I'm a johnny-come-lately for Disney's Pinocchio (2022), but even though it slipped under the radar longer than it should have, I did get to see it and with baggage attached. After all, with enough time passing, I couldn't help but hear hardy snippets of good and bad about this direct-to-Disney+ remake. Much of the two-sided buzz cuts true.
On the good side, acclaimed director Robert Zemeckis (who cowrote the adaptation with Chris Weitz) has done an impressive job translating the visual glow of the classic, 1940 animated feature into evident live action, as well as employing all its catchy tunes. Bravo!
Zemeckis has been equally gracious by not bypassing (or trimming screen time from) any of the beloved principals of Disney's prior take, which includes the eponymous puppet (voiced by Benjamin Evan Ainsworth), Geppetto (Tom Hanks), Jiminy Cricket (voiced by Joseph Gordon-Levitt), Honest John (voiced by Keegan Michael-Key), Stromboli (Guiseppe Battiston), The Blue Fairy (Cynthia Erivo), The Coachman (Luke Evans); Sophia (Lorraine Bracco), and albeit in sheer CGI form, Figaro and Cleo, each looking as cute as buttons; plus (last but not least) Gideon, who still embodies the essence of sidekick sneakiness.
On the bad side, well, quite frankly, Zemeckis' redo misses the noble purpose of Collodi's fable. True, the 1940 edition presented a watered-down view of the living puppet (for even when bad, he was never that bad), but he still did bad things and then learned from them, often with good ol' Jiminy acting as his imploring conscience.
In Zemeckis' modified presentation, our autonomous marionette falls into bad situations not by choice, but from the indirect actions of others. In other words, if he does something wrong, it's only because others guided him to do so. Sounds like the typical, criminal defense Oh, and if Pinocchio's nose grows, no big deal. A lie doesn't mean that much here. Heck, maybe Pinocchio should run for political office, since no consequences stem from his fibs. (Oh, dear Jiminy, where art thou?)
At least Pinocchio's trip to Pleasant Island demonstrates the sadistic selfishness of smashing another's property with bricks. However, once the damage is done, there's little or no apology in the wake. There's always tomorrow to smash some more, and if one should turn into a jackass as a result of vandalizing, hey, it's just the way the ball bounces. One can adapt and still be accepted without batting an eye. Hurrah!
Fairy tales are supposed to enlighten. Their lessons come through arduous toil and grave mistakes. Collodi's book reveals one of the best examples of this, and I can't think of any other Pinocchio adaptation (including Spielberg's A.I.) that has evaded the tale's worthy intent until now.
On that sorrowful, culminating note, I can only express my woeful disdain that Zemeckis has reduced Pinocchio to a Mary Sue. (No amount of traditional imagery can save the wooden lad from that.) Disney might as well have teamed the dear boy with Star Wars' Finn and called it a lackluster day for all that we've gotten from this beautiful, though engineless effort. Pinocchio deserves better; old-school Disney and its fans do, too.
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