'Truman Show' mocks life, society

By Holly Watson, On-line Forty-Niner

June 11,1998

"The Truman Show" is the most anti-Hollywood, Hollywood flick since "The Player," and it is brilliant.

The film is Jim Carrey's latest, in which he portrays Truman Burback, a victim of candid cameras gone mad. Truman lives in a quaint, utopian town by the sea, aptly named, Seahaven. It is a land ruled by the mean mastermind, Christof, played by Ed Harris.

As the film's previews disclose, "The Truman Show" is the story of an unsuspecting man who lives in a big, fake made-for-television world where "Ozzie and Harriet" mutants dance to the beat of improvisational, soap operatic cues.

While Truman is characterized to be the only real victim, everyone in society is the brunt of this movie's dark joke.

The film can be classified as an enchanting modern parody that mocks a whole slew of folks including the following: those who try to play God, such as producers, directors, politicians, parents, lawyers, doctors, developers, parents, priests and so on; sell-outs and sycophants who say and endorse anything for money or approval; lookyloos who feed off the lives of others; television groupies who meet ritualisticly in bars to cheer on sports events and nightly soap operas; and business, governmental and societal infrastructures where lies and inhumanity run rampant.

Still, while the film mocks many, it highlights one man's remarkable pursuit of what is right and true. The truth sets Truman free.