Harold and the Purple Crayon – A Painful Children’s Film

At this point, most children’s films are essentially the same therefore what ultimately sets them apart is their execution of that same perceived set of similar plot threads and themes. When it comes to Harold and the Purple Crayon, an adaptation of the book series written by Crockett Johnson, its execution leaves much to be desired. The film is merely the next derivative and lazily slapped together product that will inevitably appeal to the younger audiences it is trying to court but everyone else are sure to find themselves perpetually annoyed by how little it actually tries. The result of that lack of trying is an utterly ridiculous and borderline obnoxious watch that is neither funny nor has any redeeming qualities to it whatsoever. Doing nothing that hasn’t been done countless times before, this parade of generic tropes and bad dialog tied together by an incoherent story over the course of a short 90 minute running time is a painful watch that will feel longer than that. Feeling like a paycheck movie for all of those involved, fans of the source material may find some entertainment here but otherwise, it’s just sad. Either way, its likely destiny is to disappear amongst the glut of better children’s films already out there.

Harold and the Purple Crayon, a film that travels from an animated world into the real world, it seems like it took an animated film plot with it. Living in his own little animated world from his titular book, Harold (Levi) can make anything come to life by drawing it with his magical purple crayon. Drawing his best friends, a moose named Moose (Howery) and a porcupine named Porcupine (Tanya Reynolds), the three built quite the life for themselves as they lived for adventure. As Harold grew up, he started to become more existential about his own existence. In search of his creator, Harold drew himself a way to the real world to find who he only knew as ‘old man,’ walking through the door he conjured up alongside his friends who reluctantly tagged along to keep an eye on him (becoming humans in the process). Of course, turning to the low-hanging fruit of playing each characters’ fish-out-water naivety off for laughs, while using the most generic of humor, those moments were more painful than funny. Leading to plenty of hijinks, Harold’s purple crayon created chaos more than anything else. The big theme here is the power of imagination which is kind of ironic considering the film’s lack of imagination. However, that power only comes with belief as we drawn our own paths.

Meanwhile, Harold and co.’s adventure in the real world saw them running into a single mother named Terry (Deschanel) and her young son Mel (Benjamin Bottani). Becoming a part of their lives soon after, they stumbled their way into helping them overcome the issues that had been holding them back and get them to believe again and grow as people (without growing up and finding some humanity themselves). While Terry didn’t believe her dream was no longer possible, working at a job she didn’t like, Mel has an active imagination, arguably as a means to compensate for the fact that he was alone, and was also bullied at school. They were not the same since Terry’s husband and Mel’s father passed away, however, none of that was important in the context of the story. Empowering Mel and his imagination, that is what drew him to Harold who became somewhat of a father figure as the quest to find his creator was simply their next adventure. Mel’s activities were not lost on Terry, the object of the affection of Gary (Jemaine Clement), a sleazy librarian and aspiring fantasy writer who saw the crayon as a means to bring his world to life. Finding a way to get his hands on the crayon, the power of his unlimited imagination threatened to destroy Harold and his friends, it was up to their creativity to save the day.

On the technical side, the VFX used to bring Harold’s creations to life was one the film’s few bright spots. That being said, it was fine while the generic uplifting/energetic pop soundtrack only added to its overall irritating nature. Harold and the Purple Crayon is a painful film from top to bottom, and that started with the writing, then trickled down to the performances though it’s hard to attribute which one should get the most blame. Director Carlos Saldanha, known mostly for directing animation, fails to find the right balance in translating a film a few degrees off from an animated film into live action. A film like this is definitely not interchangeable. Rather, it something built on a foundation that already exists and one that his been built over countless times over. Now, it’s falling apart and barely holding on.

In the end, Harold and the Purple Crayon is yet another derivative and lazily slapped together children’s film that will irritate audiences before fading into obscurity.

still courtesy of Columbia Pictures

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Keith Noakes

The EIC of the coincidentally-named keithlovesmovies.com. A Canadian who prefers to get out of the cold and into the warmth of a movie theatre.