Theory Of Knowledge - The Truman Show

The Truman Show was the story of a man named Truman, whose life was caught on tape since the time he was in his mother's womb. He was legally adopted by a producer who started recording Truman's life without his knowledge. Surrounded by actors since his birth, his whole life was planned ahead by the producers, shaping him into what they wanted him to be, from what his worst fears were, to whom he married.

He was the star of the most widely watched show in the world, although he was unaware of what was going on around him, and he was the only thing that was real in his life, everything else was made up and planned by the producers, who became like the god of the show.

Cameras were hidden everywhere, from clothing, to closets, to cars, so they could capture Truman's every move. His show was live, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. The world watched mesmerized every second of the day Truman lived.

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They woke up with Truman's voice on the TV every morning, and went to sleep with his innocent face on their television screens, listening to the melodic sound of his breathing. Truman lived his life as a normal child, wanting to be an explorer when he grew up. Due to the fact the cameras were only in this studio-town, he was now allowed to travel anywhere outside of the walls that made up the day and night sky. His dream was shattered by the producers, who planned events to traumatize Truman, and make his worst fear to be water, so he could not escape the complete forged world that was the only one Truman knew.

When Truman was a young boy and had decided upon his future, the director decided that the family was to take a pleasant boat ride. Here a huge storm formatted and caused Truman's father to drown. Years later, as he was about to cross a bridge over the water, a dog with a gigantic mouthful of teeth, feverishly barked at him with the intentions of biting him. Little by little incidents like this caused Truman to become terrified of even the thought of water.

His a priori knowledge was the only thing that was not controlled by the directors. His paradigm shifts, however, were distorted with. Truman's life was a complete fallacy. Everything he was every taught was altered with so he could feel, see, reason, and talk to other people about situations and they would all agreed upon. When Truman was a teenager he saw the girl that completely stole his heart by only one look. She was one of the extras in the shows, and this love was not something the producers wanted.

While he was looking at her, another girl, who was a cheerleader, tripped and fell on top of him. He assisted her, but once he looked back at the tree where he had seen the glorious face of the other girl she had disappeared. One thing led to another and him and the cheerleader became a couple. Years later, while dancing with his girlfriend at a school dance, he saw the other girl again, and as the producers realized he had, they immediately took her away. When Truman turned to see if it was really her, she was gone.

When he was in college, he saw her again and this time he got her and talked to her by the beach where she tried to tell him the truth about his life, that nothing around him was real. Before he could understand what she was saying, a man claiming to be her father came and took her away. He never saw her again. She was the one who got Truman thinking about his life. He started thinking about the world around him. He noticed patterns in his everyday life that he had never noticed before, and once he even walked into a studio that brought his suspicions about his life even further.

It was at this point that he realized that everything around him was not what his thought, and as his paradigm shifts expanded even further about his knowledge in life, he colleted pictures in magazines of different girls who reminded him of the girl he wanted to once again see, and made a collage to resemble her face. He decided to escape town, and go find his mystery woman, and noticed that everyone around him acted peculiarly, and he couldn't escape. Finally he realized that the only way out was the way he feared most, by water. He pulled himself together, and took out a sailing boat and tried escaping.

Once the producer noticed this, he made a huge storm appear over the petite sailboat, almost bringing Truman to his death. Truman, aside from his fear stuck to his goal and kept on sailing until he came to the end of the sky, which he found to be a wall. He cried knowing that his whole life was fictitious, as the producer told him the truth, but he had reached the door that read "exit," and lead out to a world completely alien to him. Leaving the world in tears, Truman chose this door, rather than the enclosed fantasy his whole life had been, with his last words saying, "Good morning, and in case I don't see you, good evening and goodnight."

His whole life in a way, I perceive it to be a metaphor for life, and in a way the reason why some people do not believe in God or fate. If God was true, and everything was already planned out for each individual from the day they were born, much like Truman, life would not be worth living. It's like not even living at all, and not growing up and experiencing things on our own, but pushed by another being who was amused by the simple pleasure that was our life, controlling our every move.