The Truman Show

Motifs in The Truman Show

Hints at the God motif:

• Truman = True Man
• The show itself is not directed by but "Created by"
• Christof: The obvious allusion to God is made by the show's "Creator"
• Meryl says that life on The Truman Show is a "truly blessed life"
• Truman looks at the audience and commands, albeit in the form of his fantasy about climbing a mountain, his people to allow him to be a sacrifice for them and to use him as an alternative food source. "Eat me, damn it. That's an order." This, in conjunction with the other clues, is a reference to communion where Jesus commands his followers to eat of his body.
• Lauren/Sylvia wears a pin while they are in the library together that says, "HOW IS IT GOING TO END?"
• Truman's epiphany comes when the radio breaks down. Truman sees the world anew. He realizes he is important. At first, the time when he stops the traffic in the street seems silly, but it is actually logical. He is exercising his new found power. He becomes impulsive, unpredictable. His life has meaning for him at this point and he has the beginnings of a mission. "Your whole life has been building to something."
• The people in the control room who serve Christof wear tee-shirts that read, "LOVE HIM/PROTECT HIM."
• "See the sunset? That's the big guy. Quite a paintbrush he's got there." The joke is that it is not a metaphor. The big guy is Christof and he paints the sunset. It a sunset that could not happen in nature. The moon and the sun can not be in the same direction since the moon only reflects the sun's light.
• Truman's boat is called the Santa Maria
• Truman hangs on the boat with his arms spread like Jesus on the cross.
• Truman seemingly walks on water after hitting the wall. It does not matter that he is walking on a platform at the edge of the set, it is the image that the director, Peter Weir, gives you to see. If he gives you this scene, he is conveying an allusion to an event you are meant to understand.
• A voice from the sky says to Truman, "I am the creator."
• The voice from the sky says to Truman, "You're the star."
• Truman climbs a stairway to heaven. He finds it is a door. It is a blackness to the "other side." It is the end of this life he has known. He will enter it and cross over to the other side and live again. It is his resurrection.

This is not the traditional savior motif where a character is given the characteristics of Christ or God so that the audience or reader can see that he is sacrificing himself for the good of others. Rather here, the screenwriter Andrew Niccol indicates that this is what can happen when man plays god. Because the television station (and therefore its representative, Christof) adopted Truman, he is the son of the creator of his world. The allusions that link Truman to Christ are to indicate that he is a pawn in a master plan. It is not that Truman is divine, but rather a "true man" in the artificial world that has been built for him.

Christof is a bad god. He uses fear to control his creation. Christof imposes the fear of water on Truman in order to contain Truman's universe and keep him small. Truman, by going through the door into nothingness faces down his creator and becomes a creature of free will and independence rather than the unknowing laboratory experiment he has been since birth. Look also at what Weir is saying about the nature of God, or at least this god: It is not Truman who needs his creator. It is the creator who needs his creation. Without Truman, Christof is nothing.

Appearance vs. Reality Motif

Essentially the Appearance vs. Reality motif is about the difference between what the world appears to be and what it really is. For example, a small town may appear to a visitor to be full of sweet, wholesome country people who are too innocent to understand the ways of the corrupt world around them. In fact, this town may be peopled by knowledgeable, possibly crafty people who could thrive in any environment they chose to live in. The reality is sometimes very different from the appearance. Many books, movies and plays work on the basis that the characters presented are not what they first appear to be. Look at The Lord of the Flies. The innocent schoolboys that populated the island actually were savages underneath the veneer of the school uniforms.

