ABSTRACT
Contemporary trickster ®lm shows the individual as unfree, as trapped within existential boundaries. The ubiquitous `system' in the life of trickster protagonists takes a number of forms: the state, the workplace, consumer culture, family demands. Ranging from `silly movies' (Ace Ventura, Dumb and Dumber, Beetlejuice or Drop Dead Fred ) to existentialist masterpieces which raise the problem of the individual's control over his or her life ± for instance, The Truman Show (1998) or Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004), trickster ®lms raise the problems of human agency and creative spontaneity in contemporary world. Whereas many of the boring protagonist's problems are of personal character ± oppressive parents and failed relationships ± these issues are inscribed into the constrictive and overregulated framework of urban culture. His individuation takes place in the atmosphere of metropolitan disconnectedness, in the world of corporate hierarchies and all-pervasive consumerism.
