There's Always A Motorcycle: Harold and Maude

HAROLD AND MAUDE (1971)

Run Time: 1:31:00
Producer: Paramount Pictures
Director: Hal Ashby
Writer: Colin Higgins
Key Cast: Ruth Gordon, Bud Cort, Vivian Pickles

FILM MAKERS

“I was born in Ogden, Utah, the last of four children. Mom and Dad divorced when I was five or six. Dad killed himself when I was 12. I struggled toward growing up, like others, totally confused. Married and divorced twice before I made it to 21. Hitchhiked to Los Angeles when I was 17. Had about 50 or 60 jobs up to the time I was working as a Multilith operator at good old Republic Studios.” – Hal Ashby

Ashby was always a maverick and a contrary person and success proved difficult for Ashby to handle. He became unreliable due to his dependence on drugs and a reclusive lifestyle. He began taking too much time in post production on his films and had a couple of his later projects taken away from him to be edited by others. He tried to straighten himself out, but in the 1980s, he was considered by many to be unemployable. Just when he felt he was turning a corner in his life, he developed cancer that spread to his liver and colon. He died on December 27, 1988. Because he did not have a set visual style, many mistake this for no style at all. His career is not discussed as often as the careers of some of his contemporaries. – Read more at IMDB

“The film will tell you what to do.”

UCLA film school student Colin Higgins wrote Harold and Maude as his master’s thesis. While working as producer Edward Lewis’s pool boy, Higgins showed the script to Lewis’s wife, Mildred. Mildred was so impressed that she got Edward to give it to Stanley Jaffe at Paramount. Higgins sold the script with the understanding that he would direct the film, but he was told he was not ready after tests he shot proved unsatisfactory to the studio heads. Ashby said that he would only commit to directing the film after getting Higgins’ blessing, and took Higgins on as a co-producer so he could watch and learn from him on the set. Higgins went on to direct several hits including ‘9 to 5’ and ‘Best Little Whorehouse in Texas’.

Watch: Hal (2018) – Hal Ashby directed a remarkable string of acclaimed, widely admired classics throughout the 1970s, but is often overlooked amid the crowd of luminaries from his generation. Amy Scott’s exuberant portrait explores that curious oversight. Watch the Trailer. Rent the full film on Apple TV or Youtube.

Read: Being Hal Ashby: Life of A Hollywood Rebel, by Nick Dawson (2009)