Always Running and Freedom Writers Comparison

“Always Running” by Luis Rodriguez and the movie Freedom Writers, share a common goal. Both the novel and the movie suggest a way out for troubled and oppressed youth. In “Always Running”, Luis finds an activity that he personally likes and he actually does something with it. In the movie Freedom Writers, the students of Erin Gruwell find a way out of hard life by making them write and speak about their oppressed youth. The one and only difference between the movie and the book is that the in the movie, Gruwell has to deal with more oppression from more kids. Gruwell had to deal with more than 25 students in her class. Gangs and drugs were the most influential part of the characters in both the movie and book.
In Always Running, Luis had to deal with both gang life and drugs. Luis joined the Lomas gang at a young age and had been in many fights against other gang members. While in the gang, he had troubled times because rival gangs, like the Sangra gang, jumped Luis and beat him badly. There were times when he was involved in drive-by shootings but luckily he was not hit. While in the gang life, Luis encountered drugs. While in the gang, he used drugs to keep him “high and happy” as he believed that this was the way out of his oppressed youth. However, he found out the hard way that doing drugs was not the way out of his troubled life when he almost died because of overdosing. All of these factors influenced him enough to say that his life was now worthless and that there was no point in living anymore. At one point, he cut the veins on his forearm and came close to death. However, his turning point came in school when he learned to do something that he loved. He learned that he liked to write literature and this helped him get out of his troubled and oppressed youth.
In the movie Freedom Writers, many of the kids that were in Gruwell’s class had to live through the same life that Luis had lived in. However, their way out of troubled and oppressed youth was slightly different. Erin Gruwell used literature and historical events to bring the class together and help them realize that they were each going through similar situations. By uniting the class together, she used books such as the Diary of Anne-Frank to help them with their own writings to tell to other people. By giving the students a chance to tell their stories to other people, they felt as if others understood them and this helped them live a better life at home.