Main Cast: Piper Laurie, Sissy Spacek, Walter Matthau, Edward Furlong, Nell Carter
Release Year: 1995
Country: US
Run Time: 107 minutes
MPAA Rating: PG
Plot
Based on the novel by Truman Capote, this often-witty coming-of-age drama looks at a young man growing up with an unusual family in the Deep South in the 1940s. After the death of his parents, Collin Fenwick (Edward Furlong) finds himself living in a small town with two of his aunts, Dolly (Piper Laurie) and Verena (Sissy Spacek). Verena is the more stable of the two, an entrepreneur who controls a number of local businesses and rules the roost with a firm hand. Dolly, on the other hand, is a gentle eccentric who claims to hear the voices of the dead as the wind whistles through the grass, and has developed a homemade concoction that supposedly cures dropsy. Dolly's potion attracts the attention of Morris Ritz (Jack Lemmon), a smooth-talking con man from Chicago who wants to snatch the formula away from her. Along the way, Collin also gets to know Catherine (Nell Carter), Verena and Dolly's quick-witted house maid; Amos (Roddy McDowall), a barber who is also the town's one-man rumor mill; Charlie Cool (Walter Matthau), a charmingly cynical retired judge with an opinion about everything; and Sister Ida (Mary Steenburgen), an accordion-toting traveling evangelist who has had a heroic brood of 13 children without benefit of marriage. The Grass Harp was directed by Charles Matthau, the son of Walter Matthau. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
Review
The Grass Harp is just about as good a film as can be made from Truman Capote's ethereal novella. That may sound like faint praise, but considering that the source material defied translation to the stage as both a straight play and a musical, it's actually a considerable achievement. Not that the film is perfect, mind you. Kirk Ellis and Stirling Silliphant's screenplay can't quite capture the wistful, delicate flavor of the novel, and the quirkiness of the characters is better suited for the printed page; onscreen, they have a tendency to get a bit cloying. This is partially the fault of director Charles Matthau, who does fall prey to turning some of the gentle emotionalism of the piece into greeting-card sentiments. However, Matthau does a fine job with his cast, an assemblage of talent that is staggering in such a small film. While one can quibble with a few of the accents, the performances themselves are excellent. Piper Laurie is sheer perfection as Dolly, creating a vividly realized portrait of a character that in other hands could come across as blandly mild. She's matched by Sissy Spacek in a startlingly change-of-pace performance that demonstrates the dominance and power that the actress often has to keep under wraps. Walter Matthau is unusually reflective, Nell Carter a sassy delight and Jack Lemmon marvelously oily in smaller parts, and Edward Furlong is near-perfect as the character through whose eyes the story is being told. Harp is not a great film, but it's a film with a great cast. ~ Craig Butler, All Movie Guide
Stan Jolley - Art Director, Chris Gorak - Art Director, Mary Jo Slater - Casting, Shay Griffin - Casting, Kirk Ellis - Co-producer, Stirling Silliphant - Co-producer, Albert Wolsky - Costume Designer, Charles Matthau - Director, Sid Levin - Editor, C. Timothy O'Meara - Editor, Patrick Williams - Composer (Music Score), Patrick Williams - Songwriter, Paul Sylbert - Production Designer, John A. Alonzo - Cinematographer, Charles Matthau - Producer, Jerry Tokofsky - Producer, John Winfield - Producer, Clark King - Sound/Sound Designer, Kirk Ellis - Screenwriter, Stirling Silliphant - Screenwriter, Gary Pilkinton - Special Effects Assistant, Truman Capote - Book Author
Set in a small 1940s Alabama town, the film follows Collin Fenwick (Edward Furlong) as he is sent to live with his father's maiden cousins, the sweet Dolly (Piper Laurie) and the overbearing Verena (Sissy Spacek), following the death of his mother. He soon discovers that the Talbo household is anything but normal. After also losing his father, Collin grows to be close to Dolly and Catherine (Nell Carter) and becomes acquainted with the eccentric townspeople, from the gossip-loving barber (Roddy McDowall) to a traveling evangelist with fifteen illegitimate kids (Mary Steenburgen). To escape Verena's oppression, Dolly, Collin, and Catherine run away to an old tree house in the woods. Their rebellion sparks a series of events that change their lives and the entire town as well.[1][2][3]
The New York Times review of the film stated that the actors' performances were "uniformly expert, sharp renderings of distinctive individuals" and that Charles Matthau had "managed to set them in a landscape specifically distant and atmospheric."[3] The Los Angeles Times review called it a beguiling film and one that "celebrates rebirth and renewal but within a tough-minded view of life that never allows it to lapse into a fairy tale."[4]Variety called it "sensitive screenplay adaptation" and that it has a "wonderful ensemble cast."[5] Despite generally good reviews, the film did poorly at the box office. With an estimated budget of $9 million, the film grossed only roughly 1.5 million in ticket sales.[6]
