Product Details

• Actors: James Cagney, Elizabeth McGovern, Howard E. Rollins Jr., Brad Dourif, Moses Gunn
• Directors: Milos Forman
• Writers: E.L. Doctorow, Heinrich von Kleist, Michael Weller
• Producers: Bernard Williams, Dino De Laurentiis, Fred Sidewater, Michael Hausman
• Format: Color, HiFi Sound, NTSC
• Rated: PG (Parental Guidance Suggested)
• Number of tapes: 2
• Studio: Paramount
• VHS Release Date: January 13, 1998
• Run Time: 155 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (58 customer reviews)
• ASIN: 6300214257
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #78,022 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com

Fact and fiction intertwine in Milos Forman's colorful kaleidoscope of E.L. Doctorow's sprawling novel of turn-of-the-century America. Anchored in the true story of the murder of architect Stanford White (Norman Mailer) by Harry Thaw (Robert Joy) over the affections of his wife Evelyn Nesbit (Elizabeth McGovern), Forman weaves a portrait of early 1900s America in a tapestry of intertwining fictional tales. The primary thread involves the proud black pianist Coalhouse Walker Jr. (Howard Rollins) and his demand for justice when a racist fireman destroys his automobile, which escalates into a reign of terror by Walker and a band of revolutionaries. A secondary story involves an ambitious immigrant artist (Mandy Patinkin) whose primitive flipbooks send him on the road to creating early cinema. Centering all of these stories in one way or another is an upper-class family known simply as Father (James Olson), Mother (Mary Steenburgen), and Younger Brother (Brad Dourif). James Cagney came out of a twenty-year retirement to play the irascible Irish police commissioner, a character created for the film. Forman's biggest departure from Doctorow's novel, however, is his focus on Walker's story, cutting away the other threads to little more than asides in the final half of the picture, the primary dramatic weakness of an otherwise rich evocation of America's past. Randy Newman's lyrical score and Miroslav Ondricek's understated cinematography earned two of the film's eight Academy Awards nominations --Sean Axmaker

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

51 of 51 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Paramount, issue a legitimate DVD release, March 20, 2007

By 

Michael B. Marshall "mikeymars" - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Ragtime (DVD)

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 holder, I won't purchase censored goods.

132 of 141 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Elizabeth's McGovern's scenes deleted., December 7, 2004

By 

Kaiser Soze - See all my reviews

This review is from: Ragtime (DVD)

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 been cut out of this DVD. In this case, "deleted scenes" should be taken to mean, "scenes that you probably remember from the theatrical release have been cut from this version."

Anyone who objects to this sort of foolishness in principal should boycott this DVD. This isn't the first time that I have encountered this. It seems to me that the studios should feel some sort of sense of obligation to not do this, whether artistic or ethical.

35 of 38 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Superb Historical Detail, May 18, 2001

By A Customer

This review is from: Ragtime [VHS] (VHS Tape)

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 that my favorite aspect of the film would have to be the soundtrack. As a fan of orchestrated ragtime and palm court music I was relieved to hear music true to the era, rather than music true to OUR era. It should be pointed out, however, that while not imposing, music is heard during most of the film (A plus for some, a minus for others).

Historical accuracy, beautiful costumes, hundreds of old cars, historical buildings, exciting music, drama, as well as clever comedy supplied by a delightfully dim Evelyn Nesbit, combine to form a film that can only be classified as; An exciting, historically accurate, prestine, and superb film about everything turn-of-the-century.< ...I recently discovered that there IS a DVD version of Ragtime. Sadly, at least for now, it is only available in Europe, in the European DVD format...