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Pleasantville

1998 film directed by Gary Ross

Pleasantville is a 1998 film about two modern-day teenagers who find themselves suddenly inside a 1950's sitcom where their influence begins to profoundly change that complacent world.

What's outside of Pleasantville?
Where am I going to see colors like that? Must be awfully lucky to see colors like that. I bet they don't even know how lucky they are.
Written and directed by Gary Ross.
Nothing Is As Simple As Black And White.taglines

David Wagner/Bud Parker

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There are some places … that the road doesn't go in a circle. There are some places where the road keeps going.
 
In trying to get free … they sort of see that they're free already….
 
In no event shall any music be tolerated that is not of a temperate or "pleasant" nature.
 
The only permissible paint colors shall be BLACK, WHITE or GRAY, despite the recent availability of certain alternatives.
 
Doesn't she look … just as beautiful as the first time you met her? Do you really want her back the way she was? Doesn't she look just wonderful? Now don't you wish you could tell her that?
 
Reliable TV Repair · We'll fix you for good.
  • Look, you can't always like what you do. Sometimes you just do it because it's your job. And even if you don't like it, you just gotta do it anyway.
    • To Bill Johnson

Big Bob

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  • People, people.... I think we all know what's going on here. Up until now everything around here has been, well, pleasant. Recently certain things have become unpleasant. It seems to me that the first thing we have to do is to separate out the things that are pleasant from the things that are unpleasant.

Bill Johnson

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  • Where am I going to see colors like that? Must be awfully lucky to see colors like that. I bet they don't even know how lucky they are.

