Movie Review: Harold and the Purple Crayon (2024) seen in theatres

Animation comedy; Suitable for all ages

This movie follows a man named Harold, (played by Zachary Levi,) who comes to life as a human being having initially only been a hand drawn character in a story book of the same name. His friends Moose, (played by Lil Rey Howery,) and Porcupine also become trapped in the real world along with Harold, (with each character having been hand drawn as their names imply before being transported in the real world. Moose was a moose and Porcupine was a porcupine.) Harold soon finds that the purple crayon that was used to draw the pictures in his story book is magical and can make anything he draws come to life. This attracts the attention of a little boy in the real world as Harold helps him navigate his problems while trying to make it back to the story book where he lives.

The movie begins with a voiceover from an unseen narrator who tells the story of Harold who is a drawn stick figure. When Harold opens a door that he drew with the words “real world” printed on it, he gets transported into the real world and is unsure of how things work. His friend Moose soon follows him and they end up in a park where they try to find Harold’s old man, (presumably the narrator at the beginning of the film.) After mistaking an old gentleman as his old man, he ends up on the receiving end of criticism until he draws a bike which affords him the ability to travel. Soon after this, Harold and Moose are hit by an oncoming car driven by a woman with her young son in the passenger seat. After the little boy convinces his mother to allow them to stay with them, they embark on an adventure using the magic of the purple crayon which Harold is able to save the little boy from a lot of trouble by using. Throughout the film, he helps his mother find the courage to quit a job she hates by using his lack of knowledge in the real world. He also finds himself establishing a new best friend in the little boy. Will Harold be able to escape the real world and go back to being a story book character?

Seeing this movie continues the trend of movies only being viewed in the theatre since mom’s cancer diagnosis and her stay in the hospital. I know that recently, my movie blogs have been lacking even though I constantly say that I will watch my own movies. To put everything into perspective, I’ve only done three movie blogs since Canada day and that’s because I’ve literally only seen three movies since Canada day as mom had her operation a couple of days afterwards. However, things seem to be picking up in terms of mom’s health despite the fact that I’ve had bouts of depression which have affected my sleep negatively and caused me to be short with some people. I’ve had really bad dreams of mom meeting her demise, ones which I believe are real as they are happening only to wake up and breathe a sigh of relief upon realizing that it’s only a dream. Having said that, it’s been really hard for me to be in the mood to do anything fun including going to the movies, which is something I generally love doing as I realize that mom is not herself and realizing that any day could be her last. It doesn’t help matters when I see young children with their moms going places, having fun with them, ETC. This causes my anxiety to spike and if something is currently not to my liking, I will waste no time in making a case against the person who I believe is causing it. This is not limited to just human beings but animals as well as I find myself being more aggressive around birds even though I’m afraid of them. Right now no matter where I am, (at home, outside, or anywhere,) things need to go smoothly. If there’s a confrontation with anybody or anything that doesn’t have a good enough reason to get under my skin, (if I don’t think or know if anything I did wrong hence making their squabble against me legitimate,) they will hear it from me and they will not like it. As I explained to Chris tonight, public is not the place for me if people are going to be assholes and get under my skin. He knows how little patience I have when things are good but he along with the rest of this world needs to know that I’m in a very dark place right now when mom is in this condition…..as she is my voice of reason and without her I don’t care about anybody….basic rules don’t apply and pretty much, if she does end up succumbing, I may end up in jail because of what I do to someone. So people need to pray for mom but in the process, pray for me too because as I just said, SHE IS THE REASON I AM ABLE TO FUNCTION IN SOCIETY. WITHOUT HER AROUND, I DON’T BELONG ANYWHERE NEAR THE GENERAL PUBLIC.

Now you might be asking yourself how this relates to the movie since it should be a movie blog. Well, it was a really good movie. Having said that, I think it may send the wrong message to it’s targeted demographic. You see, this movie pretty much sends the message that life is easy and that finding your way out of problems is as simple as drawing pictures with a purple crayon. I’m sorry but this isn’t how life works and this is one thing I think infants or children may grow up to think they can have their way with no effort and that they can always get their way no matter what they draw, ETC. Having said that, I really did enjoy this movie.

If drawing with a purple crayon is all that’s needed for me to get what I want or need right now, then I will continuously draw pictures of mom so she can always be with me as there have been times even long before she was diagnosed with cancer that I have wished I could be with her. There’s also been as many times that I’ve wished I could live with her again as I have come to realize that I lived my best life during my time with mom. Unfortunately though, no crayon, no matter the colour can get mom out of her situation. If it was that easy, maybe I can grab a green crayon and draw myself some dollar bills and make those come to life. Wouldn’t that be nice? I’m sure a lot of people would enjoy it being that simple so they would never have to work again.

On a more mature level, one character I really enjoyed was porcupine. Despite her only being a side character for much of this film, I have to give my 34 year old adult opinion on her…..she was HOT! I loved her English accent and since I’m now on the topic, if drawing with any colour of crayon can get me out of a bad situation as this movie suggests, I should grab a crayon and draw myself a girlfriend as I’m currently single.

Stay tuned for more movie updates. I promise they are coming soon and will be more often then they are now.

This was a great movie!

Movie rating: 10 out of 10