''Harry and Tonto'' is a 1974 road movie written by

Paul Mazursky Irwin Lawrence "Paul" Mazursky (April 25, 1930 – June 30, 2014) was an American film director, screenwriter, and actor. Known for his dramatic comedies that often dealt with modern social issues, he was nominated for five Academy Awards: three ...

and Josh Greenfeld and directed by Mazursky. It features

Art Carney Arthur William Matthew Carney (November 4, 1918 – November 9, 2003) was an American actor and comedian. A recipient of an Academy Award, a Golden Globe Award, and six Primetime Emmy Awards, he was best known for his role as Ed Norton on the si ...

as Harry in an Oscar-winning performance. Tonto is his pet cat.

Plot

Harry Coombes (

) is an elderly widower and retired teacher who is evicted from his

Upper West Side The Upper West Side (UWS) is a neighborhood in the borough of Manhattan in New York City. It is bounded by Central Park on the east, the Hudson River on the west, West 59th Street to the south, and West 110th Street to the north. The Upper West ...

apartment in

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

because his building is going to be razed to build a parking lot. He initially stays with his eldest son Burt's family in the suburbs, but eventually chooses to travel cross-country with his pet cat Tonto. Initially planning to fly to

Chicago (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = List of sovereign states, Count ...

, Harry has a problem with airport security checking his cat carrier. He instead boards a long-distance bus. He gets off in the countryside, annoying the driver, so Tonto can urinate, and is left there. He buys a 1955 Chevrolet Bel Air from a used car salesman, although his driver's license is expired. During his episodic journey, he befriends a Bible-quoting hitchhiker ( Michael Butler) and underage runaway Ginger ( Melanie Mayron), with whom he visits an old sweetheart (

Geraldine Fitzgerald Geraldine Mary Fitzgerald (November 24, 1913 – July 17, 2005) was an Irish actress and a member of the American Theater Hall of Fame. In 2020, she was listed at number 30 on ''The Irish Times'' list of Ireland's greatest film actors. Early li ...

) in a retirement home; she only half-remembers him. He visits his daughter (

Ellen Burstyn Ellen Burstyn (born Edna Rae Gillooly; December 7, 1932) is an American actress. Known for her portrayals of complicated women in dramas, she is the recipient of numerous accolades, including an Academy Award, a Tony Award, and two Primetime Em ...

), a bookstore owner in Chicago, with whom he shares a prickly but mutually admiring relationship. Harry's shy grandson (who was supposed to take him back to New York) and Ginger end up going off to a commune in Colorado together in Harry's car, with his blessing, so he and Tonto are on their own again. Continuing west, Harry accepts a ride with a health-food salesman (

Arthur Hunnicutt Arthur Lee Hunnicutt (February 17, 1910 – September 26, 1979) was an American actor known for his portrayal of wise, grizzled, and old rural characters. He received an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actor for his performance in ...

), makes the acquaintance of an attractive hooker (

Barbara Rhoades Barbara Rhoades (born March 23, 1946) is an American actress, known primarily for her comedy and mystery roles, especially as lady bandit Penelope "Bad Penny" Cushings in ''The Shakiest Gun in the West'' (1968). She had a recurring role on ''Soap ...

) on his way to

Las Vegas Las Vegas (; Spanish for "The Meadows"), often known simply as Vegas, is the 25th-most populous city in the United States, the most populous city in the state of Nevada, and the county seat of Clark County. The city anchors the Las Veg ...

, and spends a night in jail with a friendly Native American (

Chief Dan George Chief Dan George (born Geswanouth Slahoot; July 24, 1899 – September 23, 1981) was a chief of the Tsleil-Waututh Nation, a Coast Salish band whose Indian reserve is located on Burrard Inlet in the southeast area of the District of N ...

). He eventually arrives in

Los Angeles Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the world ...

, where he stays with his youngest son Eddie (

Larry Hagman Larry Martin Hagman (September 21, 1931 – November 23, 2012) was an American film and television actor, director, and producer, best known for playing ruthless oil baron J. R. Ewing in the 1978–1991 primetime television soap opera, ''Dal ...

), a financially strapped real-estate salesman, before finding a place of his own with Tonto. After Tonto dies, Harry is living alone, making new friends, enjoying the climate. He sees a young cat who looks exactly like Tonto, and follows it to the beach, where a child is building a sand castle.

Cast

Also appearing toward the end of the film as Celia is Sally Marr, mother of

Lenny Bruce Leonard Alfred Schneider (October 13, 1925 – August 3, 1966), known professionally as Lenny Bruce, was an American stand-up comedian, social critic, and satirist. He was renowned for his open, free-wheeling, and critical style of comedy which ...

