Rarely have I been this conflicted about a movie.
Harold is a rich young man who kills himself regularly and enjoys attending funerals, and Maude is a free-spirited, crazy 79 year-old. They begin a relationship.
There is lots to love, and almost as much to hate. On the positive, it's consistently funny, and despite being a black comedy, is relentlessly cheerful, which works to its benefit. There also some individually fantastic scenes. The opening is terrific, and the date with the actress is pure brilliance, capped off with a great punchline and memorable final shot.
The movie is genuinely quirky, without forcing it. I especially liked that several of Harold's suicides are very real. And while overrated, the Cat Stevens soundtrack gives the appropriate mood to many scenes.
Ruth Gordon gives a great performance as Maude, portraying an inspiring zest for life and Bud Cort is suitably weird and creepy as Harold.
But
Gordon's acting aside, the character of Maude is fundamentally shitty, and not one to look up to; she is a hyper-selfish sociopath. She victimizes and traumatizes innocent people throughout the film, caring only about herself. Portraying her as a paragon of independent living and a model to aspire to makes the film's message either retarded or rotten.
It may seem like a small point, but I was really annoyed by uncle Victor, who is portrayed as a dumbass, racist, conservative warmonger, complete with Richard Nixon portrait on his wall, being mentioned as "MacArthur's righthand man". General MacArthur, regardless of whether one agrees with all his policies,
was a brilliant, well-spoken, highly intelligent man. Moreover, he was among the most progressive and forward-thinking generals of his time.
In particular, MacArthur was always deeply respectful of other cultures and militaries. (In fact, to a greater degree than Truman the rest of the Democratic leadership at the time) He would have been disgusted by Uncle Victor's racist rant.
It's a lazy, ill-informed joke which is a microcosm of the movie's juvenile, stupid attitude towards its characters and themes. Rich people are pretentious assholes. "Conservatives" are evil, idiot devils. Hippies that steal people's cars and callously run people and cars off the road (vehicular manslaughter! Awesome!) are awesome.
The ending is particularly empty and lame, especially when contrasted with the great opening. I felt like I had just watched an entertaining, but utterly pointless, idiotic little film.
