Smooth Talk and The Golden Chariot

The "golden chariot" that Arnold Frined was driving in the story Where are You Going, Where Have You Been?, and the "golden chariot" that Arnold Friend was driving in the movie Smooth Talk usually would not have made me think twice about the color similiarity, but after I had thought about it and then realized that Hati had driven a golden chariot, it made more sense. The golden chariot is a sign of a bad person, or a bad character. The author can talk about the character they are describing, and subtally a person can determine if that person or character is good or evil just by these different linkes to other stories or myths. After makeing that connection I read the story of The Pied Piper of Tucson and in this story Charles Howard Schmid Jr. also known as Smitty, also drove a "golden chariot." Once I read about his car I was sure that he was the evil character in this story. The golden charoits that Arnold Friend drives, and the one that Smitty drive are different of course from the one that Hati drives, but they are similar in many ways.

The main similarity is the color, but the other similarities are about the feeling that the chariot gives off. The feeling like something dangerous and mysterous has just driven up beside you gives you shivers all up and down your back. Connie kind of gets this feeling and so do the girls that were associated with Smitty. That feeling is not just in books and movies, but when a person knows that they are doing something that they shouldn't be doing they also get that feeling. I think that this is one of the major feelings that all of these stories are trying to get across, the feeling that doing something off limits is adventerous.

Just like in this cartoon, Sam knows that serving sharks is off limits, and dangerous, but is feels so good to escape something like that so people do it time and time again.