History Film / Pleasantville

%% * KarmicTrickster: The TV repairman.

* VisitByDivorcedDad: David's and Jennifer's mom opens the movie on the phone arguing with their father about when he gets the kids.

* LampshadeHanging: David is very genre savvy, and constantly points out tropes as they happen in-universe (but not for the movie as a whole). He even tries to warn his sister against [[DefiedTrope defying tropes]].

* StealthPun: Some early film posters colored "tv" differently from the rest of the title.

** David starts out the film as an introverted loner who thinks of the show as escapism. Halfway through the film, he begins to display more assertive leader traits [[spoiler:and earns his color by punching out a thug who was attacking his TV mom]].

* SweaterGirl: Jennifer is taken aback when she puts on the typical sweater and bullet bra.
--> '''Jennifer:''' I could, like, kill a guy with these things.

* StylisticSuck: Taken at face value, the TV series ''Pleasantville'' would be a ''terrible'' sitcom, as there would be no conflict, and characters who are already perfect can't learn anything.

* ADateWithRosiePalms: Betty the housewife after getting the sex talk from her "daughter" Mary Sue/Jennifer. This is so out of character and against the ways of Pleasantville's reality, it ''sets a tree in front of the house on fire''.

* DeconstructiveParody: Of 50's sitcoms and nostalgia for the era. Main character David thinks that the titular town, which shares its name with the [[ShowWithinAShow television program in the film]], is this: everything seems happy and idyllic, the town is permanently in the "nice" part of TheFifties (no greasers/rock 'n roll/war, etc.), and all problems are resolved in thirty short minutes. But when David and his sister Jennifer are [[TrappedInTVLand sucked into the show]], he discovers just how miserable it is: none of the books have any print in them, everybody's happy [[StepfordSmiler because they're mandated to be]], nobody has any sex whatsoever (to the point where Jennifer teaching her sitcom "mother" to [[ADateWithRosiePalms masturbate]] and experience orgasm for the first time causes a nearby tree to ''burst into flame''), and the town's Main Street ends in a circle--there's no getting out of it whatsoever. By the end, David and Jennifer have transformed the town into a place that's not nearly as perfect, but much more human and genuine.

* TheTalk: ZigZagged, in that it's a teenage daughter giving it to her ''mother'', and then when the mother is sure the father won't be interested, the daughter points out that [[ADateWithRosiePalms the man is actually dispensable]].

* TheThemeParkVersion: Although ''Pleasantville'' might appear to be taken straight from a [[TheFifties 1950s]] sitcom, sitcoms of that era were not actually that simple for the most part; references to pop culture, the outside world and sexuality occurred on even the strictest shows. The film is more about how people think of and remember those shows than how they actually were.

* DeconstructiveParody: Of 50's sitcoms and nostalgia for the era.

* AnAesop: Life is not perfect, but there's always a way to deal with it.

* TheNineties: Where the real world is set, being enough of a CrapsackWorld for David to resort to watching a '50s sitcom for escapism.

[[quoteright:310:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/pleasantville_ver5_9378.jpg]]
[[caption-width-right:310:''[[{{Tagline}} Nothing is as simple as Black and White.]]'']]

Jennifer (Witherspoon) and David (Maguire) are a pair of '90s teen siblings who, during an argument over who gets to use the big TV in the living room, wind up TrappedInTVLand due to a strange TV repairman (Knotts) and a stranger magical remote. Specifically, they wind up in ''Pleasantville'', an old black-and-white show portraying the stereotypical 1950s American suburb (along the lines of ''Series/LeaveItToBeaver'' or ''Series/FatherKnowsBest'', but even more idealistic). David is thrilled because it's his favorite show; it is a happy world where nothing bad ever happens (as a contrast to David and Jennifer's unstable home life). Jennifer, being more of a party girl, finds Pleasantville incredibly dull and wants to liven the place up. Still, they both want to get home, and David wants to do so without upsetting the community -- but the repairman gets antsy and they're stuck.

* TheNineties: Where the real world is set, being enough of a CrapsackWorld for David to resort to a '50s sitcom for escapism.

* TheNineties: Where the real world is set being enough of a CrapsackWorld for David to resort to a 50s sitcom for escapism.

[[quoteright:300:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/pleasantville_ver5_9378.jpg]]
[[caption-width-right:300:''[[{{Tagline}} Nothing is as simple as Black and White.]]'']]

A deliberately {{Troperrific}} 1998 dramedy film written and directed by Gary Ross, starring Creator/ReeseWitherspoon, Creator/TobeyMaguire, Creator/JeffDaniels, Creator/JoanAllen, Creator/WilliamHMacy, Creator/JTWalsh, and Creator/DonKnotts.