Production

Mazursky had

James Cagney James Francis Cagney Jr. (; July 17, 1899March 30, 1986) was an American actor, dancer and film director. On stage and in film, Cagney was known for his consistently energetic performances, distinctive vocal style, and deadpan comic timing. He ...

in mind for the role of Harry, but the actor turned the part down, as did

Laurence Olivier Laurence Kerr Olivier, Baron Olivier (; 22 May 1907 – 11 July 1989) was an English actor and director who, along with his contemporaries Ralph Richardson and John Gielgud, was one of a trio of male actors who dominated the British stage ...

and

Cary Grant Cary Grant (born Archibald Alec Leach; January 18, 1904November 29, 1986) was an English-American actor. He was known for his Mid-Atlantic accent, debonair demeanor, light-hearted approach to acting, and sense of comic timing. He was one of ...

. Mazursky then saw Art Carney in a play and approached him. Carney initially declined as well, in part because he was about fifteen years younger than Harry, but he eventually agreed. Cast as an elderly man, Carney, born in 1918, was actually only 13 years older than the actors who played his sons,

and Phil Bruns, and 14 years older than

, who played his daughter. Thanks to the makeup of Emmy winning artist Bob O'Bradovich, Carney was effectively transformed into the elderly Harry. At the time, Carney noted that prior to his work in ''Harry and Tonto'', he "never liked cats" but said he wound up getting along well with the cat in the film.

Reception

Nora Sayre Nora Clemens Sayre (September 20, 1932 – August 8, 2001) was an American film critic and essayist. She was a reviewer of films for ''The New York Times'' in the 1970s, and, from 1981, a writing teacher for many years at Columbia University ...

of ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

'' wrote that the film had been "directed at far too slow a pace, which means that the comic possibilities and the social comment have been diminished. The muted style robs the picture of the point it's meant to make: that imaginative energy transcends the generations." ''

Variety Variety may refer to: Arts and entertainment Entertainment formats * Variety (radio) * Variety show, in theater and television Films * ''Variety'' (1925 film), a German silent film directed by Ewald Andre Dupont * ''Variety'' (1935 film), ...

'' called it "pleasant, if commercially unexciting," with an "excellent" performance by Carney.

Roger Ebert Roger Joseph Ebert (; June 18, 1942 – April 4, 2013) was an American film critic, film historian, journalist, screenwriter, and author. He was a film critic for the ''Chicago Sun-Times'' from 1967 until his death in 2013. In 1975, Ebert beca ...

gave the film 4 stars out of 4, praising Carney for a performance that was "totally original, all his own, and worthy of the Academy Award it received."

Gene Siskel Eugene Kal Siskel (January 26, 1946 – February 20, 1999) was an American film critic and journalist for the '' Chicago Tribune''. Along with colleague Roger Ebert, he hosted a series of movie review programs on television from 1975 until his ...

of the ''

Chicago Tribune The ''Chicago Tribune'' is a daily newspaper based in Chicago, Illinois, United States, owned by Tribune Publishing. Founded in 1847, and formerly self-styled as the "World's Greatest Newspaper" (a slogan for which WGN radio and television ar ...

'' awarded 3.5 out of 4 stars, calling it "an extremely funny movie without a single gag or a Bob Hope punch line. Rather, it's crammed full of believable people who say the kind of screwball things that make your head spin and smile."

Charles Champlin Charles Davenport Champlin (March 23, 1926 – November 16, 2014) was an American film critic and writer. Life and career Champlin was born in Hammondsport, New York. He attended high school in Camden, New York, working as a columnist for the ...

of the ''

Los Angeles Times The ''Los Angeles Times'' (abbreviated as ''LA Times'') is a daily newspaper that started publishing in Los Angeles in 1881. Based in the LA-adjacent suburb of El Segundo since 2018, it is the sixth-largest newspaper by circulation in the ...

'' described the film as "eventful, sentimental, enjoyable and firmly optimistic." Gary Arnold of ''

The Washington Post ''The Washington Post'' (also known as the ''Post'' and, informally, ''WaPo'') is an American daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C. It is the most widely circulated newspaper within the Washington metropolitan area and has a large n ...

'' called it "an unusually mellow and affectionate film comedy, but it might be wise to recommend it with a slight note of caution. It's what's known as a 'good little picture.'" In '' The Monthly Film Bulletin'', Jonathan Rosenbaum wrote that the film "presumes to say something smart and 'sophisticated' about everything from urban renewal to Carlos Castaneda's medicinal lore, along with a continuous lesson about growing old gracefully that is dished out at every opportunity; yet it winds up telling us virtually nothing at all." The film holds a score of 88% on

Rotten Tomatoes Rotten Tomatoes is an American review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee, and Stephen Wan ...

based on 32 reviews, with an average grade of 7.3 out of 10.

Awards and nominations

References

External links

* * * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Harry And Tonto 1970s road comedy-drama films 1974 comedy-drama films 1974 films 20th Century Fox films American road comedy-drama films 1970s English-language films Fictional duos Films about cats Films about old age Films directed by Paul Mazursky Films featuring a Best Actor Academy Award-winning performance Films featuring a Best Musical or Comedy Actor Golden Globe winning performance Films scored by Bill Conti Films shot in California Films shot in Illinois Films shot in New York City Films shot in New York (state) Films shot in the Las Vegas Valley 1970s American films