Dialogue

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Jennifer/Mary Sue: What's outside of Pleasantville?
Miss Peters: What? ...I don't understand...
Jennifer/Mary Sue: Outside of Pleasantville... What's at the end of Main Street?
Miss Peters: Oh, Mary Sue. You should know the answer to that. The end of Main Street is just the beginning again.
David/Bud: You can't do this Jennifer. I warned you!
Jennifer/Mary Sue: So what's the big deal? Oh. Okay — they're like not good at basketball anymore. Ohmigawd, what a tragedy.
David/Bud: You don't understand. You're messing with their whole goddamn universe!
Jennifer/Mary Sue: Well maybe it needs to be messed with, David. Did that ever occur to you?
Jennifer/Mary Sue [having just introduced the slang use of "cool" into Pleasantville] : Cool.
David/Bud: "Cool"? "Cool" ? What are you doing to these people? You can't do this to them!
Jennifer/Mary Sue: If I don't do it, who will?
David/Bud: No — but they're happy like this!
Jennifer/Mary Sue: No. David, nobody's happy in a poodle skirt and a sweater set. [pause] You really like this don't you? No, its not like you think it's just like funny or dorky or anything … you like — really like it.
David/Bud: No, you have it all wrong.
Jennifer/Mary Sue: God! I am so personally mortified to be your sister right now.
David/Bud: You have no right to do this to them.
Jennifer/Mary Sue: David, listen to me for just a minute. These people don't want to be geeks. They want to be attractive. They've a lot of potential — they just don't know any better.
David/Bud: What's going on?
Jennifer/Mary Sue: I'm not sure. Um… They wanna ask you a question... I didn't know how to handle it. So....
David/Bud: Sure. [to the others] How you doin'? You wanted to ask me something?
Tommy: How'd you know about the fire?
David/Bud: What?
Tommy: How'd you know how to put it out and all?
David/Bud: Oh. Well — where I used to live, that's just what firemen did.
[The kids all murmur together]
Tommy: And where's that?
David/Bud: Um... Outside of Pleasantville.
Tommy: Well, what's outside of Pleasantville?
David/Bud: Look it doesn't matter. It's not important.
Tommy: What's outside of Pleasantville?
David/Bud: It's really not important.
Margaret: What's outside of Pleasantville?
David/Bud: There are some places … that the road doesn't go in a circle. There are some places where the road keeps going.
Margaret: Keeps going?
David/Bud: Yeah, yeah — it just keeps going — it all keeps going. Roads and rivers and …
Will: Like the "Mighty Mississippi."
David: What?
[Will holds up a copy of The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn]
David/Bud: [to Jennifer/Mary Sue] I thought the books were blank?
Will: They were.
Jennifer/Mary Sue: Okay, this was NOT my fault. When they asked me what it was about I didn't remember because I read it like back in tenth grade. When I told them what I did remember, thats when the pages filled in.
David/Bud: The pages filled in?
Jennifer/Mary Sue: But like only up to the part with the raft, because that's as far as I read.
Tommy: Do you know how it ends?
David/Bud: Yeah… I do.
Margaret: So how does it end?
David/Bud: Well, um — okay, let's see…. they were running away — Huck and — and the slave.... they … they were going up the river, trying to get free…. and — in trying to get free … they see that they're sort of free already…. [The pages fill in by themselves, completing the book] Oh my God.
Big Bob: [in the bowling alley] What happened? Are you alright? What is it?
George: Rain.
Big Bob: Real rain?
[George nods]
Big Bob: Oh my God.... Are you alright?
George: I came home like I always do. And I came in the front door. And I took off my coat. And I put down my briefcase and I said "Honey. I'm home."
[The men all nod in recognition.]
George: ...Only no one was there. So I went into the kitchen and I yelled it again. "Honey — I'm home." But there was no one there either. No wife. No lights. No dinner.
[The men all gasp]
George: So I went to the oven you know — because I thought maybe she had made me one of those "TV dinners..." But she hadn't. She was gone. And I looked and looked and looked — but she was gone.
Big Bob: It's gonna be fine George. You're with 'us' now.
Gus: What are we gonna do Bob?
Big Bob: Well — we'll be safe for now — thank goodness we're in a bowling alley — but if George here doesn't get his dinner, any one of us could be next. It could be you Gus, or you Roy, or even you Ralph.... That's real rain out there, gentlemen. This isn't some little "virus" that's going to "clear up on its own." There's something happening to our town and I think we can all see where it comes from. My friends, this isn't about George's dinner or Roy's shirt. It's a question of values. It's a question of whether we're gonna hold onto the values that have made this place great. So the time has come to make a decision. Are we in this alone, or are we in it together?
Betty [who has now become "colored"]: I got caught in the storm. You were gone all night too.
George: Let's just forget about it, we'll just go to the meeting.
Betty: No. I told you, George. I am not going to that meeting.
George: Sure you are.
