My original intention with making today a Pinocchio double feature was that I would look at a film I was fairly certain wouldn’t work out (and then it did, at least in my opinion) with the Zemeckis version, and then I’d look at this Guillermo Del Toro-directed version to see it done right. Well, that would imply that the two are comparable, even in regard to their shared source material, but this really is an entirely different beast. It’s also, as much as I will go to bat for the Zemeckis film, even better.
For a start, it’s another example of a story that is a perfect fit for stop-motion animation, since they both involve bringing life to the inanimate, and the animation here by ShadowMachine (Robot Chicken, BoJack Horseman, the doll sequence in Booksmart) is gorgeous. The movements are incredibly fluid (especially from Pinocchio himself), the set design helps Geppetto’s village feel like more than just where his shop is located, and the art style (based on Gris Grimly’s illustrations for the 2002 printing of the original Carlo Collodi novel) highlights how terrifying the normal-ass world is already, let alone the inclusion of sentient puppets, wood spirits, and giant sea monsters.
As for the story, this weirdly-enough has a few similarities with the changes that the Zemeckis version made, only they’ve been taken even further here. Geppetto still made Pinocchio as a surrogate son, but his creation is far less joyous than it’s usually depicted. It’s closer to Frankenstein than to most other versions of this story, showing Geppetto’s life with his son Carlo, the grief that built up with his death, and the eventual pouring of that grief into the carving of this puppet. David Bradley as Geppetto really sells the emotional angle here, and his interplay with Gregory Mann as both Pinocchio and Carlo early on feels a lot more accurate to a real father and son relationship. Admittedly, that comes about through Pinocchio being a lot more annoying here, but it fits and never gets into the realms of being unpleasant to watch at any point. Same goes for him actually behaving like he’s only just started life, meaning he doesn’t know about seemingly basic concepts and rules which also have to be taught to him.
The way it handles the magical side of things is nicely done as well, in that it’s insular as opposed to walking and talking animals just being an everyday thing in this universe. There’s Pinocchio, there’s Ewan McGregor as Sebastian J. Cricket, who has much more personality here and even his own character arc, and then there’s the sisters that gave and continue to give Pinocchio life: The Wood Sprite, and Death (both voiced by Tilda Swinton). Yes, Death. Pinocchio makes regular trips to the afterlife in this, and while they occasionally feel like he’s going to the hub world in a video game (I was faintly reminded of The Darkness while watching these scenes), the conversations therein build on the explorations of grief and the preciousness of life to not only add a lot to the emotional value of Pinocchio and Geppetto’s stories, but also strengthen the film’s core message.
The story takes place in Italy, as in most retellings of this story, but shifted forward to the 1930s during the reign of Mussolini. And that’s not just background information, it’s part of the plot itself, with Pleasure Island here replaced by Pinocchio and Candlewick (Finn Wolfhard) being sent to a military training camp run by Candlewick’s father the Podestรก (Ron Perlman). Like with The Devil’s Backbone and Pan’s Labyrinth, Del Toro’s depiction here of a society under the grip of fascism is highly unnerving and really drives home the inhumanity of the war being waged. Pinocchio still goes to work at a travelling puppet show (here run by Christoph Waltz’ Count Volpe), but the shows eventually become displays of war propaganda that look like something out of Captain America: The First Avenger.
And in its focusing on fascist ideology, the story here becomes one all about the nature of control. Society controlling the individual. Father controlling his son. Boss controlling their worker. The puppet master controlling their puppet. It subverts the idea that what Pinocchio must learn is to obey his father, making his arc more about free will and the importance of him choosing when to obey. Not doing things just because he was told to, but because he knows they’re the right thing to do. To that end, the whole ‘real boy’ thing is almost an afterthought, since his sentience is never really in question, nor is there ever an assumption that he ‘should’ become something else in order to be real. He is the puppet without strings; a personification of freedom itself.
This feels like it was designed for people whose favourite part of the 1940 Disney version was the donkey transformation scene, and that includes myself. It leans into the scarier aspects of the source material and its pop culture presence, but without losing the sense of wonder and joy that gave it that presence to begin with. For as full-on as this can get in its imagery, ideas, and even the emotional wavelengths (I regularly experienced mindfrag while watching this), it’s still got a lot of laughs and even musical numbers throughout, all of which are handled very well. Guillermo Del Toro’s work with DreamWorks over the years have shown that he has a knack for animation, but this shows that he can absolutely slay with it in the director’s chair, managing to stand out even in a year that has been especially strong for stop-motion animated films.
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