Pee-wee's Big Adventure

Warner Bros. Pictures | Release Date: August 9, 1985

CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION

47	METASCORE Mixed or average reviews based on 14 Critic Reviews

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Mixed:

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Critic Reviews

Critic score Publication By date

100

Stephanie Zacharek

Everything about Pee-wee's Big Adventure, from its toy-box colors to its superb, hyperanimated Danny Elfman score to the butch-waxed hairdo and wooden-puppet walk of its star and mastermind, Pee-wee Herman, is pure pleasure. Read full review

TV Guide MagazineStaff (Not Credited)

Inspired lunacy, Pee-wee's big adventure is one of the most inventive films in recent memory. This clever and wholly original work incorporates a wide variety of cinematic tools with a fresh and unique sense of style. Read full review

EmpireStaff (Not Credited)

Burton's first feature revels in the weird, the unpredictable, the infantile and the absurd. A dazzling debut. Read full review

Jay Carr

Pee- wee's Big Adventure is a shrewdly observed, deftly executed looney tune. [9 Aug 1985, p.42]

Llyod Sachs

Pee-wee's Big Adventure goes up and down the hills of Pee-wee shtick, without much concern for things like cohesiveness and consistency. What makes it wear so well is the balance achieved between Pee-wee's nitwit nervousness and his pathetic optimism. [12 Aug 1985, p.35]

Peter Stack

I'm completely unsure what else Pee-Wee's Big Adventure is about. I can tell you that 70 percent of moviegoers in their 20s and 30s will likely find this crazy production to be a barrel of fun, and frequently a barrel of laughs. A certain intelligence peeks through it all. [9 Aug 1985, p.68]

Michael Wilmington

The wrong crowd will find these antics infantile and offensive. The right one will have a howling good time. Read full review

Dave Kehr

With all these safety features built in, this 1985 film is too well padded to qualify as genuinely radical wit, but in an even-toned, TV sort of way it's mildly amusing and inventive throughout. Read full review

Liam Lacey

If Pee-Wee wasn't the most engaging physical comedian since Dick Van Dyke, it would be disastrous. As it is, the opening works well enough to have viewers completely hooked by the time he sets out on the road, like Huck Finn, with his clothes wrapped up in a handerchief on a stick. [10 Aug 1985, p.E9]

Staff (Not Credited)

Children should love the film and adults will be dismayed by the light brushstrokes with which Paul Reubens (one of three credited screenwriters, but star-billed under his stage name, Pee-wee Herman) suggests touches of Buster Keaton and Eddie Cantor. Read full review

Vincent Canby

Pee-Wee's Big Adventure is the most barren comedy I've seen in years, maybe ever. Read full review

Julie Salamon

The movie has the cartoonish realism of a Muppet movie. However, Mr. Herman is no Kermit the Frog, although he made me feel like Oscar the Grouch. [13 Aug 1985, p.1]

Staff (Not Credited)

This movie could induce terminal boredom in adults and rot the minds of the young. [26 August 1985, p.64]

Gene Siskel

Nothing, absolutely nothing, at either location is the slightest bit funny. [13 Sep 1985, p.C]