Abstract
Pleasantville presents the experience of the teenage twins David and Jennifer who are transported to the 1950s TV soap opera named Pleasantville via the TV remote control. The twins introduce free sex, arts, literature, rock and roll, and jazz to this perfected town in which residents live in order. This clash of cultures results in social unrest as the residents become aware that the order is an outcome of submission and challenge the roles attributed to them. The transformation from control to resistance is the dominant motif of the film. Using Foucault’s theory of heterotopia, this study scrutinizes how the heterotopian principles in the spatial presentations provide a good lens to negotiate forms of control and resistance.
Highlights
This journal is published by the University Library System of the University of Pittsburgh as part of its D-Scribe Digital Publishing Program and is cosponsored by the University of Pittsburgh Press
Control and Resistance in the Heterotopic Spatiality of Pleasantville Evrim Ersöz Koç In Pleasantville the teenage twins David and Jennifer are transported from their society in 1990s to 1950s TV soap opera named “Pleasantville.” This change is a travel back in time but it is a movement in space, from a space where problems such as unemployment, diseases, plagues, ecological catastrophes are evident to a space in which everything is “swell,” filled with family values, proper nutrition, and safe sex
CINEJ Cinema Journal: Control and resistance in heterotopic spatiality of Pleasantville contributes to a better understanding of the mechanisms of control and resistance in Pleasantville, using Foucault’s study on heterotopia as a theoretical framework
Summary
The connection between heterotopia and utopia will be presented which will be followed by an illustration of how the town Pleasantville inherits the characteristics of both a utopic and a heterotopic mirror. Both the town Pleasantville as a whole and the specific places in the town such as prison, courtroom, Lover’s Lane, library, and soda shop will be scrutinized according to Foucault’s heterotopology in order to point out how ideas of control and resistance are manifested in this heterotopic landscape.
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