The truman show is a thoughtful, insightful and bleak look at postmodern, contemporary society. The character is unaware that he exists within a purely simulated world that has no connection to reality, but is instead a superficial realm constructed by a media corporation.
Truman- name ‘true man’ only true thing in the text is truman himself. Yet, there is nothing real about truman apart from his human emotions, feelings for muse.
The Truman Show offers us a metaphor for our own postmodern condition.
Christoff: ‘Christ of’ is the maker of the program. creator of truman’s life.
Postmodernism describes the emergence of a society in which the mass media and popular culture are the most important and powerful institutions controlling and shaping all other types of social relationship.
Hyperreal- so real it’s not real: Truman’s life. Baudrillard argues that in a culture dominated by Tv and Film and the internet all we are now are simulations of reality, leaving us to exist within the hyperreal. Baudrillard: ‘Everything is a copy of a copy of a copy”. In The Truman Show, this notion is prevalent.
Examples of our increasing Hyperreal Culture
-Aspiring towards perfect bodies that have been manipulated with photoshop
-Irish themed bars situated around the world, which offer a version of ‘Irishness’ which is more Irish than that found in pubs in Ireland itself.
-Las Vegas skyline has a hyperreal experience of different cities around the world: the ultimate postmodern skyscape
Our postmodern culture has a fascination with reality television. New media technologies such as digital editing has made reality tv much easier to manipulate and create new narratives.
Journalist Amanda Rikton aptly describes the format, “participants are placed within an artificial environment which is highly controlled and are at all times aware that they are being scrutinised by the viewing public. To what extent a real notion of self is presented is questionable.”
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