Pinocchio (2022 live-action film)
| Not to be confused with Guillermo del Toro's Pinocchio, a stop-motion animated film also released in 2022. |
| Pinocchio (2022 live-action film) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
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 When Pinocchio wanted to become a real boy, the live-action movie was not what he meant, because in the end, neither this nor A True Story could honor the original version.
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Pinocchio is a 2022 American musical fantasy film directed by Robert Zemeckis from a screenplay by Zemeckis and Chris Weitz. Produced by Walt Disney Pictures, Depth of Field and ImageMovers, this film is a live-action remake of Walt Disney's 1940 animated film Pinocchio, which is itself based on the 1883 Italian book The Adventures of Pinocchio by Carlo Collodi. It stars Tom Hanks, Cynthia Erivo, and Luke Evans with Benjamin Evan Ainsworth, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Keegan-Michael Key, and Lorraine Bracco in voice roles. The reimagined story follows a wooden puppet named Pinocchio (Evan Ainsworth), who is brought to life by a blue fairy (Erivo) after being crafted by an old Italian woodcarver named Geppetto (Hanks). While the role of Pinocchio's conscience Jiminy Cricket (Gordon-Levitt) attempts to guide Pinocchio in matters of right and wrong, Pinocchio encounters a host of unsavory characters in his efforts to become a real boy.
Development of the live-action Pinocchio began in 1985, with Jim Henson and Steve Barron approached with the idea, but Disney turned down the project. Disney eventually announced the remake film in April 2015 with Peter Hedges being reported to be writing the film's script, before being replaced with Weitz in May 2017, who also went on to produce. Sam Mendes and Paul King were originally considered for directing, and Zemeckis was confirmed as director in January 2020. By November 2018, it was reported that Hanks was in early talks to play Geppetto; he passed on the project after King's departure but rejoined in August 2020. The main cast was announced in January and March 2021. Principal photography began in March 2021 before finishing the following month. Alan Silvestri, who has collaborated in all of Zemeckis's films, composed the score, who also wrote the new songs with Glen Ballard.
Pinocchio was released on September 8, 2022, by Disney+, as an original film and as part of Disney+ Day. It received generally negative reviews from critics, who found it unnecessary and lacking the charm of the 1940 film, and criticized the writing, deviations, Hanks’ performance, and the lack of improvement over previous adaptations, although the visuals, musical score, and some of the other actors' performances received praise. It received six Golden Raspberry Award nominations, including Worst Picture and Worst Actor for Hanks, and won for Worst Prequel, Remake, Rip-off or Sequel.
Plot
In an Italian village, the wooden puppet Pinocchio is brought to life by the Blue Fairy and seeks the life of adventure while striving to be a real boy. Pinocchio's life is turned upside down when he leaves his father to follow the circus.
Why It Definitely DOESN'T Wish Upon a Star
- Much like Disney's previous live-action remakes of the Disney Animated Canon, it basically furthers once again Hollywood's lame ideology of "everything old is new again" by remaking this film, proof that they did not learn their lesson from Disney.
- Extremely primitive and unfinished CGI, including the scene where the Monstro chases Pinocchio and Geppetto.
- It lacks the charm of the original animated Disney film that made it classic and beloved.
- As per many of the previous Disney live-action remakes, the movie is rather pointless and unnecessary, as the story is still way too similar of the original 1940 animated version, making the movie copycat. In particular, many didn't appreciate that the film still has The Coachman be a Karma Houdini, especially since this version of the character is even more evil than his predecessor and the behavior the kids indulge in on Pleasure Island isn't nearly as bad as it was in that film.
- The signature scene where Pinocchio lies to the Blue Fairy being replaced didn't sit very well with fans, with some of them feeling that it took away one of the most important aspects from the original story.
- Tom Hanks does a shockingly bad job as Geppetto, even for his own standards. It's pretty sad, since he is usually a wonderful actor, especially with his most iconic roles being Forest Gump from the movie of the same name and Woody from the Toy Story films of the same name.
- The ending deviates from the adaptations. In this film, Pinocchio almost looks like he does not become a real boy, but he actually does if you look at his limbs very closely.
