Pleasantville and Emotions

Watching the 1998 film “Pleasantville” that stars Reese Witherspoon and Tobey Maguire among others including William H Macy conjured up a philosophical idea, or perhaps, homage.

The film displays a television show that is as prim and perfect as a hedge in the 1950’s suburbia. But when Maguire and Witherspoon enter via the realms of a magic remote, their impact is more than appearances. By the conclusion of the film the environment has changed dramatically- both in attitude and becoming colourful- literally.

In the court room near the end of the film where Maguire’s character is being tried for going against the Code of Conduct imposed to rein in the changes in the town, he  implies and interesting point; emotions are important and integral, to be without them, is to suppress.

To extend this from the Hollywood script to the real world, it is important to see that even the emotions that we do not like, or put a bad spin on are beautiful.

When we get angry, or frustrated, it stems from the goal to do well and to achieve something and to do so in a positive manner. When we yell and scream, anger is a mere guise for passion not properly addressed or expressed for that matter.

To be human is to be a rollercoaster of emotion, to go through the highs and lows, to feel numb as well as lucidly frightened.  Having our emotions maintained in an orderly fashion is not ideal.

This is not to say, however that it gives us all a free pass to go to the highs and lows, the way I see it, life is separate to emotion and to achieve the goals we set in life, those emotions need to be edited, but not constrained.

By this I mean, to have a levelled approach where the variant between angry and placid is not a skyrocketing jump.

I digress.

The fact of the matter is, humans are such because we can articulate the highs and lows of emotions, to be otherwise is merely pleasant. Comfortable but misrepresenting.