HAROLD AND THE PURPLE CRAYON

Since Harold (Zachary Levi, 'Shazam!', 'Tangled') was four, he has been living in an animated world with his magical purple crayon. Along with his friends Moose (Lil Rel Howery, 'Free Guy', 'Tom & Jerry') and Porcupine (Tanya Reynolds, 'Emma.', Netflix's 'Sex Education'), he goes on adventures that are narrated by a voice in the sky known as Old Man (Alfred Molina, 'Spider-Man: No Way Home', 'Promising Young Woman') who is from the real world. Now a grown man with a childlike imagination, the Old Man suddenly stops narrating Harold's adventures, so Harold decides to go to the real world to find him. Upon arriving he runs into Terri (Zooey Deschanel, 'Trolls' franchise, '500 Days of Summer', TV's 'New Girl'), a struggling single mum, and her son, Mel (Benjamin Bottani, Netflix's 'Leo'), who assists Harold on his quest. On his journey he runs into Gary Natwick (Jemaine Clement, 'Avatar: The Way of Water', 'Moana'), a librarian who plans to steal the magical crayon for himself.

'Harold and the Purple Crayon' is a misguided mess. Firstly, and the biggest issue is this is a live action film about an adult version of a character who is four years old. You both lose what connected children to the picture book - the fact they could imagine themselves as Harold - and you also have to watch Zachary Levi fumble around acting like a child. This movie wasn't so much painful as disengaging; no one wants to be here, the film isn't interesting in grabbing your attention, it's 90 minutes of unfunny antics being projected in front of your eyes for no reason.

I'm just so baffled how we got to this being how the story was adapted. 'Shazam!', which also sees Levi as an adult acting as a child, wasn't such a massive success that audiences were demanding to see him play more man-children. You also have to throw away the source material and create a new story, making it pointless for this to be based on a 69-year-old story.

'Harold and the Purple Crayon' is a book that continues to inspire children's imaginations, yet its 2024 film adaption is a bland wasteland that is best used if you want to punish them. There is no reason to even think about this movie, it serves no purpose, and manages to entertain absolutely no one.