In The Truman Show, it appears that Truman lives in a benevolent, peaceful world. In fact his world  is a prison that relies on the fact that Truman does not know he is a prisoner. The lovely small town of Seahaven turns into that prison when Truman makes his escape. The soundtrack becomes that of a pre-war Germany with air raid sirens and the sound of black boots on concrete. Look with irony at the words that Truman's friend Marlon says at the beginning of the movie: "It's all true. Nothing is fake. It's just controlled." Andrew Niccol, the screenwriter, wishes to challenge the way we look at the world. In the movie Christof says, "We accept the reality of the world with which we're presented. It's as simple as that." Do we never challenge the rules that are presented? What would we think, what would we believe, what type of people would we be had we been brought up in Asia, Africa, Europe or South America? Do we ever question the givens of our culture? What would happen if we did? Would we have to walk through a door into a new world like Truman?

"The unexamined life is not worth living." –Socrates

Names Sometimes Have Meaning

Truman: True Man

Burbank: City in California where television is produced. This real life city's nickname is "Television Capital of the World." It is near Hollywood. Truman is the only True Man in Television.

Christof: Of Christ, created by god

Seahaven: "Sea" represents Truman's fear; "haven" is a place of safety

General Notes

"We accept the reality of the world we're presented." -Christof, portrayed by Ed Harris in The Truman Show.

"The unexamined life is not worth living." -Socrates

Jim Carrey can be a good actor, though often, too often, he is out of control. During the scene after he hears the radio tell him he is being watched, he has an extended period when he says nothing yet the viewer can see Truman thinking. The audience is able to see Truman's thoughts. That is good acting. However, when Carrey has the rain fall on him in an isolated three foot square area, he exuberantly gives "the Jim Carrey sound." There is no other way to describe the sound because it is only Jim Carrey who makes that sound. He out of control. He is not being Truman Burbank; he is being Jim Carrey. While the car radio is going on the fritz, Carrey lifts his foot and kicks it. Does anyone kick a car radio while a car is moving? Only actors who are in a car riding above a flatbed truck and are not really in control of the car.

Truman and Marlon sit looking at the sunset. It is not a sunset that can happen in nature. We only see the moon because of the reflected light from the sun, therefore we cannot see a full moon and the setting sun in the same direction in the sky.

Notice the posters in the travel agent's office that attempt to dissuade Truman from leaving Seahaven. The travel agent arrives still wearing her make-up bib from the back.

My question: why does the bus not move? Is it because the actor strips the gears because he cannot drive a bus or was it planned for him to strip the gears and keep Truman from moving? But these are not really good questions to ask of a piece of art. It is meant to be a fable, not an imitation of reality. Questions about the actions of an unreal situation serve no purpose when the real purpose of the plot is to convey a theme.

Truman shows Meryl the loop that the extras are moving in. When it comes to pass, he makes the "Jim Carrey sound." However, if these extras are on a loop going around the block, how do they always arrive at the same time since they travel at different speeds?

The best performance in the movie goes to Noah Emmerich who must play believable sincerity while the audience is watching him play "believable sincerity" and still carry it across to the audience.

The voice Mike Michaelson, the host of the show about The Truman Show who interviews Christof is better known as Principal Skinner from The Simpsons.

Christof challenges Sylvia, "What distresses you, caller, is that Truman ultimately prefers his cell, as you call it." This is the central conflict. Does Truman prefer his cell? Would we? Do we?

When Truman looks into the mirror and calls for Major Burbank, that is the time when he shows that he knows what is going on. "That one is for free," he says indicating that he knows that he has been putting on a show for someone. All of his actions from that point on indicate that he is no longer concerned with his old reality.

When the extras search for him the sound of their footsteps do not match the way they are walking. The sound is meant to convey the goose-stepping sounds of authoritarian marching. Notice the transformation of the all of the personalities of the extras. The next door neighbor's dog becomes a vicious, snarling hound held back by his master who is now hunting Truman as if he were an escapee from a chain gain. The twins who were so good natured and meek now speak with the tone of the stereotypical southern sheriff barking orders into the phone.

Christof is a failure as a god because he is a small god. If humans have a god at all, shouldn't they have a greater god than he?

Real Life Trumans

Elian Gonzalez

O.J. Simpson