Stereotypes In Pleasantville

This essay will talk about the representation of the American suburbs in cinema that reveal contemporary attitudes to the myths of the suburban utopia promoted in the 1950s, it will be looking at the racial myths, the gender myth, attack on gender roles. The essay will also look at films and TV shows that represent these myths but at the same time challenge the myths, films such as Pleasantville (1998), American beauty (1999), Blue Velvet (1986) and Happiness (1998). The television shows that address these myths are Leave it to Beaver (1957 – 1963), Father Knows Best (1954 – 1960), The Donna Reed Show (1958 – 1966), this essay will mainly discourse the film Pleasantville.
During the 1950s the American dream started to become more prominent

to the way all Americans dreamed of living, living in an egalitarian society with material prosperity. Many people dreamed of living this prosperous life but it remained a dream, while other Americans in the 1950s made this their reality, having a house on their own land with a car, dog, wife/husband and 2 to 3 kids. As the war came to an end post-war affluence redefined the American dream, the great depression was over along with the years of time sacrificed thanks to the war. Cars were being created again at a faster rate, with the authorisation of the interstate highway act thousands of miles of roads were constructed making living further away from work a possibility.
“Government supported suburban development through the assistance of the Federal Housing Administration (FHA), a department that worked to create neighborhood solidarity through homogeneity, harmony and attractiveness. The Federal Aid Highway Act of 1956, helped to build neighborhoods conducive to husbands who commuted to the city to work, women who were stay-at-home mothers and wives, and children who lived and went to school in a tightly knit, local community (Haralovich 118). Home ownership represented social status (in the1950s and the present day): buy the house, have the family that lives in the house, and you have achieved the American Dream.” Smukler (2008:1)
With the rise of racial fears and affordable housing, the desire to leave the dirty cities were factors that made white Americans flee to the suburbs. Giving them the ability to own their own detached homes, many Americans soon surpassed their parents and the standards of living they enjoyed. With the constant increase of wanting to live in the suburbs, it came with critics who criticised the designs of the homes, the way homeowners were made to keep their communities looking uniform. Residents were made to constantly mow their lawns, African Americans were excluded from the suburbs making a generation of Americans excited with the chance of owning their own lands changing the American Dream.
With the constant increase of population in the suburbs increased, TV shows were made to support the myths of the suburban utopia. These shows promote the myths of the suburbs, these myths are that the suburbs are typically white affluent families. They are mainly middle class patriotic heterosexual home owners, they all have gender specific roles. Making the man the bread winner of the family while the wife stays at home cooking and cleaning conforming to the stereotypes, these families are always in a happy marriage with 2-3 kids who are always performing well at school. The shows that support this myths in the 50s were Leave it to Beaver, Father Knows Best, The Donna Reed Show, these shows that were mostly sitcoms gave the suburban audiences what they were interested in seeing. This included not only seeing the outside world but were also focused of themselves, or “hyper-idealized” versions of themselves and what they aspired to be. The shows operated as a way to entertain the suburban viewers with story like depictions of their suburban communities, while the shows acted as a way to entertain the viewers it was also used as an advertisement for the suburbanite viewers and for those who were eager to move to the suburbs and live the American Dream, the myths of the 1950s suburban utopia mostly came from adverts or sponsors, television shows and the FHA (Federal Housing Administration).
“A suburban movie is, first of all, set in a suburb for all or a major part of the action, and its characters relate significantly to a suburban ethos, real or imagined. The cinematic suburb typically features universally recognizable icons, such as “picture windows, patios, barbecues, power lawn mowers, the problems of commuting, . . . armies of children manning their mechanized vehicles down the sidewalks” (Donaldson 1968, 195), tree-lined roads, single-family detached houses (often in tract developments), and, more recently, shopping malls. Although the stereotype “never described more than a portion of the suburban experience” (Harris 2001, 259), overwhelmingly, movie suburbanites are portrayed as white and middleclass.
Suburban films go to support the quote above, this can be seen in the film Pleasantville. The film represent the contemporary attitudes the myth of the suburban utopia that were promoted in the 1950s, the film also challenges the unrealistic way of living, the racial and clearly specified gender roles. The film Pleasantville is about two 1990s teenagers who find themselves in a 1950s sitcom where their influence begins to profoundly change that complacent world, the film shows the “ideal” life making the life in Pleasantville cosy, perky and clean, no problem is too small to solve, they start to change the way things are approach in this world by the way people look, think and start to act. The film has a colour problem during the film, the way the suburbanites react to the way colour starts to show in their daily lives, the way they react to it was to ban colour outright and whoever goes against the mayor’s wishes will be locked up and judged seen towards the end of the film as David and Mr Johnson are locked away for creating a colourful mural. It can be argued that the relationship between race and the American suburbs has been one of “possibility, contradiction and exclusivity” in the 1950s, post war social adjustments to the domestic front emphasised a white, middle class family. With the support of the government and the FHA who wanted to create neighbourhoods with solidarity through homogeneity, harmony and attractiveness. Pleasantville pays close attention to the structure of home, family, work and friendships, the film is in black and white until the 1990s twins colorize the this shallowness vision by introducing truth through the discovery of sexuality, creativity and difference in people.
The relationship between the people who lived in the suburbs and race specifically African Americans was strained whether it would be on or off the television, families who were non-whites would be rejected from loan applications when trying to purchase a house in the suburbs. Black families with similar backgrounds would find it hard to get a loan, they would be carefully screened to make sure that they were members of the middle-class different to white families who would automatically have their loans accepted.
“The discrimination experienced in real life suburbia was easily reflected on television if there were no people of color in those communities off-screen, there would be none on-screen as well.

