Pleasantville

Gary Ross's 1998 film follows two siblings who fall into a black and white television series of the nineteen-fifties. Nothing in the town ever changes. When change begins, colour appears. The film makes colouring both a technical and a narrative device; the narrative makes the reaction to broken conventions its real subject. Tobey Maguire and Reese Witherspoon lead. The colour transitions were made with digital methods considered advanced at the time. It is the director's first feature. Who it's for: those who like idea-driven fantasy. Who it's not for: viewers expecting the allegory handled with subtlety; the film states its message plainly.