Hal Ashby and the Making of Harold and Maude

Hal Ashby and the Making of Harold and Maude PDF Author: James A. Davidson
Publisher: McFarland
ISBN: 1476623856
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 225

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Book Description
The original script was sold to a major Hollywood studio virtually overnight; the screenwriter was working as a pool boy and driver for the producer; the director was considered an "acid freak" by the studio heads; the star was a 74-year-old actress who didn't know how to drive a car. The film flopped upon release but later became one of the great cult successes of all time. This is the fascinating, never before told story of the making of Harold and Maude, shot guerrilla-style in the San Francisco Bay Area by a crew of "New Hollywood" filmmakers in the winter of 1971.

Hal Ashby and the Making of Harold and Maude

Hal Ashby and the Making of Harold and Maude PDF Author: James A. Davidson
Publisher: McFarland
ISBN: 1476623856
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 225

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Book Description
The original script was sold to a major Hollywood studio virtually overnight; the screenwriter was working as a pool boy and driver for the producer; the director was considered an "acid freak" by the studio heads; the star was a 74-year-old actress who didn't know how to drive a car. The film flopped upon release but later became one of the great cult successes of all time. This is the fascinating, never before told story of the making of Harold and Maude, shot guerrilla-style in the San Francisco Bay Area by a crew of "New Hollywood" filmmakers in the winter of 1971.

Harold and Maude

Harold and Maude PDF Author: Colin Higgins
Publisher:
ISBN: 9783150091227
Category : American fiction
Languages : da
Pages : 151

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Book Description
Den dødsfikserede unge mand Harolds største fornøjelse er at gå til begravelser. Her møder han den 80-årige Maude med samme interesse, og et både sært og tæt venskab udvikler sig

Being Hal Ashby

Being Hal Ashby PDF Author: Nick Dawson
Publisher: University Press of Kentucky
ISBN: 0813139198
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 665

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Book Description
The story of the director behind Harold and Maude, Being There, and other quirky classics: “A superb biography of this troubled, talented man.” —Tucson Citizen Hal Ashby set the standard for subsequent independent filmmakers by crafting unique, thoughtful, and challenging films that continue to influence new generations of directors. Initially finding success as an editor, Ashby won an Academy Award for editing 1967’s In the Heat of the Night, and translated his skills into a career as one of the quintessential directors of 1970s. Perhaps best remembered for the enduring cult classic Harold and Maude, Ashby quickly became known for melding quirky comedy and intense drama with performances from A-list actors such as Jack Nicholson in The Last Detail, Warren Beatty and Goldie Hawn in Shampoo, Jon Voight and Jane Fonda in Coming Home, and Peter Sellers and Shirley MacLaine in Being There. But Ashby’s personal life was difficult. After enduring his parents’ divorce, his father’s suicide, and his own failed marriage all before the age of nineteen, he became notorious for his drug abuse, which contributed to the decline of his career near the end of his life. Ashby always operated outside Hollywood’s conventions, and though his output was tragically limited, the quality of his films continues to inspire modern directors as varied and talented as Judd Apatow and Wes Anderson, both of whom acknowledge Ashby as a primary influence. In Being Hal Ashby: Life of a Hollywood Rebel, the first full-length biography of the maverick filmmaker, Nick Dawson masterfully tells the turbulent story of Ashby’s life and career.

Harold and Maude

Harold and Maude PDF Author: Colin Higgins
Publisher: Chicago Review Press
ISBN: 1613731299
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 146

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Book Description
Nineteen-year-old Harold Chasen is obsessed with death. He fakes suicides to shock his self-obsessed mother, drives a hearse, and attends funerals of complete strangers. Seventy-nine-year-old Maude Chardin, on the other hand, adores life. She liberates trees from city sidewalks and transplants them to the forest, paints smiles on the faces of church statues, and "borrows" cars to remind their owners that life is fleeting—here today, gone tomorrow! A chance meeting between the two turns into a madcap, whirlwind romance, and Harold learns that life is worth living, and how to play the banjo. Harold and Maude started as Colin Higgins's master's thesis at UCLA Film School. He was working as a pool boy when Paramount purchased the script. The 1971 film, directed by Hal Ashby, bombed. But then this quirky, dark comedy began being shown on college campuses and at midnight-movie theaters, and it gained a loyal cult following. In 1997 it was selected for inclusion on the National Film Registry at the Library of Congress. This novelization was published shortly after the film's release, but has been out of print for more than 30 years. Even fans who have seen the movie dozens of times will find this companion valuable, as it gives fresh elements to watch for and answers many of the film's unresolved questions. Colin Higgins was a screenwriter, director, and producer of films that included Harold and Maude, Silver Streak, 9 to 5, and The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas. He died in 1988.

