(A Superhero Named) Tony

Maude: I should like to change into a sunflower most of all. They’re so tall and simple. What flower would you like to be?
Harold: I don’t know. One of these, maybe.
Maude: Why do you say that?
Harold: Because they’re all alike.
Maude: Oooh, but they’re not. Look. See, some are smaller, some are fatter, some grow to the left, some to the right, some even have lost some petals. All kinds of observable differences. You see, Harold, I feel that much of the world’s sorrow comes from people who are this [a single daisy] yet allow themselves be treated as that [a field of daisies].

//

I’m a sucker for hippie idealism. Sure, it’s often predictable in its execution and at times disingenuous in its intentions, but for my money there’s nothing wrong with peace, love and understanding. Also, it doesn’t hurt if you’re doing it to spite the evil elites du jour.

The New Hollywood of the 1970s professed a lot of these same values, and no filmmaker ever seemed so genuine about adhering to them as Hal Ashby. Going against he grain, maintaining the individual amidst the crowd, downright counterculture mischief — all these ideas come through so poetically in Ashby’s films, a true contrast to the “Groovy, man” youth-baiting of something like Psych Out. And his films are so painfully American, great documents of our cultural history. I wasn’t alive during those heydays, but few other films I’ve seen from that period evince that era (or what I’ve been led to believe about it) like Ashby’s.

(It’s unfortunate that the lionization of 1970s Hollywood has become predictable and disingenuous — and mostly thanks to those who were a part of it. But that’s another, less positive-vibed topic altogether, man.)

For all my lionization of Ashby, I came to see Harold and Maude very late (like, on DVD). I knew of the film and what it was about. I’d seen other Ashby films, but I would regularly raise the eyebrows of people who thought they knew me well — “What, you haven’t seen Harold and Maude?!”

Revisiting the film recently in one of Cinespia’s outdoor screenings at Hollywood Forever cemetery made me think so much more about the communal experience of moviegoing than anything else. I’ve always been an advocate of seeing a movie on the big screen, and when it comes to comedy and horror and and classics movies with cult followings, a good crowd experience can’t be beat. Yet I only thought of it in terms of movie watching and never as communal hippie kind of stuff. That’s all reserved for politics and dissent, right? Such is the downfall of my home video generation.

To understand how I came to this realization at a cemetery instead of a theater, one must understand the Cinespia experience: In a historic Hollywood cemetery, a diverse crowd gathers on an expanse of lawn (sans graves!) to watch a movie projected on the side of a mausoleum. Picnics ensue. Alcohol (and other substances) abound. Many of the films are of the crowd-pleasing, culty nature, and it is not uncommon to experience applause, communal recitation of dialogue or other interaction. The cemetery is really beside the point. People line up down the block, on foot and in cars, for this kind of thing. I’ve seen some memorable cult-friendly shows there in the last couple years, in particular Pee-wee’s Big Adventure, The Warriors, and Dawn of the Dead, but the recent Harold and Maude was by far the most crowded I’ve seen.

Although it’s a late discovery for me, I love the movie, its idiosyncratic emotions and how they represent that great hippie ideal. Yet somehow sitting under the stars I couldn’t see, surrounded by thousands of living people (and even more that were dead), really put the religious experience of moviegoing into perspective.

Harold and Maude provides all the right pieces to draw hipsters to a cemetery — cult appeal, a preoccupation with life vs. death, offbeat humor — however the overwhelming nature of the crowd dwindled for me during the scene quoted at the top of this post. My revisiting that night was one among many, to be sure. My revelations about community film watching probably differed from another’s simple enjoyment of laughing at fake suicides. A different interpretation perhaps, but it’s a similar experience. If you dig to the roots, our daisies are planted in the same garden.

The daisy scene ends with a dissolve to an aerial view of a cemetery, rows of white headstones matching the daisies as far as the eye can see. It’s on the nose like only the ’70s could be, and no doubt the cemetery imagery encouraged my feelings at the time. It also appears to be a military cemetery, which makes for a heartrending cinematic transition after Maude’s speech, and fulfills the era’s obligatory statement on the Vietnam War.

Not that Ashby ever anticipated current events, but recent war and loss do help the film transcend its cult branding. As always, oh so Ashby, and so painfully American.

Everything new is old again.

Two weeks ago, the Los Angeles Conservancy kicked off the 21st season of its invaluable Last Remaining Seats series, which brings classic films to the city’s (last remaining) movie palaces. It’s quite an experience; the theaters astonish with their beauty, their grandeur, and in some cases their disrepair. Many of the theaters do not operate regularly anymore, and only one from this year shows movies any more regularly than during the Last Remaining Seats series.

Ironically, I’m a newbie to the series. This year marks my first as an attendee, so any “revisiting” for me only comes with the films I’ve seen in the series so far — North by Northwest at the magnificent Orpheum and Roman Holiday at the Los Angeles, which still needs some restoration work.

I’ve seen or been exposed to the two films more times than I can count. North by Northwest has imagery as iconic as any other great Hitchcock film, and LRS is the first time I’ve seen it projected. Roman Holiday is just a solid classic that I’ve seen so many times I can’t even remember if I’ve seen it in a theater. I may have. Once. In college, maybe? I don’t know.

Good thing I know those films so well, too, because during each screening I found my eyes, and so my mind, wandering: to walls, to ceilings, to balconies, to architectural details nothing short of foreign to eyes dulled by stucco, brick and drywall. Revisiting is more an out of body experience at these places. Getting lost in one of Hitchcock’s best is suddenly in competition with an overwhelming feeling of context, a reminder that this is how it was meant to be, that this is what made the movies larger than life before television and blockbuster marketing, that this is how Hitchcock was meant to be watched.

So although it sounds impossible, by attending this series for the first time I’ve revisited a place I’ve never been. Sure, that’s not “revisiting” by definition, but it certainly feels like it. Last Remaining Seats lends a sense of place and legitimacy to and experience that I’ve only known through Turner Classic Movie-approved imagery and a contagious sense of wonder and propaganda I like to call “We Love the Movies.” I now possess a better understanding of the grandiose movie experience and have a tangible link to it. I guess that’s history.

Props to the Los Angeles Conservancy for making each movie more than just another night at the picture show. Special programs, old trailers and guest speakers are part of the package. The original theatrical trailer for Psycho preceded the opening night’s North by Northwest, as did an interview with Eva Marie Saint and Patricia Hitchcock conducted by Curtis Hanson. To end this interlude, Hanson said something to the effect that if you haven’t seen North by Northwest on the big screen, then you haven’t seen North by Northwest. Cliché, right?

I won’t front: I have nothing of value to say about Hitchcock that hasn’t already been said again and again and again. Likewise, that old big screen line might sound like a familiar trap, but only because it’s true.