Betty: No, I'm NOT. — Look at me, George. Look at my face. That meetings not for me.
George: You'll put on some make-up.
Betty: I don't want to put on make-up.
George: It'll go away. It goes away.
Betty: [firmly] I don't want it to "go away".
Skip: [as the townspeople are burning books] Mary Sue, it's better this way!
Jennifer/Mary Sue [resisting his efforts to grab Lady Chatterly's Lover by D. H. Lawrence from her]: NO! This is like the only book I've ever read in my whole life, and you're not going to put it on that fire!
Big Bob: This is not the answer, people. No matter how upset we may get, or how frustrated we may be, we're not gonna solve our problems out in the street. It's just the wrong way to do it. We have to have a "Code of Conduct" we can all agree to live by. Now, I asked George and Burt here to sketch out some ideas — and I think they've done a terrific job. If we all agree on these then we can take a vote and I think we'll start to move in the right direction. "ONE: All public disruption and acts of vandalism are to cease immediately. TWO: All citizens of Pleasantville are to treat one another in a courteous and pleasant manner...
[The kids are hiding in the ruined malt shop]
Lisa Anne: "Courteous and Pleasant manner." That doesn't sound too bad.
David/Bud [reading the new Code of Conduct]: "THREE: The area commonly known as Lover's Lane as well as the Pleasantville Public Library shall be closed until further notice. FOUR: The only permissible recorded music shall be the following: Johnny Mathis, Perry Como, Jack Jones, the marches of John Phillips Sousa or The Star Spangled Banner. In no event shall any music be tolerated that is not of a temperate or "pleasant" nature."
Kids: Oh my gosh.... No....
David/Bud: "FIVE: There shall be no public sale of umbrellas or preparation for inclement weather of any kind. SIX: No bedframe or mattress may be sold measuring more than 38 inches wide. SEVEN: The only permissible paint colors shall be BLACK, WHITE or GRAY, despite the recent availability of certain alternatives. EIGHT: All elementary and high school curriculums shall teach the "non-changist" view of history — emphasizing "continuity" over "alteration." Wow.
George: You know, your mom went out.
David/Bud: Went out?
George: Yeah. She went out for a little while.
David/Bud: When?
George: Three days ago.
George: What happened? One minute everything's fine — the next... What went wrong?
David/Bud: Nothing went wrong. People change.
George: People change?
David/Bud: Yeah. People change.
George: Can they change back?
David/Bud: I don't know — I think that's harder.
David/Bud: I've got something to say!
Big Bob: Very well.
David/Bud: You don't have a right to do this. I mean, I know you want it to stay pleasant around here, but — there are so many things … that are so much better. Like silly, or sexy, or dangerous … or brief. And every one of those things is in you all the time, if you just have the guts to look for them.
Big Bob: That's enough.
David/Bud: I thought I was allowed to defend myself.
Big Bob: You're not allowed to lie.
David/Bud: I'm not lying. You see those faces up there? They're no different than you are, they just happen to see something inside themselves…
Big Bob: [bangs gavel] I said that's enough.
David/Bud: Here, I'll show you. Dad?
George: Yeah, Bud?
David/Bud: It's okay Dad, just listen a sec. I know you miss her, I mean, you told me you did. But maybe it's not just the cooking, or the cleaning, that you miss. Maybe it's something else. Maybe you can't even describe it. Maybe you only know it when it's gone. Maybe it's like there's a whole piece of you that's missing too. Look at her, Dad. Doesn't she look pretty like that? Doesn't she look … just as beautiful as the first time you met her? Do you really want her back the way she was? Doesn't she look just wonderful? [he nods] Now don't you wish you could tell her that? [he nods, and suddenly is colored]
Big Bob: [bangs his gavel] You're out of order!
David/Bud: Why am I out of order?
Big Bob: Because I'm not gonna let you turn this courtroom into a circus!
David/Bud: Well, I don't think it's a circus, and I don't think they do, either. [David turns to look at the crowd, where many of the black-and-white people are changing into color. There are gasps and murmurs. Jennifer grins]
Big Bob: [bangs the gavel] This behavior must stop at once!
David/Bud: But see? That's just the point! It can't stop at once, because it's in you, and you can't stop something that's inside you.
Big Bob: It is not inside me!
David's Mom: When your father was here, I used to think, "This was it." This is the way it was always going to be. I had the right house. I had the right car. I had the right life.
David: There is no right house. There is no right car.
David's Mom: God, my face must be a mess.
David: It looks great.
David's Mom: Honey, it's really sweet of you, but I'm sure it does not look "great."
David: Sure it does. Come here.
David's Mom: I'm 40 years old. I mean, it's not supposed to be like this.
David: It's not supposed to be anything. Hold still.
David's Mom: How'd you get so smart all of a sudden?
David: [pause] I had a good day.

