To Disappointed Fans of the Book: Recommending a WAY better movie

I would recommend the film Pleasantville to anyone who, like me, was pissed off by how Hollywood once again screwed up an adaptation of what was a great book. The plot is deceptively simple:

Impressed by high school student David's (Tobey Maguire) devotion to a 1950s family TV show, a mysterious television repairman (Don Knotts) provides him with a means to escape into the black-and-white program with his sister, Jennifer (Reese Witherspoon). While David initially takes to the simplistic, corny world of the show, Jennifer sets about jolting the characters with doses of reality that unexpectedly bring a little color into their drab existence.

but hides a great deal of intelligence, beauty, and humanity- all qualities missing from this adaptation.

It's a fun, imaginative movie that deals with the same themes of conformity, oppression, repression, and the human spirit but also manages to be an entertaining 90's comedy at the same time. It's astoundingly similar to The Giver in it's mature handling of its social commentary, even with its use of colors ( which makes me wonder if it was inspired in some part by L. Lowry's work), and every aspect of the movie- the acting, the directing, the cinematography- just works.


TL;DR: Check out Pleasantville on IMDB if you hated this movie. Come on, you know you want to!