Exactly how pleasant is “Pleasantville?” The answer may depend on whether you enjoyed this summer’s hit “The Truman Show” because the two movies have an awful lot in common.

Lately, the movie industry seems to enjoy poking fun at its cousin — television. Both “Pleasantville” and “The Truman Show” are spoofs based on 1950’s-style television towns, where Mom has dinner ready for the bread-winning father, and all the townspeople are chipper as they go about their daily work.

And both movies position the main characters in an unknowing struggle between the perfect television world and the looming “real world.”

However, while Jim Carrey must escape into bittersweet reality in “The Truman Show,” the people of Pleasantville have their own version of reality, as seen when the “real world” enters the perfect television world.

In fact, their new reality ends up being much more perfect than our “real world.”

“Pleasantville” is about a teenager named David (Tobey Maguire) who has a strange fascination with the black-and-white television show “Pleasantville.”

To him, the always predictable, ever-perfect lives of the Pleasantville residents, where everyone’s problems are solved with a big stack of blueberry pancakes, is preferable to the confusing world in which he lives.

On the night of a “Pleasantville” marathon, David and his twin sister Jennifer (Reese Witherspoon) break the remote control in an argument over who gets to decide what to watch.

They are then visited by a television repairman played by of all people Don Knotts (better known as Barney Gumble to “The Andy Griffith Show” fans), who gives them a new remote.

When the two accidentally press a button on the remote during another fight, they are magically zapped into the “Pleasantville” world.

The town of Pleasantville is exactly as it appears on television. To the townspeople, nothing exists outside of Pleasantville, and from the perspective of the two newcomers, very little exists within the town.

Firefighters rescue cats from trees since there are no fires in Pleasantville, the restrooms have no toilets, marriages are sexless and library books are blank.

David is living out his dreams in Pleasantville, but Jennifer feels trapped in what she considers to be Nerd Land.

To entertain herself, she introduces a little “naughtiness” into Pleasantville. She provides the captain of the basketball team, Skip (Paul Walker), with a personal demonstration about the birds and bees.

Boys will be boys, and Pleasantville teens are no exception. Skip brags to his friends about his new favorite pastime, and then many other youngsters start their own experimentation.

As each person in Pleasantville breaks free from the predictability of everyday life, they change from lackluster gray-tone to Technicolor brilliance.

The world around them also begins to piece-by-piece turn to full color with each new discovery. Even the library books start to fill up with pictures and words.

Not everyone is prepared for change. George Parker (William H. Macy) and the Pleasantville men tightly grasp onto the old, familiar Pleasantville because they are the ones who benefit from it the most.

In contrast, George’s wife Betty (Joan Allen) is one of the first to change color. She and Mr. Johnson (Jeff Daniels), the soda-fountain owner turned full-color artist, develop the first love affair in Pleasantville’s clean history.

“Pleasantville” takes a sharp spin away from kindness when the Chamber of Commerce men decide that enough is enough and protest against the “coloreds.” Although the movie’s acting performances in general are impressive, the true star of “Pleasantville” is the use of color.

The differences between the menacing black-and-white world and the hopeful Technicolor people within it are quite dramatic and add to the tensions between the conflicting groups.

Instead of coming across as preachy, which a movie like this could easily do, “Pleasantville” is more inspirational. It presents a completely optimistic view of the impact of change.

Audiences don’t know whether change is a good idea for Pleasantville, but the movie encourages them to hope for the best.

Whether the audience buys into the film’s positive outlook is an issue for a different movie, since “Pleasantville” gives no other alternative, except for naive optimism.

3 1/2 stars out of five

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Teresa Halvorsen is a senior in journalism and mass communication from Northwood.