Rating: 
Summary: An unusual 'feel good' film.
Review: I'm not really sure why I like this film....and that's one of the things I like! Weird.Background - The hit 50's television show 'Pleasantville' is having an all night marathon. David Wagner (Tobey Maguire) intends to watch every episode. His sister Jennifer Wagner (Reese Witherspoon) intends to watch a concert with a new boy-toy. The two fight and are somehow transported inside the black and white show. Story - The town of Pleasantville is a typical utopian vision from the 1950's. Everyone has a white picket fence, and the boys play basketball for the school team. When David's sister begins messing around with the balance in the town, things start to go awry. The normally black and white town begins to become 'in living color'. While many in the town fight the change to color, some accept it willingly. They want to change, and grow. The town begins to tear itself apart as the grey people and the colored people begin to fight. It harkens back to the 50's and 60's era with black and white race relations. This is a good film that unfortunately, didn't get a any decent advertising when it was released. I think it's a bit of a cult classic that way. Most of the people who've seen it did so because of word of mouth. So take it from me, you should get this one.
Rating: 
Summary: Underrated....and brilliant!
Review: I was reminded of how good this movie is after watching ABC's broadcast...commercial interruptions notwithstanding. I've also seen the other positive reviews, and wanted to add mine. "Pleasantville" stands as a work of art both technically and narratively.
It is a fantasy, of course, so it is unfair to judge it on any other level. Once past a fairly clumsy setup, the movie takes you along with it to a time that really was idyllic only in our memories...but what a beautiful way it is depicted! The fictional Mayberryesque town is gradually changed by the two characters brought into it. Tobey and Reese are brilliant in approaching their roles with the right mix of seriousness and levity, blending into a story with a powerful messages. The metaphors can be heavy-handed, such as the town's "shaking hands" logo being eerily like a swatstika, and the courtroom balcony, but it still packs a wallop when we first hear the word "colored" Most touching for me was the transformation of Reese Witherspoon's character, as well as the usual knockout performance by Joan Allen .If you haven't seen it, you won't be disappointed. It's a brilliant film overall, and truly a must-see.
Rating:
Summary: Deep in the extreme!
Review: Who says Hollywood can't make a movie that is both smart and entertaining? Pleasantville is proof that it can. Here is a movie that is an enjoyable escapist entertainment. But it is also a religious allegory similar to The Truman Show, depicting the fall of man and loss of innocence in a variety of forms. I don't want to connect the dots for you because you need to watch this movie closely and think about its meanings. When is it that people begin to take on color? What causes it for some doesn't cause it for everyone. It is a commentary on everything from the Civil Rights and Women's Liberation movements to Christianity, Genesis and the fall of man. And all of it is dressed up in a clever conceit about the good old days of black and white sitcoms. Along with The Truman Show, this is one of Hollywood's greatest productions of the decade. One day people will appreciate it for the masterwork that it is.
Rating:
Summary: Five stars, if only because the resident kook didn't like it
Review: This film was ahead of the curve, being a high concept, innovative technical marvel for it's time. The monochrome vs. color metaphor that is the films big-draw trick and center is really about putting yourself out there and taking a chance vs. playing it safe. THAT's the metaphor. Even an eight year old child gets the point. Whether 'they' didn't understand it, or are simply deliberately twisting the meaning in the name of crypto-nazi propaganda is anyone's guess. But they're putting out bad information. If you live in 2005, and find modern media engrossing, you have to give this film it's props. The screenplay isn't brilliant, but the metaphor, and the big trick, are perfect.
Rating:
Summary: An Enlightenment Movie!!
Review: Two Thumbs Up for this excellent spiritual plot about waking up to reality. By 'reality' I mean wake up and 'smell the coffee' or wake up and 'smell the roses'.
Our world often seems to be living in Pleasantville as society (most especially religion) deems laws and rules that prevent one from advancing their knowledge and curiosity. Since many other reviewers have disclosed the plot, I won't have to so, I'll just add my comments.
The movie made me laugh and smile and gave me a sense that the director really had a hold of something subtley worthwhile. As people became 'enlightened' their appearances changed. Isn't that what happened to Moses? But this movie is set in the 1950s era, which makes it one of innocence and pure enjoyment. All rolled into one great theme, Pleasantville is a winner! A+ roles for Tobey McQuire, William Macy, Reese Witherspoon, and Jeff Daniels.
