All the world's a stage

Rating: 9/10 (20 September 2014)

The Truman Show (1998) stars Jim Carrey as Truman, the everyday good neighbor in an idyllic seaside town. Unbeknownst to him, his reality is being controlled from behind the scenes. Truman begins to notice subtle cues that things aren't as perfect as they appear to be. The Truman Show points out our social desire to watch reality television to the extreme and shows the audience just how staged it all is.
The Truman Show allows the audience to see Jim Carrey in a serious role. Often he has made serious points throughout his career, but always with a comedic edge. He tames his comedic expressions in order to appear the quintessential everyday normal man and yet is able to endear Truman to the hearts of the audience.
When Truman's father attempts to tell him it's not real, he is removed from the cast of the show. Truman is told that he died at sea. This reinforces the fear of the open ocean that Christof, the director of the Truman show (Ed Harris) wants to instill in Truman. The final goal is to keep Truman contained. In college, Truman meets Lauren (Natascha McElhone) who falls in love with him and plans on revealing the truth. Again, Christof intervenes and she is removed from the show. When Truman fights with his wife (Laura Linney) a new love interest appears. His best friend Marlon (Noah Emmerich) appears to be more and more dangerous as he comes closer to the truth. Truman feels he is descending into madness. He counts how often the same car drives by to make his point. Stranger than Fiction (2006) also follows this line as a seemingly normal man begins to hear his life narrated.
The Truman show starts off with a great deal of openness and lighting. Everyday appears to be a perfect sunny day. As Truman begins to notice things, the lighting starts to get darker. We see this when he tries to escape and is confronted by Marlon and later in the storm sequence. The lighting leads the audience to see just how unreal Truman's reality is. The openness changes as the film progresses. Early on the film uses wide shots showing the audience that the town itself is a character. As the movie progresses, the shots begin to tighten in around Truman. Yet even then the audience sees the enormity of Truman's obstacles in the final storm sequence. The camera pulls away from Truman and shows just how small he is against a seemingly vast ocean. When Truman's illusion of reality crumbles, he is finally free and no longer confined to a staged script.