Friendship divining rod
Harold and Maude is one of those movies which transcends the goals of ordinary movies which seek mostly to entertain. This film actually manages to become an indicator of human compatibility. If you like the movie, you will probably get along with me and anyone else that likes it.

To enjoy this movie you have to be able to laugh at difficult subjects like death. The conversion of a classic car into a pimped out hearse has to make you giggle a little. You can not be so judgmental that a little thing like a romantic relationship between the teenaged and the elderly shuts your mind off. You have to have a generally positive outlook on life. People with this grouping of characteristics seem to like others with these same traits.

Directed by the quirky Hal Ashby, this 1971 black comedy sets the tone perfectly in the beginning when a seemingly suicidal Harold (played by Bud Cort), hangs himself to the incongruous upbeat melody of a Cat Stevens song in full view of his mother. His mother (Vivian Pickle) reacts by casually telling him that dinner is ready.

Harold fills his days by inventing ways to try and shock his mother with fake suicide, attending funerals of people he does not know and sessions with his psychiatrist. It was while attending one of these funerals that he meets Maude (played by Ruth Gordon), a senior citizen, who lives life in a completely opposite manner than Harold. He is a young man obsessed with death and she is an old woman obsessed with life.

Maude's sense of freedom from possessions often materializes in her tendency to borrow other people's automobiles. She does not seem to even try to comprehend why anyone would mind. One of the funniest sequences in the movie occurs when she goes into the city to dig up a tree that is "sick from breathing all the smog". She puts it in the back of one of the trucks that she had unwittingly stolen and is chased by the police into the forest. She figures out a way to evade the police without even trying, which seems to be how she handles everything.

Maude's embrace of life starts to rub off on Harold even as his mother doggedly attempts to set him up on dates. Each new date is scared off by Harold's flamboyant suicide scenes. While his mother searches for the right woman for Harold, he thinks he has found her in Maude.

This absurdist take on boy meets girl may just be the most original attempt at a romantic comedy, but without Cat Stevens' soundtrack this movie might have fallen on its face. Stevens weaves scenes together with just the right mixture of irony and even a couple touching ballads.

This is not a film for everyone. If suicide is a sensitive topic for you, this film would be an hour and a half of cringes and frowns. Regardless, watching it is worth the risk. Like I said, this is not just about entertainment. This movie could forever be your friendship divining rod.

Quirky little film
This came highly recommended by a friend. I can't believe I had never seen it because I've been a movie buff for 40 years. This is quite enjoyable...definitely quirky. Ruth Gordon is remarkable. The soundtrack by Cat Stevens is great too.

Quirky
Quirky story of love and living a life. Makes you think about the difference between creating a picture perfect existence to please everybody else and what it means to live life on your own terms. Makes you happy to be alive. I would call it an esoteric cult classic, except I've never met a person who didn't love this movie.

Harold and Maude
I purchased this movie at my daughters request, but found it to be funny and sad. Harold is a troubled young man, who looks even younger than his 20 years, living under a most repressive, overbearing, single(?) mother. He meets and is fascinated by Maude, a MUCH older woman that enjoys life to the fullest. The spring/winter love they find is touching and kind of weird, but understandable when you watch the whole movie. All in all, a good movie.

I haven't lived ... but I've died a few times ...

Hal Ashby's masterpiece Harold and Maude is so many people's favourite movie, that it's mind-boggling. When the film was released in 1971 it was panned by the bulk of the reviewers and was thought of as something that would be quickly forgotten as it was not easy for the Academic journalists to pigeonhole. Both, Bud Cort and Ruth Gordon won Golden Globes for best Actress and Best Actor that year even though the press had been grossly unkind. Several American theatres even played this film repetitively for two years, day after day, just because it was that good.

The screenplay for Harold and Maude was an idea that was spawned for Collin Higgin's thesis for the UCLA screenwriting MFA program and the film took off from there. The book is also available, for those interested, but be advised the book was put together after the film and reads a bit dry, and doesn't tell an expanded story as one would think it would, but rather a slightly `different story', if you will. But don't get me wrong, the book is still very entertaining and a good read.

The film is about a struggle between the value of life and a young man named Harold Chasen and the mentoring brought by his new friend Maude. Not until he meets and forms a bond with Maude does he start to understand that the world, and himself isn't on the verge of an apocalypse as he might have been led to believe by his self-indulgent and caddish mother, wonderfully imagined and portrayed by Vivian Pickles. Don't you just love that accent, and her random French phrasing?

Harold obviously was meant to be portrayed as someone suffering, as we see multiple attempts at suicide, which is a large part of his verbal and physical vocabulary. He has either an absent or dead father which is a theme that is not addressed but does make the viewer wonder how much it plays upon his psyche. The real story is the grand coupe of how Maude wins him over, getting him to really embrace and appreciate life, which is incredibly touching, making this movie one of the most unforgettable films of all time. The score, woven in beautifully by Cat Stevens, heightens the importance and greatness of the film, which continually pull at the heart-strings and the mind.

Some people, smirk and pull away if they've heard about this film, but haven't seen it. They always say: "Oh, that film. Not interested." I've met about a handful of these types and they're typically bothered by Harold and Maude's relationship. Yawwwnnnnn. Others say they're always bothered by the suicide aspect, let me tell you that the thought of suicide has got me through many a dark night, and I don't find it offensive or inappropriate in the slightest. All I can say is do yourself a favor and watch it from beginning to end, uninterrupted and just accept it for what it is. Just because an element of a film bothers you -- doesn't mean that the film is bad, it just means that the film stirred an uncomfortable emotion in you. That's all.

It would be nice to see this film get the re-master and frame-by-frame cleaning and color correction treatment. The DVD quality looks like a really good video transfer, but a video transfer nonetheless. It's presented in 5.1 Dolby surround, which is a plus, but this film really begs a commentary, extras, stills, all of that which is common on other releases.

And yes, for the record ... this is in my top three favourite all-time films. Magnificent.