- Unlike past Disney remakes, the designs in this film are faithful to the designs from the original Disney film (save for the Blue Fairy and Monstro). However, because the designs are attempting to combine the original cartoony Disney designs with the more realistic look of previous Disney remakes, they tend to fall into the uncanny valley territory as a result like Sonic 06. This is especially the case with Jiminy Cricket, who has a more realistic design, but is still presented as a anthropomorphic funny animal, which makes him come across as unintentionally creepy-looking.
- Same goes for Honest John, where while his body is very cartoony and animated (complete with countless grand, thespian gestures) and Keegan-Michael Key gives a very lively performance, he has a photorealistic face, and pretty much every expression he makes looks like a cornered fox snarling and bearing its teeth. He even looks very creepy like the Cat from the infamous 2003 adaptation of The Cat in the Hat with Mike Myers, or another Fox character cosplaying as the one from Pinocchio.
- The same can be said for Figaro the cat, Cleo the goldfish and Monstro the whale, despite them being depicted as more realistic animals unlike Jiminy Cricket, Honest John and Gideon, their CGI effects look ugly and fall away under the uncanny valley.
- Monstro's design is very unfaithful because he's supposed to be a whale, and yet he is given the qualities of a sea monster.
- And what about the brief ending where Pinocchio turns into a human when his legs transform (as mentioned above).
- The donkey transformation is even more disturbing and nightmare-inducing kward comcompared the original not to mention weird and uncanny at the same time.
- Poor grasps of the sources material original film, apart from ending, for example, Honest John and Gideon trap Jiminy under a glass jar, which did not happen in the original film.
- In the original movie, Pinocchio is on his way to school when he runs into Honest John, who persuades him to go to the theater instead and skip school. But in this remake, he actually does go to school but gets kicked out by the teacher for "being a puppet", and states that school is for "real children" and that puppets like him belong in a puppet show.
- The Blue Fairy (who is a white character) being blackwashed was met with massive controversy due to how racist it is towards white people. Even worse, they kept the race-swapped fairy in the official trailer, which resulted being massively disliked on YouTube (before YouTube removed the dislike numbers).
- Also, unlike the animated Disney film, she only appears once in the film after she brings Pinocchio to life and never appears again afterwards, hence making her role completely pointless.
- A point of minor contention with the original film was that the four actual villains of the story (i.e., Coachman, Stromboli, Honest John, and Gideon) get off scot-free while Lampwick is subject to a fate worse for only being a bit of a jerk. While Stromboli is punished this time around, Coachman, Honest John, and Gideon all remaining Karma Houdini's is seen as a waste by many, especially considering Coachman is even more evil in this version along with Honest John and Gideon were punished in the book and were going to be punished in the original film before it was cut.
- The concept of Pinocchio staying a wooden puppet. It's not unheard of as the Russian adaptation Buratino also doesn't turn into a real boy in the end, but at least there it felt more organic because the whole story had a different direction with the main character, the opposite to how it's not fleshed out or properly built in this remake, which also added a Fantastic Racism angle with Pinocchio being immediately rejected from the school for being a puppet, thus it just comes off more like the movie spells out a lesson that isn't followed through since it's strongly implied he turns into a real boy anyway.
- Despite the movie is set in Italy, all the written are English (although to be fair, it was also in the original, but still they could just add subtitles).
- The decision to bowdlerize the Pleasure Island scenes to remove any references to smoking and alcohol was criticized by viewers, since it removes the anti-smoking and anti-drinking message of the original movie and makes the kids' fates even more of a Disproportionate Retribution since it's less "juvenile delinquency" and more "typical child behavior".
- Anachronism: In the 30-second scene where the remake shows off the cuckoo clocks, the clocks showcases various characters Disney owns or adapted from public domain works, including but not limited to; Woody, Bullseye, Donald Duck, Rodger Rabbit, Jessica Rabbit, Maleficent, Aurora, Snow White, Dumbo, Rafiki, Simba, The Evil Queen, Zazu, and the Seven Dwarves. It doesn't make any sense for clocks like these to appear since most of these films debuted after Pinocchio (especially films released as late as 1995 with Toy Story).
