Is one horrible 'Pinocchio' per year not enough?
Netflix
Yes, the impressive stop-motion animation makes co-director/co-writer Guillermo del Toro’s “Pinocchio” better than Robert Zemeckis’ atrocious “Pinocchio.” But focusing on the aesthetics of something that’s cool to look at and miserable to watch is like raving about the singing on Adele’s (hypothetical, for now) album of Smash Mouth covers. Which is about as welcome as a second hideous “Pinocchio” in the span of three months.
I mean, these are rhetorical and also really not:
How do you spend a lot of time establishing Geppetto’s (voiced by David Bradley) relationship with his 10-year-old son Carlo (Gregory Mann) and then, after Carlo dies and Geppetto drunkenly decides to make a new boy out of wood who magically comes to life, have Pinocchio voiced by the same actor? That’s creepy and insulting.
Why does Pinocchio have taste buds (he’s very excited about hot chocolate) but doesn’t feel pain when his legs are on fire?
How come he immediately speaks English well after being given life but doesn’t know what a clock is?
If Geppetto—who is a grieving shell of himself but still functional—is so concerned with lessons or even being protective in the slightest, why doesn’t he at least say something about safety when agreeing to make Pinocchio new feet after they burn off?
After it’s very weirdly determined that Pinocchio can’t die but that he needs to wait a couple minutes before being reanimated (?!), Geppetto rejoices that the boy is alive again. Yet he doesn’t cry or even react that much when the boy dies?
As a filmmaker, how lazy do you have to be to show a child (Carlo) literally gazing up at Jesus on the cross in a church just before he is killed? And then later tie Pinocchio to a cross too, even though the film doesn’t actually explore anything about faith, challenges to it or otherwise?
How could you set the film against the rise of fascism under Mussolini in Italy (including an admirer voiced by Ron Perlman who wants the seemingly immortal Pinocchio to be a fighter) and do so little to show young viewers what’s bad about fascists? Should kids just think these people are fans of firm requests?
Furthermore, why is there so much discussion about war in general being objectionable, creating a false equivalency between the opposing sides?
Why include several very underwhelming songs while also suggesting that you can’t decide if the movie is supposed to be a musical or not?
Related: Must we be subjected to Pinocchio and a dancing poop puppet singing about farts, boogers and slime in front of a Mussolini poster? Seriously, who is this for?
Are we really supposed to be moved by the hollow lesson of trying your best? What if a fascist dictator is just trying his best?
With all this going on, is Pinocchio’s honesty really the key issue? And why is there no discussion about other people’s noses not extending when they lie?
If this movie is for adults, why cast painfully dull Ewan McGregor as the voice of Sebastian J. Cricket? If this movie is for kids, why cast Cristoph Waltz as the voice of evil Count Volpe? In fact, why cast either of those distractingly recognizable voices at all?
Are we really supposed to buy a wooden puppet having the strength to carry a person to the surface from underwater? Or even that Pinocchio already knows how to swim?
How could you possibly end the movie—spoiler alert, bleh—by teaching a child a grown-up lesson about sacrificing your life for a loved one and then undermine that completely with a wish?
Write new stories. Seriously.
D
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