Concealed Reality (critical essay about the Movie American Dreamz)

Media has invaded the world with its captivating grandeurs and mesmerizing proposals. It renders too much allurement that no one can resist! It gives us every information we need to the point that we already entrusted our everyday lifestyle to it. Leisure time is usually spent outdoors playing different interesting games but now, majority prefers to just stay inside their houses, seat in their comfortable couch, serve themselves with some chips, turn on the televisions and give full attention to their favorite shows.

People usually start their day reading the latest news in periodicals. In the movie “American Dreamz,” for the re-elect President Joseph Stanton (Dennis Quaid), it is tormenting to open the newspaper after four years of being uncorrupted by negative contents of broadsheets. Political and issues on terrorism confronted him causing to his nervous breakdown. In this situation exemplified, it is visibly shown how media affects our whole realities and by it being covered up makes us persons aboveboard.

American Dreamz is a fantastic movie written by Paul Weitz. In this movie, it was shown how the show is being manipulated, designed to the viewer’s appetite. Things that are exposed are only those that are interesting to people. They even change details to make it more appealing. For entertainment, it is very well appreciated but for the sense of reality, to those who are not aware, it might seem to be real but for those who know, it’s on the contrary. The crowd gets confused on what to believe in. Another strikithing is that, even their personal lives get to be edited.

Reality in its essence means resemblance to what is real. People usually get hysterical in everything they’ve seen that they can relate to their own experiences. There are so many shows produced to be shown on televisions and their primary aim is to hook advertisers. Nowadays, numerous reality shows have invaded the international small screen. Story writers try to come up with something that would interest majority of the audience. As time goes by, they were also able to adapt with advancements of society and to the variations of their viewer’s tastes. Reality shows came up successfully that meets the purpose of their contractors- to sell. Back to the meaning of “reality show,” it is something that is unscripted and the whole views should happen unpretentiously, but, does reality shows really depict reality or somewhat, it’s just kind of scripted like any other stories? In the movie, Sally (Mandy Moore) was one of the few who were chosen to be the contestants in American Dreamz, a wildly popular singing contest in which private details of the contestant’s lives were revealed. She has this ex- boyfriend William (Chris Klein) who is madly in- love with her and to get the crowd’s sympathy, she made them believe that she too loves her boyfriend. They might be able to win the viewer’s preference but then again, the truth there is, they are not the same real persons that the crowd learned to love. In the last part wherein William proposed to Sally, her mother even suggested to make it on the finals to catch more the audiences’ sympathy. They were making this for Sally to get the sure win. The sincerity of this meaningful event was degraded. Worst is that, Sally really don’t like the idea of getting married but for the sake of winning, she’s doing it.

At times, dignity of the person is being exchanged with money. Some think that being chosen to be in that program is a real great thing and so, they make themselves as the director’s little puppet and follow everything to the extent that they are changing the real person in them. Because of the prize, they forgot who they really are and pretend to be someone who is actually not them. For the big guns behind all these, in times of scouting for talents, which is one of the earliest steps, they already have their qualifications. They match people who were of different personalities that seem to add spice on the program they are on. Of course, given that it is well needed for the programs to become more interesting and appealing to the eyes. Because of the “behind the scene realities” revealed by the movie “American Dreamz,” watchers get to be a little confuse on what the real thing is, but then most of the crowd doesn’t really care at all as long as the entertainment goes on.

Different people got different perspectives and that is another reality that we have to boldly accept. Each of us lives our own lives. What is incomprehensible is that, technically we are given individual life to live but why do people keep on getting through with other’s business? That’s a real cancer of the society that is hard to escape from. With these interventions, there are times wherein we get to be more involved and be carried away with others and we forget to tackle our own struggles first. By these examples, we were able to visibly see how we allow media to get into our lives and affect the whole being of each and everyone of us. This is a clear media invasion. It has brought so much influence with us and will be bringing a lot more in the days, weeks, months and years to come. The modern world revolves around it… and so do we.