THEY MET AT THE FUNERAL OF A PERFECT STRANGER. FROM THEN ON, THINGS GOT PERFECTLY STRANGER AND STRANGER.
Harold and Maude eventually gained a cult audience, which only proves that great movies find an audience sooner or later… but why didn’t anyone like it back in 1971? It was generally ignored on its premiere and even Roger Ebert, who awarded it one and a half stars, to my knowledge has yet to change his mind. I have no idea why critics dumped on it, but I’m guessing audiences might have been turned off by the notion of the two leads having a romantic affair. But this black comedy knows how to overcome a 60-year age difference.
Staging yet another suicide
20-year-old Harold Chasen (Bud Cort) is staging yet another suicide for his mother (Vivian Pickles). She’s used to his ghoulish pranks, however, and simply tells the “corpse” hanging from a noose to look more livelier for dinner. This has been going on for some time. Harold has no idea what to do with his life and has become more than a little obsessed with death, varying his mock suicides with attending funerals of strangers. As his mother desperately tries to find young women for Harold to date, he suddenly makes an irresistible acquaintance at a memorial service. The woman who catches his attention is 79-year-old Marjorie “Maude” Chardin (Ruth Gordon) who also happens to get a kick out of going to funerals.
The more time Harold spends with the free-wheeling Maude, he discovers that there’s more life in this woman than anyone he has ever known. It doesn’t matter what she’s up to (and sometimes her activities entail getting caught up in a car chase), Maude knows how to enjoy every second of life…
Diametrical opposites
Harold and Maude are diametrical opposites in many ways, yet perfect for each other because of a mutual understanding of, and fascination for, each other. Harold hasn’t really lived yet and he’s trapped in a spiral of negativity and inaction where all he can think about is how not to live. Maude, on the other hand, has lived a long and exciting life and there are several scenes that hint at excruciating hardships that she’s suffered (was she in a concentration camp?); she has always refused to negotiate with death and as long as she decides life is worth living, she’s going to have fun.
Some of Harold and Maude’s conversations and moments together are funny and moving, even romantic. Director Hal Ashby handles that last part quite tastefully, but the film’s sense of humor is more blunt. Harold’s “suicides” are often blood-soaked and his apathetic reactions to an older generation’s attempts to make him go “normal” (Why not date girls? Or join the army and fight in Vietnam?) mirror the late 1960s youth revolt in hilarious ways. Some of the slapstick involving Maude’s encounters with cops run the risk of becoming too silly, but it’s only borderline.
Terrific, sensitive performances by Cort (whom Ashby hired after a suggestion from Robert Altman) and veteran actress Gordon; both of them are now primarily remembered for this movie.
There were times when Harold and Maude reminded me of The Graduate (1967); both films deal with the anxiety-ridden existence of young folks who don’t know what to do with themselves once school is definitely out, and both movies also got a major boost from their song scores. In this case, Cat Stevens contributed several classics and even wrote two new songs specifically for this film (mentioned below). He would later say that his musical legacy was due in part to Ashby’s decision to put his songs in the movie. Apparently, folk rock goes hand in hand with meditations on the young and the hopeless.
Harold and Maude 1971-U.S. 90 min. Color. Produced by Colin Higgins, Charles Mulvehill. Directed by Hal Ashby. Screenplay: Colin Higgins. Songs: Cat Stevens (“Don’t Be Shy”, If You Want to Sing Out, Sing Out”). Cast: Bud Cort (Harold Chasen), Ruth Gordon (Marjorie “Maude” Chardin), Vivian Pickles (Mrs. Chasen), Cyril Cusack, Charles Tyner, Ellen Geer.
Trivia: Bob Balaban and Elton John were allegedly considered for the part of Harold. Later adapted as a Broadway play. Remade for TV in France (1978) and Serbia (2001).
Last word: “I walked into this room and Hal [Ashby] was the first person I saw. Hal made me feel so warm and welcome. He said, ‘This is Colin Higgins who wrote the script, this is Chuck Mulvehill who’s producing it,’ and I just looked at all three of them and said, ‘I’m playing this part.’ And Hal laughed and said, ‘I guess you are!'” (Cort, The Guardian)
