Critics reviews

Presented as a series of impressions rather than a straightforward, linear progression of scenes, in keeping with the way that the world seems when one is under the influence, The Beach Bum gives Korine plenty of room to play to his strengths... Unfortunately, as with some of the director's other works, there isn't really enough going on here for a full-length feature.

[The Beach Bum is] not big and it’s not clever, and it certainly misses Isla Fisher’s feminine touch when she bows out... It does however have the kind of go-for-broke performance you rarely see from a respected leading man and its meandering, druggy charm slowly worms its way in.

Korine would have us believe the central character is a lovable, free-spirited maverick, but mostly he comes across as a selfish, overgrown child in need of a kick up the pants, making it hard for viewers to warm to his wacky ways.

The film’s vaudevillian misadventures lack jeopardy and are often played for straight comedy... It’s not unfunny watching McConaughey smoke a joint from between Isla Fisher’s toes, but some viewers may find themselves less enamoured of Moondog than the film is.

A leisurely, neon-soaked stroll through chaos and hazy bohemia, full of slapstick and pathos. [The Beach Bum] is as much Korine’s most mature film as it is his most juvenile.

The Beach Bum is a film of vignettes, of cartoonish coincidences that link arms and stroll down promenades together. It roams, and has the best time doing so. It’s refreshing to experience a film fuelled by its prohibited life supplies, that so rarely feels anything less than tremendous fun.

The plot of The Beach Bum is incidental. The real joy is the kaleidoscopic fairy tale vibe, as easy and breezy as a hot summer’s day at the beach.

There are things to enjoy in the film’s genial, non-judgmental approach to bad behaviour, and all power to McConaughey’s commitment to the character. But you’ll need a lot of patience – or weed, or tranquillisers – to stick with Korine’s paper-thin, larky portrait of a literary bum in crisis.

Harmony Korine’s latest exercise in no-seatbelt-style filmmaking casts McConaughey in the role he was born to play... [He] lives in the Moondog role, swaggering like a sloshed pirate in what will be one of his definitive performances.

The Beach Bum would be more entertaining if it weren’t the same scene over and over, with escalation in lieu of evolution. But that’s Korine’s strategy, for better or worse, possibly both.

Despite being a paean to burnouts, and hanging on a character who is perpetually stoned and half-dressed in Guy Fieri-esque flame shirts, The Beach Bum aims for — and hits — warmth and earnestness in its devotion to Moondog and simply living life; it’s utterly sublime.

The pursuit of pleasure [in The Beach Bum] is not confined to our hero alone but extended to all comers, with a horny democratic good will, and it’s typical of Korine to suggest that, in an era as acrimonious as ours, the true provocation is to harbor no grudges, to forgive us our trespasses, and to drift along, catching the tide of contentment.