Harold and Maude(1971)
dir. Hal Ashby
A death-obsessed kid meets a woman who steals cars.
Where to watch: Free: YouTube (with ads), Kanopy and Hoopla (library card); rent from $3.99 on Amazon, Apple TV and Fandango At Home (JustWatch US, checked 2026-10-23). Verify.Letterboxd ↗
Harold is a death-obsessed rich kid who stages fake suicides to shock his mother. At funerals he meets Maude, a free-spirited woman nearly eighty who steals cars and replants trees. Their friendship, and then something more, turns a black comedy into a love story about being alive.
Why it’s here
The film laughs at the family, the church, the army and the psychiatrist, and takes the side of a boy who wants to feel something. What's punk is Maude, who refuses every authority and has the best lines in the film. What's pedagogical is the question it asks: what does it mean to live on purpose? Pairs with LAUGH & RESIST shelf books like Brain Droppings and Revolution for the Hell of It. Note: the romance between a teenager and a woman nearly eighty is played for comedy and puzzles some viewers, and some of Harold's fake deaths are dark.
Where This Film Lives
- Setting
- United States • North America
Read Alongside
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