How does the film The Truman Show tell the audience about the influence of the media? - Christoff

What is Christoff’s role in the programme?
How is this similar to programme makers in real life?
Think of a specific part of the film where Christoff manipulates Truman and what this tells the audience. Do you think this happens to any extent in TV in real life?
How does TV influence us?

Christoff’s role in “The Truman Show” is to control every detail in the Seahaven set, to ensure that the show runs smoothly and captures the audiences attention to bring in income, and to manipulate Truman such that he would remain in Seahaven. We can see this from the way Christoff orders his group of producers and technicians in the main control room to adjust the dimness of lights, angles of different cameras, to clean up on-set screw-ups (e.g. falling spotlight, radio channel). For example, we can see Christoff ordering his technicians to jump from “camera 1” to “camera 2” to get a better view of Truman when Truman is reunited with his father. He used the position of the camera to show Truman tearing in joy, thus producing a warm feeling among the audience. Christoff’s biggest role in the programme would be to keep the show running, by containing Truman in Seahaven by any means possible. Christoff sometimes takes the place of the people interacting with Truman and in so doing, controls what they say, or uses props to brainwash Truman to want to stay in Seahaven. One example of Christoff’s manipulation of Truman was in Truman’s childhood, where Truman announced that he aspired to be an explorer, but was put down by his teacher, who mentioned that he was “too late”, as there was “nothing left to explore”. Truman was thus discouraged by his teacher’s words and never did become an explorer. Another example was when Truman “secretly” wanted to go to Fiji. To discourage Truman, his boss sent him on an assignment to leave Seahaven by boat, that reminded him of his fear of water.

Christoff’s role is similar to that of programme makers in real life, because both Christoff and programme makers in real life aim to provide entertainment for viewers and in so doing to generate profit, and to ensure the smooth running of their programme. Christoff plays the major role of coordinating the filming and technical processes, just like any other programme maker in real life would do. Programme makers would definitely want to create an entertaining programme by eliminating errors and mistakes during filming. Christoff plays his role by making orders for switches in camera angles, or the introduction of music into scenes, or even artificial environmental changes. He thus creates a dramatic effect in scenes through altering the mood of the scenes by means of filming techniques. Christoff’s plays his role to generate profit and providing entertainment by simply running the Truman Show. “The Truman Show’s” “no-scripts” nature allowed it to draw much attention and make much profit (via viewers, merchandise [pillows] and advertisements [product placing]). Programme makers in real life also play the role of maximizing profits by creating interesting and entertaining programmes. For example, “American Idol” was a programme that sought to seek out talented musical performers in the US, and of course, to generate profit.

One way how Truman is manipulated by Christoff is through the manipulation of his emotions. It has been scripted earlier on in the show that Truman had lost his on-screen father during a sailing trip. However, due to an error on the crew’s part, Truman gets to meet his “father”, first accidentally, then intentionally, in a highly dramatized scene of a father-and-son reunion. In addition to the re-inclusion of Truman’s father’s character, Christoff instructs the crew to adjust the lighting and music to further amplify the dramatic setting. There is then evidence of increased viewership with scenes of various people tuning in to the show, and Christoff then makes a comment about an increase in profit after the addition of this dramatic scene. Truman’s emotions are undermined in such a way that his genuine feelings have become a form of entertainment for viewers worldwide and also a means for Christoff to gain personal profit through higher viewership. The audiences of the Truman Show, engrossed in this sudden turn of events in the storyline, are probably unaware that Truman’s feelings are manipulated; instead they will probably tune in more to the Truman Show to catch more of such scenes, oblivious to the emotional well-being of Truman himself. This may not happen to such a large extent in real-life television, but the fact that we often tune in to watch and experience emotions that are often fictitious and scripted, ignorant of the true feelings of the actors themselves, is similar to how the audiences of the Truman Show pay no heed to the reality of Truman’s emotions.

Evidently, television affects people greatly. Based on extensive research, audiovisual media, which includes television, is the second most effective means of communication. Effectiveness is boosted by seeing and hearing the persuasive message. As such, it means that television is effective in communicating messages because people are able to remember what they have seen after watching and hearing, thus highlighting the power of the television. This, however, can be both positive and negatively. A positive example would be that through television, people are now able to access the news, sometimes in real time, instead of obtaining news from the newspapers published the next day. In addition, television allows the production of shows discussing current affairs. This helps people gain insight into matters and increase their knowledge of the world around them, thus impacting them positively. However, television can have adverse effects on people as well. This is proven to be true in the book Children and Television (TV): 50 Years of Research by John P. Murray, where it states that fifty years of research on the impact of television on children's emotional and social development demonstrate that there are clear connections between watching violence on television and engaging in aggressive or violent behavior.

- Yik Sin, Christian, Yu Wen, Edith, 09S07A