Harold and the Purple Crayon - Blu-ray Review

Movie
Oh my my my. I knew for a fact when I watched the trailer that Harold and the Purple Crayon was going to be nothing about the 1955 children’s story of the same name. That was a depressing and rather introspective on look at wanting the powers of god, and then never being happy when you had them. It was sweet, melancholy, and a rather poignant look at some of life’s reality when it comes to power and the desire for happiness. Well, I was right as Harold and the Purple Crayon is absolutely NOTHING to do with the original story, except to use the purple crayon to make things, and of course reference the book inside of the movie.

Part of me wants to use this review to compare the film directly against the book and its themes, but at the same time I almost think that I have to view this as an entirely different animal, otherwise the comparisons are going to enrage me and nothing positive will ever come of it. You know what, I think that’s the better route here, as most audience members are going to be children anyways, and will have very little knowledge of the book anyways (for the most part, some parents are still reading this book to their kids). And in that right the film is actually not half bad. It’s mildly charming, filled with colorful characters, and carries a sweet enough message.

Inside of his own world, Harold (Zachary Levi) is a fun loving character inside of a LITERAL children’s storybook. He gets to draw things with his crayon that come to life, and gets to hang around with his friend Moose (Lil Rey) and Porcupine (Tanya Reynolds) while listening to “the old man” (Alfred Molina) narrate. However after the old man goes silent, Harold decides to exit the story book realm and find him on his own in “the real world”. As you could have guessed it from the trailer, Harold and his two friends pop out of the pages into real bodies, and now have to figure out WHERE the old man is so that he can come back. Along the way Harold makes friends with a young boy named Mel (Benjamin Bottani) who lives most of his time in the world of fantasy after his father died. While his mother (Zooey Deschanel) is not exactly pleased about it, Mel decides to help Harold and his friends try and find the old man.

As I said, Harold and the Purple Crayon has literally NOTHING to do with the original themes of the book, and acts more a tangential “based on the idea of a secondary thought of a niggling of the original story” type of thing. We get glimpses of the book when story obsessed Gary the librarian (Jemaine Clement) wants to use the magic crayon to bring his 2nd rate fantasy story to life for the publishers, but most of the story is simply Harold and Mel bonding together and learning from each other. Sadly the story can be a bit stale at times, and definitely more than a bit cloying. Zachary Levi is his normal bombastic self, playing the same “child in a man’s body” as he did in the first Shazaam!, which at times is sort of fun, but also gets old really fast. Zooey Deschanel, who is usually the quirky charismatic lead in most of her roles, actually fades into the background most of the time, and Lil Rey annoys everyone as he always does in his comedic films.




Rating:

Rated PG for mild action and thematic elements.




Video:

The 1.85:1 AVC encoded Blu-ray by Sony Pictures is a solid looking disc for sure, and in many ways MORE than solid. Colors are suitably bright and cheerful, with richly saturated primary shades of Purple, green and blue that really pop off the page at times. Fine details are good, but never great. Showing plenty of nuance to see, but somehow manages to not look AS sharp as I would have hoped. Black levels suffer just a teensy bit with some very mild crush and a few washed out dark shots. Otherwise this is a very pleasing looking disc with plenty of detail and great textures. There was some mild blocking a few shots, but at the end of the day most people will be very happy with the disc.









Audio:

As is the case with the video score, the 5.1 DTS-HD MA track sounds equally “fine”. It’s got great dialog with strong separation of the mains during some of the more chaotic events (such as the plane), and very solid surround usage. Strangely the bass is pretty mild in the film, even with things like a car crash or the before mentioned plane scene. As a result the track is one that will sound good, but you’re always left feeling “this could have been great” with the hijinks Mel and Harold get into. Still, it does everything required of it and I can’t really complain at all. Just a good solid mix.












Extras: :

• How to Draw Harold, Porcupine & Moose
• "Colors" Sing Along
• How Do You Spell Imagination?
• Deleted & Extended Scenes














It’s sort of a mixed bag here. I liked the film as a rather throw away family film like John Krasinski’s IF, but also can see why fans of the original book may be a bit peeved by this adaptation .I’m not going to hate on it nearly as much as other people have as I sort of view this as it’s own entity and not an abortion of the source material (it really is more of a tangential side story based upon the idea of the book), but still, it’s a rather rote children’s movie that doesn’t horrify you, nor does it amaze you. Luckily for fans of the film the Blu-ray looks and sounds amazing, just with a mild amount of extras sprinkled in. Decent rental.


Technical Specifications:

Starring: Zachary Levi, Lil Rey Howery, Zooey Deschanel, Tanya Reynolds, Benjamin Bottani, Alfred Molina
Directed by: Carlos Saldanha
Written by: David Guion, Michael Handelman, Crockett Johnson (Novel)
Aspect Ratio: 1.85:1 AVC
Audio: English: DTS-HD MA 5.1, French, Korean DTS-HD MA 5.1, Spanish, Thai DD 5.1
Subtitles: English, English SDH, French, Spanish, Korean, Mandarin, Thai
Studio: Sony Pictures
Rated: PG
Runtime: 100 minutes
Blu-Ray Release Date: October 8th, 2024

lol... Looks like a pretty cool movie. Granted, maybe not by the book, but I've never heard of it and would never read it anyway.

Sonnie Parker said:

lol... Looks like a pretty cool movie. Granted, maybe not by the book, but I've never heard of it and would never read it anyway.

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yeah it's definitely a cute enough movie on it's own. It may not be super special, but it isn't bad either. I had fun

I saw Harold once as a child, not knowing who he was. He has been on my mind for years, and this was a reminder. Thank you!