ragtime

             Most people have had a person or specific experience in their lives that has caused them to change or transform into someone new, someone stronger, someone better. To have such influences are important because they ultimately mold us into who we are. In E.L. Docotrow's Ragtime there are more than one characters who were influenced by certain persons or encounters that helped them grow and open their minds. The story traces the ways in which the events and people enter and affect the lives of an upstate New York family.
             Unlike Doctorow's best-selling novel Ragtime, the movie concentrates on just one of the several important stories. Instead of telling dozens of stories and how each one somehow relates to another, like in the novel, the film is mostly concerned with the story of Coalhouse Walker, Jr., a black piano player who insists that justice be done after some white volunteer firemen insulted him. The movie traces the ways in which Coalhouse Walker enters and affects the lives of an upstate New York family. A young black woman gives birth to Coalhouse's son, and then the family takes in both the woman and her son, hiring her as their maid. Coalhouse comes calling. He wants to marry the mother of his child. He has earned enough money. Everything's all set for the ceremony, when an event takes place that changes everything. The local volunteer firemen, enraged that a black man would own his own Model T, block the car's way in front of their station. They pile horse manure on the front seat. And Coalhouse cannot rest until he sees his car restored to him in its original condition. Although this alone is an interesting and rivative story, the movie loses many important aspects of the novel. There are many transformations that seem to be absent in the movie that enhanced and defined the characters of the story.
             Among these transformations that were not found in the movie was the growth of Mother. Throughout the 20th ce...

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ragtime. (1969, December 31). In MegaEssays.com. Retrieved 02:40, March 29, 2024, from https://www.megaessays.com/viewpaper/72320.html