Truman and the Corporate Father

Abstract

On the occasion of the 25th anniversary of The Truman Show, the purpose of this text is to revisit Peter Weir’s film (1998) in light of two main sources: Open Sea (A Bankrupt Horizon) by Juan Jorge Michel Fariña, an article published a year after the film’s premiere (1999), and Parents in Cinema: Films in Dialogue (2022), the latest book by Eduardo Laso. Drawing from the first source, this analysis aims to delve into the comparison of Truman’s paternal figures (Christof, the corporate father, and the fake father assigned to him by the reality show) with the fathers of appropriated babies during the Argentine military junta’s dictatorship from 1976 to 1983, recognizing the bonds based on the falsification of identity in both contexts. The concept of a corporate-scale superego is introduced, employing tools from group psychology and a typology of parents, the latter supported by the aforementioned second source. Rethinking The Truman Show entails the challenge of updating it and drawing conclusions about the nature of the relationships formed between information senders and receivers within the current communication landscape. After all, a classic is a film that remains relevant despite the passage of time.