The Films of Hal Ashby

The Films of Hal Ashby PDF Author: Christopher Beach
Publisher: Wayne State University Press
ISBN: 081433542X
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 206

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Book Description
Analyzes the films and filmmaking career of director Hal Ashby, placing his work in the cultural context of filmmaking in the 1970s. Hal Ashby directed eleven feature films over the course of his career and was an important figure in the Hollywood Renaissance of the late 1960s and 1970s. Though he was a member of the same generation of filmmakers as Martin Scorsese, Francis Ford Coppola, and Robert Altman, Ashby has received comparatively little critical or scholarly validation for his work. Author Christopher Beach argues that despite his lower profile, Ashby was an exceptionally versatile and unusually creative director. Beach focuses primarily on Ashby's first seven films—The Landlord, Harold and Maude, The Last Detail, Shampoo, Bound for Glory, Coming Home, and Being There—to analyze Ashby's contributions to filmmaking culture in the 1970s. The first two chapters of this volume provide an overview of Ashby's filmmaking career, as Beach makes the case for Ashby's status as an auteur and provides a biographical survey of Ashby's most productive and successful decade, the 1970s. In the following chapters, Beach analyzes groups of films to uncover important thematic concerns in Ashby's work, including the treatment of a young male protagonist in The Landlord and Harold and Maude, the representation of the U.S. military in The Last Detail and Coming Home, and the role of television and mass media in Shampoo and Being There. Beach also examines the crucial role of the musical score in Ashby's films, as well as the rapid decline of the director's career after Being There. The Films of Hal Ashby is based on Beach's extensive use of unpublished archival materials, as well as a number of interviews with actors, directors, producers, cinematographers, and others involved in the making of Ashby's films. This volume will interest film and television scholars, as well as readers interested in filmmakers of the 1970s.

Hal Ashby and the Making of Harold and Maude

Hal Ashby and the Making of Harold and Maude PDF Author: James A. Davidson
Publisher: McFarland
ISBN: 1476663211
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 225

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Book Description
The original script was sold to a major Hollywood studio virtually overnight; the screenwriter was working as a pool boy and driver for the producer; the director was considered an "acid freak" by the studio heads; the star was a 74-year-old actress who didn't know how to drive a car. The film flopped upon release but later became one of the great cult successes of all time. This is the fascinating, never before told story of the making of Harold and Maude, shot guerrilla-style in the San Francisco Bay Area by a crew of "New Hollywood" filmmakers in the winter of 1971.

Glorious Birds

Glorious Birds PDF Author: Heidi Greco
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781772141719
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 96

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Book Description
Literary Nonfiction. Film. Cinematic film, the art form that came into its own in the 20th Century, is not only familiar to all of us, but is likely the form that lodges most clearly in memory. Like music--and the music employed in a film--scenes come back, often carrying emotion as well as remembrance. One such film is Harold and Maude, the 1971 production that brought Bud Cort and Ruth Gordon to what are possibly their most memorable roles, and the film that locked so many Cat Stevens songs in mind. A cockeyed love story that stretches the definition of a May/December romance, it reveals the fact that love can indeed be blind to matters of age or appearance. This book takes us back half a century to when this one-of-a-kind film was released--a time with its own kind of turmoil, but a time as well of a different kind of innocence--one worth exploring again. Fifty years, traditionally a golden anniversary, is surely an appropriate time to celebrate.