The most popular programs depicting these neighbourhoods, such as Father Knows Best, Leave it to Beaver and The Donna Reed Show, had no significant black character roles. Overall, portrayals of people of color were few and far between during the early years of television programming, particularly rare was the depiction of non-white families.”
In Pleasantville the lack of diversity is prominent in the film as they are no black people in the film, which supports the fact that the myth of a suburban utopia was only aimed at middle-classed white families, it secludes non-white

families.
This film also criticises the Americans’ hunger for nostalgia through the 1950s suburban utopia for those who call for a return of family values, “the voiceover to the Nickelodeon-like 1990s rerun promises “family values,” “safe sex,” and a “flashback to kinder, gentler times.” along the way, through Pleasantville TV’s old-time version of suburban life is revealed to be ridiculous. During an early scene, David is watching the Pleasantville shows, where the father the breadwinner returns home after a “swell” day at work and is greeted with a martini by his perfect housewife, whom he affectionately calls “Pumpkin.” Although the wife’s delicious homemade cooking is the focus of their conversation, while their two “gee-whiz” children enter the scene to announce that Bud has won first place in a science fair. While, back in the normal time of the1990s, David’s mother argues over the phone with her ex-husband, who go back on on his pledge to take the children on the first weekend of the month. As she frustratingly stops herself to going on her weekend away with her boyfriend, while the housewife from the TV show Pleasantville exclaims, “What’s a mother to do?”
The film Pleasantville depicts the standard of work chosen for family members, the suburban dream was meant to show the homogeneous definition of the family life, from the ways the architecture of the domestic house were set up to the reinforced the gender specific roles of a domestic house.

The father would be outside of the house working typically in another city while the mother would stay inside cooking, cleaning and looking after the children when they are home from school. Pleasantville is only possible through the suppression of any form of individualism and segregation of those who lean against the authoritarian power of the mayor, the beginning of the emancipation of the females citizen reminds the audiences of the sexual revolution that took place between the 1960s and the 1980s with the rise of hippie culture, drug culture and the women’s rights movements. The revolutions went against the suburban utopian myths, the rise of hippie culture saw the growth in homosexual behaviour between men and women gave them the right to be free to express their feelings. Along with the rise of homosexual behaviour, the use of drugs grew as well. Teenager were starting to experiment more with drugs, hippie culture brought about the belief that everyone should live the life and be happy and not to think about what other thought you should be. The hippie culture rejected the middle class values, they “championed free love and sexual liberation particularly for women” the rise of

women’s rights movement challenged the expected role women have in their families, a women was expected to follow one path, marry in her early 20s, and start a family and to devote her life to homemaking. The women’s rights movements focused on dismantling the gender specific roles and the workplace inequality that women faced during the 1960s.
Pleasantville depicts the suburban middle-class family sitcom of the 1950s and the 1960s, the sitcoms usually centre on the families and their home lives. The breadwinner father, the housewife and the children who ae almost perfect who live in their suburban home. With the structures of the defined gender roles and the value of home life, these sitcoms drew on the unrealistic representation of family relationship and the domestic space. Leading to much opposition during the 1960s, the change in colour from black and white to colours represents the major change in America during the 1960s. The film reveals that the myths of the suburban utopia were over exaggerated showing the women to be unhappy about the way of living, as opposed to the myth that the women loved living the life of waiting at home being the homemaker cooking and cleaning till their husband and kids returned from work and school. The rise of the hippie culture and women’s rights movement during the 1960s challenged this myth, women wanted more freedom to work and top stop following the path of the gender specific roles. The film also shows a lack of diversity in race within the suburbs, which was another revelation that not everyone can live the American dream, you had to be white and middle-classed so not only were non-white denied application to live in the suburbs, they were never depicted in any adverts. The only way for them to live in the suburbs were if they worked for a rich affluent white family as the housekeep, while the mother was allowed to work as teacher, nurse or secretary.