Harold and Maude
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Harold and Maude is a movie directed by Hal Ashby in 1971. The film features both dark and light humor, social satire (including anti-war), promotes the notion of living life to its fullest, and has long had a cult following. The film is number 45 on the American Film Institute's list of 100 Funniest Movies [link] and number 42 on Bravo's 100 Funniest Movies. In 1997, it was selected for preservation in the National Film Registry of the Library of Congress.
The film was a commercial failure when it was released and the critical reception was divided.
The screenplay upon which the film was based was written by Colin Higgins, and published as a novel[link] in 1971. The movie was shot in the San Francisco Bay Area.
The movie has given two new words "harolding" (to hang around cemeteries) described by Douglas Coupland in "Harolding in West Vancouver" (1996) and "maudism" or "maudianism", the philosophy of living each day to the fullest.[link].
Summary
The film first introduces us to Harold, an alienated 20 year-old young man from a wealthy family who lives in a large mansion with his domineering mother. Harold stages realistic mock-suicides. This has evidently been going on for so long that his mother takes no notice, other than when Harold causes a particular mess with his fake blood. For amusement, Harold attends funerals of people he doesn't know. At these he repeatedly sees Maude, a 79 year-old woman who befriends him. Maude is very much his opposite: a senior citizen, energetic, impulsive, and light-hearted. The two form an unlikely friendship, then romance.But on her birthday, Maude follows through with her plan to die at age 80 by taking pills. After much heart-ache, Harold decides to destroy the last piece of his former morose self by driving his custom Jaguar hearse off of a cliff. As the camera pans up, the audience sees a new, happier Harold walking towards the horizon playing his banjo.
Themes
Hal Ashby, the director of the film, was part of the San Francisco youth culture, and his film posits the doomed youth of the alienated against the vital age of the Holocaust survivors. (At one point, Harold and the audience glimpse a concentration camp ID number tattooed on Maude's arm.) While Harold is part of a society where he can have no importance and no meaning, Maude has survived against totalitarianism. Against the backdrop of the Vietnam War, Harold can only feel significant by dying. Maude, on the other hand, is a fabulist and a dreamer. She sees beauty where others see none, believes in the innate goodness of people (but not the State), and practices what she calls her own individual revolution. Her backstory is only hinted at in the film. She tells Harold at one point about Alfred Dreyfus seeing fantastic birds on Devil's Island and finding out later that they were only seagulls. She says that to her they would always be glorious birds.Cast
- Marjorie Chardin (Maude): Ruth Gordon
- Harold Chasen: Bud Cort
- Mrs. Chasen: Vivian Pickles
- Glaucus: Cyril Cusack
- Uncle Victor: Charles Tyner
- Sunshine Doré: Ellen Geer
- Priest: Eric Christmas
- Psychiatrist: G. Wood
- Candy Gulf: Judy Engles
- Edith Phern: Shari Summers
- Motorcycle Officer: Tom Skerritt (as M. Borman)
Crew
- Cinematography by: John Alonzo
Music
The soundtrack is by Cat Stevens, and includes two songs, "Don't Be Shy" and "If You Want To Sing Out, Sing Out", which he composed specifically for the movie and which were unavailable for several decades on vinyl or cassette (they were later released on the compact disc Footsteps in the Dark). There is no official soundtrack for Harold and Maude.Track listing
These songs are in the order with which they appear in the movie.
- "Don't Be Shy"
- "On The Road To Find Out"
- "I Wish, I Wish"
- "Miles From Nowhere"
- "Tea For The Tillerman"
- "I Think I See The Light"
- "Where Do The Children Play?"
- "If You Want To Sing Out, Sing Out"
- "Trouble"
Trivia
- Harold buys his Hearse from San Carlos Auto Wreckers.
- Maude steals the Mustang in front of the San Mateo County Courthouse.
- The expansive cemetery is the Golden Gate National Cemetery in San Bruno, California.
- Motorcycle police officer pulls Maude over on the Old Dumbarton Bridge causeway.
- The film My First Mister, directed by Christine Lahti, is a sort of reverse remake, with Albert Brooks and Leelee Sobieski standing in for Gordon and Cort.
- A French adaptation for television translated and written by Jean-Claude Carrière appeared in 1978. It was adapted for the stage and performed in Québec, starring Roy Dupuis.
See also
External links
- French tv adaptation written by Jean-Claude Carrière and dir. by Jean-Paul Carrère
- [Harold and Maude, the unofficial homepage] by Mike Sullivan
- [Kierkegaard's Narrative]: Harold and Maude
- [Guide to shoot locations]
- [Real Life Harold & Maude, San Francisco Chronicle, 1/10/06]
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