Theme music

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Jai Guru Deva Om.
Nothing's gonna change my world.

Taglines

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  • Nothing is as simple as Black and White.
  • Pleasantville — It's Just Around the Corner.
  • Reliable TV Repair · We'll fix you for good.

Quotes about Pleasantville

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Sure times are tough in the 90′s, but it ain’t all bad and the “good old days” weren’t always all that good.
This is an exquisite, timely film. It’s nice to know that occasionally, even Hollywood does something right. ~ Merle Bertrand
 
In the twilight of the 20th century, here is a comedy to reassure us that there is hope — that the world we see around us represents progress, not decay. ~ Roger Ebert
 
Pleasantville, which is one of the year's best and most original films, sneaks up on us. It begins by kidding those old black-and-white sitcoms like Father Knows Best, it continues by pretending to be a sitcom itself, and it ends as a social commentary of surprising power. ~ Roger Ebert
  • Pleasantville is a morality tale concerning the values of contemporary suburban America by holding that social landscape up against both the Utopian and the dystopian visions of suburbia that emerged in the 1950s.
    • Robert Beuka, in SuburbiaNation : Reading Suburban Landscape in Twentieth-Century American Fiction and Film (2004), p. 14
  • Every now and then, a movie comes along that does the motion picture industry proud. … What seems at first to be a gently satiric nostalgia piece gradually turns serious when the twins introduce spontaneity and a dose of 90′s reality to Pleasantville’s pre-programmed denizens. This reality virus, manifesting as color, gradually spreads through the town.
    While this awakening adds color, knowledge and diversity to their previously rote existence, the unprepared citizens must also come to grips with such decidedly unpleasant scourges as intolerance, violence and racism. When that once-charming black and white 1950′s Main Street view transforms into B&W newsreel-like footage of a book burning, hatred-spewing mob chanting “No Coloreds,” the film certainly tempers our nostalgia – and cleverly fires its warning shots right across our bow. Sure times are tough in the 90′s, but it ain’t all bad and the “good old days” weren’t always all that good.
    This is an exquisite, timely film. It’s nice to know that occasionally, even Hollywood does something right.
  • The wonder or this film, its grand feat, is to recast the nostalgic and imperturbably pleasant black-and-white landscape of Pleasantville as in need of a strong dose of our violent, endangered, live-and-in-color, three-dimensional world. The film identifies as repressive (and ultimately dangerous) the "false front" of Pleasantville as it contrasts with the emotional untidiness of "real life." By the end, instead of continuing to hope his actual family becomes like the one on Pleasantville, the brother models the no longer idealized Pleasantville on "real life."
    • Virginia Blum, in Flesh Wounds : The Culture of Cosmetic Surgery (2003), p. 244
  • Pleasantville is one of the year's delights. It flies off the screen with a freshness and wonder that tickle you with the though that film itself is reborn, not just the characters in Gary Ross's allegorical fairy tale. The device Ross uses as springboard on behalf of passion and intensity — and the antinostalgic belief that you can't go back, only forward, is simply brilliant and brilliantly simple.
  • Though writer/director Gary Ross works in some heavy-handed strokes, his portrait of stodgy Eisenhower America dazzles with some of the loveliest imagery of any 1990s film.
  • In the twilight of the 20th century, here is a comedy to reassure us that there is hope — that the world we see around us represents progress, not decay. Pleasantville, which is one of the year's best and most original films, sneaks up on us. It begins by kidding those old black-and-white sitcoms like Father Knows Best, it continues by pretending to be a sitcom itself, and it ends as a social commentary of surprising power.
  • The film observes that sometimes pleasant people are pleasant simply because they have never, ever been challenged. That it's scary and dangerous to learn new ways. The movie is like the defeat of the body snatchers: The people in color are like former pod people now freed to move on into the future. We observe that nothing creates fascists like the threat of freedom.
    Pleasantville is the kind of parable that encourages us to re-evaluate the good old days and take a fresh look at the new world we so easily dismiss as decadent. Yes, we have more problems. But also more solutions, more opportunities and more freedom. I grew up in the '50s. It was a lot more like the world of Pleasantville than you might imagine. Yes, my house had a picket fence, and dinner was always on the table at a quarter to six, but things were wrong that I didn't even know the words for.
  • Ambitious, ingenious and visually breathtaking, Pleasantville is a rarity in contemporary filmmaking; a fully-realized vision that succeeds on multiple levels. Writer and director Gary Ross has crafted a wondrous experience that satisfies as a comedy, a fantasy, a drama and a parable. Movies don't get much better than this.
  • Hollywood satire is not usually this enjoyable: Both savage and silly, Pleasantville is an absolute blast.
    • Bruce Kirkland, in Jam! Movies (13 April 2004)
  • It never rains, the highs and lows rest at 72 degrees, the fire department exists only to rescue treed cats, and the basketball team never misses the hoop. … Pleasantville is a false hope. David's journey tells him only that there is no "right" life, no model for how things are "supposed to be."
    • Robert McDaniel, in a review of Pleasantville in Films and History (May–June 2002), p. 85
  • Parents need to know that Pleasantville raises many ideas about modern troubled times versus old-time simplicity, as well as freedom, responsibility and tolerance. The movie contains many sexual situations, as the naïve TV characters learn about sex for the first time, but the movie handles them gracefully. … High schoolers may appreciate the way that the twins, at first retreating in different ways from the problems of the modern world, find that the rewards of the examined life make it ultimately worthwhile. Parents and teens alike will find many things to think and talk about after watching Pleasantville, including the movie's parallels to Nazi Germany (book burning) and American Jim Crow laws ("No colored" signs), and the challenges of independent thinking.
    Also intriguing is the path of Jennifer's character. At first, she thinks that it is sex that turns the black and white characters into color. But when she stays "pasty," she realizes that the colors reveal something more subtle and meaningful — the willingness to challenge the accepted and opening oneself up to honest reflection about one's own feelings and longings.
  • This movie is about the fact that personal repression gives rise to larger political oppression...That when we're afraid of certain things in ourselves or we're afraid of change, we project those fears on to other things, and a lot of very ugly social situations can develop.

Cast

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