- Pleasure Island also has food like burgers and root beer which also count as anachronistic because the story takes place around 1895. And while Burgers and Root Beer were made before this movie takes place in 1885 and 1875 respectively, but no historical evidence suggests that they had been introduced in Italy at the time which would make them out of place for the film’s setting.
- There's even a scene where Honest John mentions Chris Pine even though Chris Pine wasn't even born at the time period the movie takes place. Chris Pine was born in 1980, not 1895, so how would Honest John know? (But to be fair, if one may theorize, this may be coincidental since there was probably another person around at the time whose name is also Chris Pine as well).
- The remake removed Pinocchio's Disney Death from the original, instead giving one to Geppetto, who is brought back via Swiss-Army Tears. This is arguably the most egregious change as Pinocchio's Heroic Sacrifice was the most important part of the original movie (i.e., Pinocchio's arc in the original movie was that he needs to prove that he was worthy of becoming a real boy, but because of his naivety he makes several bad choices and only by sacrificing his own life to save his father is he redeemed and brought back as a real boy).
- Bad pacing just like Pinocchio 3000 and the 2002 Pinocchio.
- There's an disgusting, out-of-place poop joke in this movie, which is very unnecessary and unneeded for Disney movie. To prove this to you, Pinocchio was going to school only to encounter a pile of dung on the road. The original didn't have a cringey poop joke in the first place.
- Lame and poor direction by Robert Zemeckis who directed much better movies like Back to the Future and Who Framed Roger Rabbit.
Redeeming Qualities
- The acting and voice acting (with the exception of Tom Hanks), especially from Benjamin Evan Ainsworth, Luke Evans, Keegan-Michael Key, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, is decent.
- Decent visual effects, aside from the uncanny valley quality CGI.
- The logo variation for the film is cute, since near the logo's end, Jiminy cricket hovers down and sings the logo's song "When You Wish Upon a Star"
- Pinocchio becomes a real boy, although his transformation is rather slow (mentioned in the WIaFB#6 earlier) and hard to see.
- Unlike in the original Disney movie, Stromboli actually gets arrested by Carabinieri thanks to his mistreated and exploited employees (even though offscreen).
- Despite the movie being souless, at least most of the characters are still likable.
- Despite the fact that this remake is completely unnecessary and pretty soulless, at least it can be great to see a Pinocchio movie that seems like a feature-length movie that is more similar to the original film after eighty-two years, and it can be really nostalgic to certain people, like adults who watched the original Pinocchio as a kid, and especially old people who watched the movie as a kid.
Reception
Unlike the animated movie, it received generally negative reviews from critics, who found the film lacking the charm of the original film and was unnecessary while criticizing its writing, plot, dialogue, and deviations, but praised the performances of Evan Ainsworth and Gordon-Levitt, visuals, and musical score. On Rotten Tomatoes, the film has an approval rating of 31% based on 88 reviews with an average rating of 4.70/10. The site's critics consensus reads: "Visually dazzling but soulless, the largely inert Pinocchio reaffirms that you should always let your conscience be your guide... away from unnecessary remakes.", while audiences consensus reads, "Just watch Disney's original Pinocchio instead.". Metacritic assigned the film a weighted average score of 41 out of 100, based on 28 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews."
Videos
Trivia
- On October 29, 2019, it was reported that Disney was considering releasing the film on its streaming service Disney+ due to the box office failure of its 2019 remake of Dumbo, though it was reported that "a theatrical release seems more likely" after the hiring of Robert Zemeckis as director. On December 9, 2020, the film was officially announced to be moving back to Disney+ instead of a theatrical release in response to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Comments
- Bad media
- Disney
- Disney+ films
- Live action Disney remakes
- Controversial films
- Live-action films
- American films
- Bad movies from good franchises
- Remakes/reboots
- 2020s films
- Musical films
- Fantasy films
- "It's made for kids"
- Adventure films
- Comedy films
- Based on books
- Boring films
- Cash grabs
- Terrible grasp on the source material
- Gross-out films
- Racist films