Ragtime

Paramount, issue a legitimate DVD release
I can't overemphasize the level of disappointment I have at the hack censorship Paramount management has engaged in with the DVD release of Ragtime. How they got Milos Forman to participate in adding commentary to that blatant smear of his efforts is is beyond me.

Does the studio actually think that diluting the film to "reposition" it (ergo, move it from an R to a PG rating) is going to dramatically grow its appeal? The core market for this DVD is the universe of film fans old enough to fondly remember seeing the original theatrical release in the early 1980s -- but what the studio is offering them (as many reviews here clearly state) is unacceptable.

I want to see Elizabeth McGovern's entire performance, Paramount - so I went to the secondary wholesale market and purchased a new old stock VHS copy, which contains the FULL original release.

Or put another way, one less DVD sale for you.

Because yes, while it's your right as the copyright...

Elizabeth's McGovern's scenes deleted.
No question that Ragtime is a good movie, but there's also no question that for a significant number of people, Elizabeth McGovern is a major reason for buying this DVD. If so, and if the visual appeal is an essential part of that, then you should know that what is on this DVD is not what was in the theatrical release. I haveven't seen the VHS version, so I don't know if it was similarly butchered, but I really don't understand the point of this sort of stuff, and I find it irritating. I can understand adding scenes to a "director's cut" in a non-theatrical release, but under no circumstances does it make sense to me that scenes that were present in the theatrical release should be deleted in the non-theatrical releases. To make matters worse, the back of the box says "deleted scenes". There is a deleted scene that was not in the theatrical release, but it isn't worth watching, and it certainly doesn't make up the scenes that were present in the theatrical release and that have...

Superb Historical Detail
If there were ever a movie that could be dubbed flawless, I think Ragtime is it. Milos Forman must have travelled back in time, bought ever little piece of the past, and carried it back with him to 1981. Everything is superb, from the costumes to the motor cars, from the buildings to the boardwalk, from New Rochelle to the Lower East Side.

I think one thing that may have been lost to some viewers, however, are the true historical characters and news events portrayed in Ragtime. Evelyn Nesbit (Elizabeth McGovern) for example, was a real person and most events in the film concerning her really happened in 1906, including the incident on the roof top cafe of the Madison Square Garden. Even the song played when the 'incident' occurred, I Could Love a Million Girls from the operetta Mamzelle Champange, is historically accurate. This, of course, is only an example of the host of real characters presented in the film, including Teddy Roosevelt and Booker T. Washington.

I'd have to say...

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