Harold and the Purple Crayon
Columbia Pictures | Release Date: August 2, 2024 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
34
METASCORE
Generally unfavorable reviews based on 23 Critic Reviews
Positive:
1
Mixed:
13
Negative:
9
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
80
The TelegraphRobbie CollinJul 31, 2024
This bright children’s adventure, loosely adapted from a picture book about a young boy whose drawings become real, feels like the sort of thing Jim Carrey might have made in his first flush of success. It’s silly, relentlessly amiable, and embraces the low-stakes playfulness of its conceit. Read full review
60
Total FilmMatt MaytumJul 31, 2024
It’s not the sort of family film you’ll wax lyrical about, but there’s enough colorful, chaotic, kid-friendly fun to amply entertain. Read full review
60
ColliderJeff EwingJul 31, 2024
It is a somewhat decent movie hampered by so many preventable oversights and missteps. Read full review
50
ReelViewsJames BerardinelliAug 5, 2024
Perhaps in the hands of a visionary genius in touch with their inner child, it might have been possible to achieve something better than an overlong throwaway distraction for a preschooler. In the hands of these filmmakers, however, it feels like a soulless cash-grab – an attempt to tap into the family-friendly frenzy that has emerged this summer. Read full review
50
The Associated PressKaitlyn HuamaniJul 31, 2024
Even if the book’s story has been told and the movie’s format has been done before, a movie that reminds us to be imaginative — and that delivers some imaginative visuals to boot — can’t really get old. Read full review
50
The Hollywood ReporterFrank ScheckJul 31, 2024
It’s hard not to wish that in the future, Harold will stick to the cartoon world where he belongs. Read full review
48
TheWrapWilliam BibbianiJul 31, 2024
It’s a mostly harmless time-waster of a motion picture; functionally a movie but without too much of that pesky depth or entertainment getting in the way. Read full review
46
Paste MagazineRory DohertyJul 31, 2024
The true fatal flaw of Harold and the Purple Crayon is that everything—from the story to the visual design—feels like it came pre-packaged in a microwave dinner. Read full review
42
IndieWireDavid EhrlichJul 31, 2024
It’s dull and low-energy stuff to begin with, but that a story premised on the infinite potential of a child’s imagination should end by cribbing from the most creatively bankrupt stuff of modern cinema is a perfect microcosm of how far Harold and the Purple Crayon misses the mark. Saldanha and his writers had the entire world at their disposal, and they ended up drawing a total blank. Read full review
40
Los Angeles TimesKatie WalshAug 5, 2024
The premise still feels too thin and juvenile to grab audiences of any age. So what algorithm decided this movie would be a lucrative endeavor? Read full review
40
The Observer (UK)Ellen E JonesAug 4, 2024
Since Levi is the single-use plastic of screen performers – flat, shiny, desperately unfashionable – it’s left to Jemaine Clement to provide the story’s charismatic core as Gary, the villainous failed fantasy novelist with a thing for Mel’s mum. Read full review
40
EmpireHelen O'HaraJul 31, 2024
It’s well-intentioned and manages some nicely judged messaging by the end, but Harold’s mugging and his animal companions’ antics aren’t nearly as cute as the film thinks they are. Read full review
40
The Irish TimesDonald ClarkeJul 31, 2024
With little of Crockett’s original charm remaining, the audience is left with a generic entertainment struggling to find a reason to exist beyond the need for more “content”. As soon seen as forgotten. Read full review
40
VarietyOwen GleibermanJul 31, 2024
The film ends with an overly spelled-out plea for the value of “imagination,” but about the only thing the filmmakers are drawing with their purple crayon is algorithms. Read full review
30
We Got This CoveredCharlotte SimmonsAug 5, 2024
Immaturely crafted and an insult to children's media, 'Harold and the Purple Crayon' should have gone back to the drawing board, and perhaps stayed there. Read full review
30
Wall Street JournalKyle SmithAug 1, 2024
The charming, gentle simplicity of the book, with its childlike art, has been displaced by a mania for digital images and frantic attempts to be funny. This crayon should have been left in its box. Read full review
30
The New York TimesGlenn KennyAug 1, 2024
The movie plods around awkwardly, trying to leech whatever charm it can from the remaining elements of the original. Read full review
30
IGNAllegra FrankJul 31, 2024
“Random” aptly summarizes Harold and the Purple Crayon, with its patchy subplots, distracting amount of dialogue added after filming was wrapped, and geographic cluelessness. Read full review
25
Movie NationRoger MooreAug 1, 2024
The diplomatic thing to do would be to say the new film of Harold and the Purple Crayon is misguided, dull and mostly humorless and leave it at that. Read full review
20
LooperAudrey FoxAug 5, 2024
It's almost impressive that a movie all about the power of imagination could be so creatively bankrupt and incurious about the world, but this misguided kids' film manages to be all that and so much more (or less, depending on your perspective). Read full review
20
New York Magazine (Vulture)Jen ChaneyAug 2, 2024
Harold and the Purple Crayon makes the classic Hollywood mistake of taking a story that was lovely because of its concision and simplicity and turns it into a movie that is overly long and complicated for no good reason. Read full review
20
The GuardianJesse HassengerAug 1, 2024
Harold and the Purple Crayon is not funny, not insightful about children, and it costs much more time and money to see than simply reading the books that it tries to turn into a meta-text. It makes imagination seem like a garish endurance test. Read full review
12
RogerEbert.comPeter SobczynskiAug 2, 2024
Here is a film that pays lip service to the importance of creativity without ever displaying a demonstrable shred of it during its seemingly interminable run time. Read full review
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