I loved it. My late husband loved it. We watched it a number of times, always getting the same warm enjoyment and I'll continue to do so as the years go by. My personal opinion is that this movie is a Classic.
Rating:
Summary: Multileveled Motion Picture
Review: Great value DVD with special features, especially noteworthy being the Director's Commentary track.
This movie offers a lot to audiences on many levels...from blithe entertainment fare to a deeper "message" film; all ingeniously and expertly executed with wonderful performances. Joan Allen is heaven...
It might just inspire you to check out some art books and revisit that dog earred copy of "Huckleberry Finn."
Rating:
Summary: Excellent film - but largely for the younger set
Review: I feel I have to write a defense of this film after reading some of the outraged comments below. It's like a conservative knee-jerk reaction - and these reviews are missing the most important things about this film.
Yes, it seems ridiculous that all these kids in Pleasantville are suddenly having sex to 50s rock-n-roll, and that does seem like pandering to the "coolness" of today's social mores. But what's most effective about the film is the way Bud realizes that the black-and-white world he used to escape to on his television screen is an entirely meaningless form of existence. He's deemed a hero in Pleasantville, not for blowing away the "bad guys" (which I suppose is a more typical kind of Hollywood answer that would have pleased the conservatives), but for making them see their own hypocrisy - the hypocrisy that they're living in a fantasy world. Bud learns that deep questions of morality are rarely posed in black and white, and so this is a coming-of-age film as his road to maturity involves first learning that it falls to him to be the one to make important value judgements (rather than resorting to some black-and-white simplicity) but he also has to get others to realize that they must do so too.
What's beautiful about this film is not the celebration of the fact that a father returns home every day at the same time with a "hi honey, I'm home" and his wife is there to greet him. Instead, it's the realization that life will not always work out that way, and to appreciate it more when it does not because its expected, but because it's based on meaningful choices that people make. (Hence the very end of the film: Bud's "Pleasantville" mom is left with a choice - and we never learn what she chooses. It's like asking the viewers: "what would YOU do?")
When Bud returns home at the end, he no longer has any interest in the "Pleasantville" marathon with its simple black-and-white answers, but instead he finally pays attention to his real mom, whose life is pretty much a mess. (We aren't told how much of this is her fault.) Instead of escaping into his own fantasy world, Bud/Dave suddenly realizes how much of a difference he can and does make in her life. He is wise enough to realize that this sudden meaningful connection he has with his mother is more of a "Pleasantville" moment than all the reruns he'll ever spend time watching.
I can't think of a better film expression of "family values."
Rating:
Summary: EVOCATIVE REALITY CHECK, INGENIOUSLY EXECUTED
Review: After you hold your breath, suspend your disbelief, and make the leap through your television screen, you realize that technical savvy is not the only thing going for this film. As it dovetails the dual tropes of time travel and alternate reality, it creates a clever sketch of timeless social issues.
Two modern teenagers land up in the parallel universe of a 1950's (and thus B&W) television sitcom called Pleasantville, named after the straight-laced town where it is based. Think ice cream parlors, ponytail girls in poodle skirts, Have-Another-Meatloaf moms in aprons, Honey-I'm-Home dads in prim suits, the whole staid shebang of Father Knows Best.
Slowly but surely our teenagers find themselves baffled as they discover this black or white world where everything comes in simple cans of right or wrong. You sort of know what will happen from here on, they will gradually emancipate this folk stuck in a social tapeloop and put the whole town on the path to a messy and deeply flawed, but democratic, creative and infinitely layered progress.
Thematically this may sound frugal but it's a technical marvel to behold. Some sleek digital FX deftly blends vivid color and B&W images in each shot as our 50s society comes alive in fits and starts, like leaves in autumn. Fascinating cinematic accomplishment.
Yet the film draws such bipolar reviews because it's loaded with moral tidings. It's about living life to the fullest, heeding to heart's desires, and taking the good with the bad instead of sweeping things under the rug and acting 'pleasant' all the time. Having passion brings with it positives and negatives, but suppressing true feelings for the sake of fictitious harmony makes for an empty life.
