The Truman Show: The Film That Invented Your Instagram Feed

How many times did you check your phone today? How many photos did you post knowing someone’s watching? Truman Burbank lived 30 years without knowing he was being filmed. We know. We do it anyway. The Truman Show (Peter Weir, 1998) wasn’t science fiction—it was a documentary from the future. Jim Carrey lives on a giant set, surrounded by actors, with 5,000 hidden cameras recording every moment. One year later, Big Brother was invented. Thirteen years later, Black Mirror. The film beat them all because it understood something we still struggle to accept: you don’t need to force anyone to live in a reality show. People do it willingly.

The Truman Show is about a man discovering his entire life is a lie. Truman Burbank (Jim Carrey) lives in Seahaven, a perfect island where everyone waves, the sun always shines, and his wife smiles every morning. But Seahaven doesn’t exist—it’s a TV set the size of a city covered by a dome. His wife is an actress. His best friend is an actor. Everything designed by Christof (Ed Harris), creator of history’s most-watched program. For 30 years, the world has watched Truman grow without him knowing. The film premiered in 1998. Big Brother was born in 1999. Today, in 2025, Instagram Stories works exactly the same: we live publicly, but now we pay for our own cameras.

There’s one scene that explains everything. Truman stands in front of his bathroom mirror. He draws with soap on the glass. Smiles at nobody. Talks to himself. What he doesn’t know: 5,000 cameras record him from every angle. One inside the mirror. Another in the drain. One more in his toothbrush handle. The entire world watches him do something as intimate as shaving. And worse: they enjoy watching. Weir doesn’t need dramatic music or dialogue. He just shows a man living his routine while millions observe. It’s uncomfortable. Pure voyeurism. But in 2025 we do exactly the same. We record our morning routine. Upload it to TikTok. Wait for likes. The difference: Truman didn’t choose. We did. And we keep doing it.

Roger Ebert wrote something brilliant about this film: “We accept almost everything in our lives without examining it closely. When was the last time you reflected on how truly strange a tree looks?” He’s right. Truman lived 30 years without questioning anything. Why does everyone talk like commercials? Why does the weather never go wrong? Why does his best friend always appear at the exact right moment? He doesn’t question it because it’s his normal. Just like us. We accept that Google listens to us. That Instagram knows what we want to buy before we do. That Alexa records our conversations. We accept it because it’s already normal. The film wasn’t exaggerating. It just arrived 27 years early.

Something I need to say bluntly. This film has been a cult classic for 27 years. Millions love it. So do I. But there’s something uncomfortable about all this: Weir built a perfect prison and made it so beautiful we forget Truman suffers. Seahaven is so clean, so colorful, so aspirational it almost justifies Christof. That’s the trap. The film criticizes voyeurism but makes you enjoy it. It tells you “this is wrong” while entertaining you with exactly that. It’s hypocritical. And brilliant. Because that’s how everything works—we criticize Instagram while posting our breakfast photo. The film doesn’t resolve the contradiction. It exposes it. And leaves us uncomfortable with ourselves.

Is it worth it? Absolutely. It’s not perfect—it’s a cult film, which means it divides opinions—but it’s necessary. For whom it IS: anyone who uses social media and never questioned why they share so much of their life. Black Mirror fans who want to see where it all came from. People who grew up with reality shows and don’t know they didn’t exist before. For whom it’s NOT: if you’re looking for clear answers or endings that resolve everything, this will frustrate you. It’s slow. Reflective. Deliberately uncomfortable. It’s a film you can’t miss if you’ve ever felt your life is a constant performance for others. Available on major streaming platforms. The question persists: did Truman really escape or just switch to a bigger set?