The centerpiece to the movie is a 50's sitcom of the same name, featuring a place where everything is wonderful and father knows best. It's an uncomplicated world since everyone knows what to do and how to do it. You just follow the script.

When the movie opens we're in the present day. There we meet David, the school nerd, and his twin sister Jennifer, the coolest of the cool chicks. They live in a sadly dysfunctional household with their divorced mother.

Both employ escapist techniques to remove themselves from the harshness of their lives. David is addicted to "Pleasantville," he knows every episode and every character, while Jennifer follows more physical pursuits. But an argument over the remote finds them magically zapped into teveland, where they become Bud and Mary Sue, the perfect children of "Pleasantville."

All this is rather fun. Like "The Wizard of Oz" in reverse, suddenly their world is black and white. There is no imagination, no risk-taking, no trauma, just a clinical and easy existence. And one that Jennifer and David are destined to destroy. Like a teenage femme fatale, Jennifer's lust contaminates everyone around her, and suddenly the black and white world begins to burst into color. And life gets really really complicated.

There's many smart moments in this movie, like the references to the garden of Eden, paradise lost the courtroom scene from "To Kill a Mockingbird." These playful moments are quite successful. But when the film settles back to sermonize, things are a tad less amiable. Perhaps if "Pleasantville" had rested comfortably in the land of entertainment, it would be a truly fine film. As it is, from about two thirds of the way through, when the film begins to look like a history of oppression in the United States, things go downhill.

Nonetheless for the most part I really enjoyed "Pleasantville," if only from a technical perspective. And, like "The Truman Show" it certainly raises the consciousness to the importance of media values on our lives.