Which is a relevant, timeless message. We resist change. Pleasantville suggests that changing and growing as a people, even falteringly, is important. Just because the 50s were used as a metaphor for this message, don't believe for a minute this isn't a universal issue that exists today and forever.
While some questions are raised and left dangling, like that of premarital promiscuity (one of our protagonist teenagers is less than discreet), I still find it bizarre that some reviewers managed to spot racism in this perfectly sane film. Perhaps it's time for them to leave their cubbyholes and stop watching Amistad re-runs.
Acting wise, the entire cast is right-on. Maguire is convincing as the spokesperson who lashes out in favor of modernity. Witherspoon looks outstanding in black and white, and then makes red angora sweaters look better than anyone this side of Meryl Streep in Sophie's Choice. Veterans Will Macy and Joan Allen look like they were born to play Mom and Dad.
Difficult as it is for a film so brimming with social connotations to boast universal adoration, I was utterly floored by it and couldn't recommend it highly enough to the discerning viewer. Delectable blend of nostalgia and pansophy.
Rating:
Summary: I loved this movie
Review: Perfectly cast, with an unusual theme that no one has really come up with before and put to the big screen. I sat enthralled the entire time.
I think this was both Tobey Maguire and Reese Witherspoon's first big acting breaks, we know they both went on to huge things but talk about breakthrough, watershed moments for both of them. Witherspoon is slutty Jen in moder times, and sweet, pure, virginal Mary Sue/Muffin when she and her brother are transported through means of a magical tv remote (given to them by tv repairman, Don Knotts.) She takes care of the sweet, pure and virginal side of Mary Sue in short order. I was just waiting for someone in the film, probably her brother David (Maguire) to bring up how her actions could affect the time/space continuem thing...
Then there's David, ("Bud" in Pleasantville). God, Maguire's good at playing geeks and nerds and doing it while being completely endearing and likeable and charming. He's the quiet, unpopular half of the Jen-David twinset. His favorite show is the tv sitcom from the fifties, Pleasantville, with which he can recite all the lines right along with the characters.
This movie isn't just a fluffy little bit of fifties-visitation. People have to remember that this isn't Happy Days. There are no greasers in Pleasantville. It's a tv show, and it's depicted just the way Leave It To Beaver or Father Knows Best used to do it, where the women stayed home to do the housework and cooking (in crinolines and pearls, of course), and met the "breadwinners" at the door with a martini and a dazzling smile.
It's amusing, but there's something so beguiling about watching two teenagers bring the apple to paradise. (That's a direct reference in this movie, by the way.) Jen and especially David's confusion and wonder at being in this place that shouldn't exist, watching their newly introduced ideas colorize the inhabitants of this place that shouldn't exist, subtly making statements about closeminded people and the results of non-pluralism and the great lengths and lies and blockage some, particularly leaders, will go to maintain their own illusions, is both a poignant and potent statement of the state of things in the modern world.
I can't emphasize enough what a stellar cast is in this film--Loved William H. Macy in this, and recognized several alumni from the tv show Buffy the Vampire Slayer too! Everyone in it is just outstanding. In fact the whole movie is just outstanding. This is one that I will be able to watch and enjoy more than just once.
The movie has a little bit of everything, it's funny, sad in places, at one point it's very frightening as we witness the reaction of a mob to such a radical idea of a nude work of art on a store window (In color, yet!) I rooted for the characters the whole time. We even sympathize with George (Macy) as his whole perfect, insular world crumbles around him, his marriage unravels, and he's reduced to eating cocktail olives because he doesn't know how to fix anything for himself to eat. (Betty always took care of that, but she's "gone out". For 3 days.)
It's a quirky little film.
Highly recommended.
Rating:
Summary: Beautifully Acted
Review: Pleasantville is like a colorized movie version of Twilight Zone. A modern day boy (Toby McGuire) dreams of going back to the innocent days of the 1950s. When he gets his wish via a magical stranger played by Don Knotts, he and his sister Reese Witherspoon steps into a black and white world of Pleasantville, a town stucked in the 1950s. As the town's innocence is wiped away with the introduction of books and knowledge, color replaces the black and white starkness of the town and its people. Beautifully acted and filmed, this movie has heart and a brain.
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