get wind of it all hell breaks loose. This is an obvious response for the increasing popularity of reality TV and the surreal quality of those who react to it and how interesting it really is. We live in an age now where people take out their cameras and update the world with their life every single day on Youtube. It can be the most boring day ever but hey people will watch it, millions in fact. Where does this fascination with typical humanity come from? We are a society that can’t get enough of the day to day life of someone else, look at how many headlines the Kardashians make in a week for doing absolutely nothing. I think it comes from a lack of something interesting in the viewer’s life or taking pleasure in one’s pain. Either way this formula relates to people, this film is just the study of that.

  A ton of things are scripted, MTV reality shows are built off of forced drama that goes nowhere. The Truman Show makes parody of this through his entire life being scripted. Majority of the viewers don’t realize it and in reality most viewers don’t either. Fake drama is 90% of our entertainment nowadays and even when there isn’t drama we sometimes create it to keep ourselves entertained. The Truman show is not only a lesson in reality TV but how we can look at something so basic, forgettable and pointless as the normal day of a normal man and turn it into the biggest topic of your day. Is it genuine curiosity or complete and utter boredom with your own life? Take it for what you will but as this ongoing climb of reality shows appearing in all forms of media still goes strong, the message is still relevant.