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April’s suspense-thriller “Disturbia,” a three-time No. 1 box office pick in America, depicts the seedier side of American suburban life. It’s hardly the first time the topic has come up in popular culture; the theme has been prevalent in movies (“American Beauty”), plays (“suBurbia”), music (My Chemical Romance’s “The Black Parade”), and TV (“Desperate Housewives”).
But “Disturbia,” starring Shia LaBeouf as a teenager on house arrest three months in a seemingly idealistic suburban neighborhood, is one of the first hugely-successful mainstream films focusing on the age group that that will experience the most severe consequences of urban sprawl: adolescents.
The film features a serial killer, a mysterious car crash and various depictions of heterosexual teenage eye candy in the form of Sarah Roemer, but all of this is far less important than the real themes of the film, that suburban life is isolating, suburban neighborhoods are not as perfect and heterogeneous as they appear, and electronic media is killing America’s youth.
During the first major portion of the film after the character is put on house arrest, he goes through a series of activities to kill time. It’s pretty much a checklist of the worst things a teenager can do to become a non-productive member of society. He plays X-Box 360 for a few hours. He then rips into several boxes of twinkies. (A commentary on my generation’s propensity toward diabetes and obesity?) Next he goes on iTunes. Then he watches high-def television. Then he’s playing his PSP. Then he listens to his iPod.
Either the producers wanted to make a few extra million dollars on product placement, or they’re trying to make a statement about suburban life. (Or both).
The character is trapped in his house because of the circumstances of the plot, but this is just a thinly disguised metaphor for typical suburban life. In suburbia, if you don’t own a car, you are pretty much trapped at home and it’s up to you to find your own means of entertainment. And even if a teenager does have a car, is there necessarily anything interesting within driving distance to do anyway?
Eventually, our main character’s sources of electronic entertainment are either taken away or threatened by other people around him who have not yet succumbed to suburban oblivion. His mother, who is a baby boomer and not a disillusioned adolescent, cancels his credit card subscriptions to X-Box 360 and iTunes. He then moves onto using TV to occupy his time, but the mom cuts the cord with a pair a scissors. His neighbor (and love interest), who just moved to the suburbs from the city and thus devoid of the negative, soul-crushing aspects of suburban life, threatens to throw his iPod of a roof at one point in the film.
The film then comments on the fact that suburban life is never as pristine and perfect as it appears to be. The main character’s businessman-and-perfect-father neighbor is having an affair with the house’s maid. The children of the cheerful housewife across the street secretly order porn through the satellite TV using their mom’s credit card. The gentle, seemingly-harmless neighbor who tries to woo over the main character’s mom is actually a serial killer with the bodies of 12 dead women buried underneath his house. The hot city girl who just moved in spends more time on the roof of her house rather than in her house because he Hollywood parents are fighting 90 percent of the time they interact.
The suburban lifestyle is socially isolating to the main character. He doesn’t go to the party that takes place down the street from him, and instead spends the time playing his PSP and listening to his iPod. He only interacts with one friend in the film. He appears to have no one else in his life.
A lot of this is largely due to the circumstances of the plot – he’s on house arrest and thus cannot travel 100 feet away from his ankle bracelet’s transmitter. But again, this is a thinly-veiled metaphor about suburban life.
Kristen, a senior elementary education major who wished to keep her name withheld, grew up in Lake in the Hills, Ill. She describes herself as a self-imposed homebody. She’s a homebody because there was absolutely nothing to do, ever, in her hometown, so she adjusted to finding electronic means of entertaining herself. This is self-imposed because she really, really rather prefers to be around people, but doesn’t know how.
Kristen’s story makes me rethink my own life and experiences with suburban sprawl. Growing up in a bedroom community similar to Kristen’s, I never really considered any other way of life. It wasn’t an option, and I rather enjoyed isolating myself with electronic media in my suburban house everyday after school. But if I knew that other lifestyle options were out there for me, and that socially isolating myself in my adolescence would put myself and Kristen in a bad place down the road, would I have gone about things the same way? How much of an impact has suburban life had on my worldview and my ability to experience the world around me, and how much would this have changed if I grew up outside of the suburbs?
“Distubia” should be essential viewing for teenagers and parents alike. Parents should watch it to know what they should not let their children do in their spare time, and teenagers should watch it to realize that dangers of living a conformist suburban lifestyle. Powered by AkoComment 2.0! |