100 Cult Films

100 Cult Films PDF Author: Ernest Mathijs
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
ISBN: 1838714006
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 659

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Book Description
Some films should never have been made. They are too unsettling, too dangerous, too challenging, too outrageous and even too badly made to be let loose on unsuspecting audiences. Yet these films, from the shocking Cannibal Holocaust to the apocalyptic Donnie Darko, from the destructive Tetsuo to the awfully bad The Room, from the hilarious This Is Spinal Tap to the campy Showgirls, from the asylum of Das Cabinet des Dr. Caligari to the circus of Freaks, from the gangs of The Warriors to the gangsters of In Bruges and from the flamboyant Rocky Horror Picture Show to the ultimate cool of The Big Lebowski, have all garnered passionate fan followings. Cult cinema has made tragic misfits, monsters and cyborgs, such as Edward Scissorhands or Blade Runner's replicants, heroes of our times. 100 Cult Films explains why these figures continue to inspire fans around the globe. Cult film experts Ernest Mathijs and Xavier Mendik round up the most cultish of giallo, blaxploitation, anime, sexploitation, zombie, vampire and werewolf films, exploring both the cults that live hidden inside the underground (Nekromantik, Café Flesh) and the cult side of the mainstream (Dirty Dancing, The Lord of the Rings, and even The Sound of Music). 100 Cult Films is a true trip around the world, providing a lively and illuminating guide to films from more than a dozen countries, across nine decades, representing a wide range of genres and key cult directors such as David Cronenberg, Terry Gilliam and David Lynch. Drawing on exclusive interviews with some of the world's most iconic cult creators and performers, including Dario Argento, Pupi Avati, Alex Cox, Ruggero Deodato, Jesús Franco, Lloyd Kaufman, Harry Kümel, H. G. Lewis, Christina Lindberg, Takashi Miike, Franco Nero, George A. Romero and Brian Yuzna, and featuring a foreword by cult director Joe Dante, 100 Cult Films is your ultimate ticket to the midnight movie show.

Harold and Maude

Harold and Maude PDF Author: Colin Higgins
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Feature films
Languages : en
Pages : 220

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Book Description


Easy Riders Raging Bulls

Easy Riders Raging Bulls PDF Author: Peter Biskind
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 1439126615
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 516

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Book Description
In 1969, a low-budget biker movie, Easy Rider, shocked Hollywood with its stunning success. An unabashed celebration of sex, drugs, and rock 'n' roll (onscreen and off), Easy Rider heralded a heady decade in which a rebellious wave of talented young filmmakers invigorated the movie industry. In Easy Riders, Raging Bulls, Peter Biskind takes us on the wild ride that was Hollywood in the '70s, an era that produced such modern classics as The Godfather, Chinatown, Shampoo, Nashville, Taxi Driver, and Jaws. Easy Riders, Raging Bulls vividly chronicles the exuberance and excess of the times: the startling success of Easy Rider and the equally alarming circumstances under which it was made, with drugs, booze, and violent rivalry between costars Dennis Hopper and Peter Fonda dominating the set; how a small production company named BBS became the guiding spirit of the youth rebellion in Hollywood and how, along the way, some of its executives helped smuggle Huey Newton out of the country; how director Hal Ashby was busted for drugs and thrown in jail in Toronto; why Martin Scorsese attended the Academy Awards with an FBI escort when Taxi Driver was nominated; how George Lucas, gripped by anxiety, compulsively cut off his own hair while writing Star Wars, how a modest house on Nicholas Beach occupied by actresses Margot Kidder and Jennifer Salt became the unofficial headquarters for the New Hollywood; how Billy Friedkin tried to humiliate Paramount boss Barry Diller; and how screenwriter/director Paul Schrader played Russian roulette in his hot tub. It was a time when an "anything goes" experimentation prevailed both on the screen and off. After the success of Easy Rider, young film-school graduates suddenly found themselves in demand, and directors such as Francis Coppola, Peter Bogdanovich, George Lucas, and Martin Scorsese became powerful figures. Even the new generation of film stars -- Nicholson, De Niro, Hoffman, Pacino, and Dunaway -- seemed a breed apart from the traditional Hollywood actors. Ironically, the renaissance would come to an end with Jaws and Star Wars, hugely successful films that would create a blockbuster mentality and crush innovation. Based on hundreds of interviews with the directors themselves, producers, stars, agents, writers, studio executives, spouses, and ex-spouses, this is the full, candid story of Hollywood's last golden age. Never before have so many celebrities talked so frankly about one another and about the drugs, sex, and money that made so many of them crash and burn. By turns hilarious and shocking, Easy Riders, Raging Bulls is the ultimate behind-the-scenes account of Hollywood at work and play.