“The Truman Show” Might Have Been a Preview of Everyone’s Lives Today

The 1998 sci-fi movie doesn’t feel like fiction anymore

I think it was 2008, and I was a 20-year old living in a boys’ hostel during my undergraduate degree, and all we did was play a bunch of multiplayer games (think Age of Empires II and Counter-strike — yep, those golden days!) and exchange movies on “hard drives” because the cloud didn’t exist.

The Truman Show, a real gem of a movie from 1998, was one of those that I watched during those days, and it left a lasting impression on me, and I’ve probably watched it about 5 times since. Once when I wanted my parents to watch it for the crazy idea that it was, another time with my sister and brother-in-law, and the latest being with my wife, who isn’t so much of a Hollywood movie person.

Yet, everyone that has watched it on my insistence, can’t help but be in awe of the masterpiece by Peter Weir and Jim Carrey — probably one of those amazing actors who’s underrated for his sheer acting brilliance, just because he chooses to laugh it off in his comical portrayals.

But, most recently, when I watched the movie again, I felt like hasn’t the world today become like a congregation of thousands and millions of Truman Burbanks? Aren’t we all living publicized and broadcasted lives with barely any privacy?

The Constant Privacy Invasion of Social Media

In 1998, more than two decades ago, the only way of keeping in touch with others was probably via the traditional phone call and potentially good old snail mail — letters and postcards.

The ever-so-convenient cellphone, Whatsapp, Facebook, Instagram, and the whole works were far from even being possibly conceivable ideas. The internet bubble was yet to happen, and so this is a time when even Yahoo Messenger had only just been launched — Yahoo Messenger was launched in March 1998, while The Truman Show was released in June of the same year.

So, it is safe to say, that everyone’s life was their own — and it was shared with close friends and families, and the neighbors who in those days weren’t mere strangers living next door, but real friends and people you trusted and relied on in times of need.

If someone had a baby you'd probably only find out if they chose to inform you, or the next time you met them, which could be by the time the baby is a couple of years old. If someone had a death, you’d know either by an obituary and notice in the local newspaper, or from word of mouth, and an invitation to the funeral.

Yet, today the world is different. You have a breakup, or a new job, or are headed somewhere beautiful on your honeymoon, or you lost a loved one. The first impulse is to let the world know via a Facebook status update, or a Tweet, or an Instagram update.

Well, if you’re not in a state to do it, someone else will for you. Announce to the world how you’re grieving the loss of a loved one and would like to not be contacted. And the “likes” will start to pour in — to an announcement of death.

Don’t get me wrong, I am not against letting your near and dear ones know about the good things and the bad ones that happen in your life, after all sharing compounds joy, and lessens pain. But, does anyone care anymore?

Or is everyone like the audience in The Truman Show who is just happy to derive a variety of emotions vicariously from the lives of others? Are there any real relationships, or feelings anymore? Or are we just living in a world where everything is about external validation, and our lives aren’t really our own anymore?

External Factors Guiding Our Lives and Decisions

Remember how Truman is almost forced to move his life in a certain direction, and how the world conspires to ensure he stays away from the woman he truly loved, or thought he did, and puts him on a path to marry a woman who’s merely an “actor.” Not just that, the constant subliminal messaging via TV commercials, forced magazines to have a baby because the creator of the “script” thought it was time for him to have a baby for the ratings of the show.

Isn’t that what is happening with our lives?

Societal considerations and expectations constantly nudge our lives in a direction, that’s not necessarily the one of our choosing. Parental pressure for a certain kind of education, peer pressure during teenage for a certain lifestyle, more peer pressure to follow a certain path in terms of careers, constant need to keep up appearances in a social context, and hence a forced lifestyle, and so on.

Again, the subliminal messaging of the “perceived” idea of perfection that is fed to us every day. The slim, tall, spotless skinned model on the billboards and the commercials, the guy with a surfer bod using all those branded products, the perfect family that’s always smiling and happy, and all the other stereotypes of the “ideal” life.

Whatever happened to trying to lead a simple, happy life and doing with it what you truly want to do. And the idea of being content with what you have without comparing your life to others’ lives. With the constant overflow of information around us, it is quite impossible to stay disconnected from the world, and care only about what you want to care about.

Is There a Solution? Can We Climb Our Way Out?

By the end of the movie, when Truman Burbank realizes this is all a setup and his life has been constrained in a giant city-sized studio, and he decides to climb his way out of the trap, he fights all odds and wins.

How do we escape this artificial setup that’s been created around us by this digitization of the world and the omnipresence of social media?

The answer probably lies in conscious acceptance of the fact that most of us are stuck in this trap, and then doing what it takes to find the escape path, and climb that steep wall that Truman climbs, and finding the world beyond it!

To some of us it may mean disconnecting from all the social media, the technology around us and doing a social media detox, to others it may mean introspecting and ensuring that we allow intrinsic motivation to drive our actions more than external validation, to others it may mean just learning to be content with ourselves without comparing every part of our lives with others.

To each of us, the solution, and the escape from The Truman Show is different, yet it is on us to find it before it’s too late!