Motorcycle Diaries

              The Motorcycle Diaries follows two young men across much of their homeland of Argentina and parts of Latin America. The beauty of the story lies in the two mens attitude toward their adventure and their background, that has led them to where they are now. Guevara experiences many personal transformations throughout his long journey across Argentina, that left him as a renowned hero even to this day. Che Guevara became internationally known for his efforts in the revolution and his marxist ideas. One obvious characteristic of Guevara was his outgoing attitude towards life and his unsettled nature (Eduardo 20). Along their travels, Guevara and his friend Alberto, encounter the indigenous people of the country and see their impoverished conditions. They run into countless people that Guevara diagnoses with several medical disorders throughout these impoverished part of the countryside. This shows a clear insight into what the 23 year old Guevara saw while traversing the Latin American landscape.
              Che was undoubtedly influenced by his family and the environment he grew up in. He had a broad knowledge of the classes of people in his country and an overall complete worldview at an early age. This eagerness to learn was just magnified and became more obvious once Che and Alberto began there adventure. Filled with humorous scenes, the underlying tone of the film were much more serious. Guevara’s early life added to his world view and no doubt gave him the inspiration to take this adventure and find out as much about his homeland as possible. As a child Guevara’s parents housed ex-combatants from the Spanish Civil War who shared there stories of struggle (Eduardo). Hearing these stories of heroism and bravery may have given Che the attitude and outlook towards life that he needed to achieve his later goals and aspirations.
             Ernesto is openly saddened by the mistreatment of the impoverished people he meets along his journey. He feels a need to be very honest with the people he encounters if they have some obvious medical problem. These range from a tumor on a mans neck to the atrocious conditions that the men at the copper mine are subjected to. The real change in Ernesto’s attitude came when he arrives at the ruins of Machu Picchu in Peru. He is astonished at these incredible ruins high in the mountains of Peru, and wonders how such a civilization was replaced by the current urban decay of Lima. The most important scene comes near the end of the movie when Ernesto enters a leper colony and sees first hand the literal division of society. The lepers were kept on one side of the river while the staff lived on the other. This surely angered Ernesto to no end and had something to do with his willingness to interact with these lepers without the use of gloves. This shows his true kind nature and reaffirms that Ernesto just wanted to help people in the end.