In Review: Pinocchio (Disney +)

Synopsis: In Pinocchio, A puppet is brought to life by a fairy, who assigns him to lead a virtuous life in order to become a real boy.

The Story

Toymaker Geppetto carves out a puppet of a little boy. The puppet, which he calls Pinocchio. That night as he says his prayers Geppetto sees a shooting star and wishes for a son. Hearing Geppetto’s wish. The Blue Fairy brings the puppet to life and tells him to try and lead a virtuous life so he can eventually become a real boy. In order to help the young boy in this task. The fairy assigns Jimminy Cricket to be Pinocchio’s conscience, which proves to be a challenging task as the boy has a knack for finding trouble. 

When Geppetto awakes, he is thrilled to find that his creation has come to life and proceeds to be a father to the child and sends him to school. However, Pinocchio gets thrown out of school for not being a real boy and is then kidnapped by a traveling show and is made to sing and dance for the crowds.

The Acting

Tom Hanks takes on the fatherly role of Geppetto and puts in a solid performance as the lonely toymaker. He does a great job of the character’s mannerisms and fully embraces the role. Likewise, Joseph Gordon-Levitt brings his voice to Jimminy Cricket, who acts as both Pinocchio’s conscience as well as the story’s narrator. While Benjamin Evan Ainsworth provides his voice to the titular character and fully commits to the role.

Cynthia Erivo puts in a nice performance as the Blue Fairy and does a brilliant job with the song ‘When you Wish Upon a Star, however, the Fairy’s role in this movie is not as big as it was in the original animated version of the film as Disney changed the ending for this modern take.

Overall

As a fan of the original animated version, I was looking forward to seeing this but was also a little nervous about seeing it. You see the original version has some fond memories attached to it. As I remember my late father taking me and my brother to see it during the mid-70s to get us kids out of the way so my late mother could host a Tupperware party.

Anyway, I really liked this new take on the story. The character models were brilliantly animated and the voice talent really brought them to life. I loved some of the references to famous actors during the scene where Pinocchio was being picked up by Honest John the Fox who tries to hoodwink the boy.

All the musical numbers are intact and remain as timeless as ever.

And the ending of the film, which is changed works well as I can easily imagine Pinocchio and Jimminy Cricket having many more adventures. It always troubled me a bit when the Blue Fairy waved her wand and made the puppet into a real boy in the original film. As it kind of made Jimminy Cricket’s role as the boy’s conscience somewhat redundant. So I liked this ending better as it kind of celebrates the fact that Pinocchio is different from other kids.