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What Will the New Pinocchio Teach Us?

Disney+ has unveiled a whole bunch of new content for its self-proclaimed Disney+ Day, and its cornerstone attraction will be a star-studded remake of Pinocchio.

Directed by Robert Zemeckis (the guy behind the Back to the Future movies, Who Framed Roger Rabbit and Forrest Gump) and starring Tom Hanks, Cynthia Erivo, Luke Evans and Joseph Gordon-Levitt as the voice of Jiminy Cricket, the CGI-slathered remake promises to be (ahem) a whale of an attraction for the streaming leviathan.

But will it be any good?

It’s a great question, and one we can’t answer for you just yet. I’m particularly interested to see how the new film navigates the strict ethical template of its predecessor. Because when you look at the original Pinocchio, it just might’ve been the most conventionally moral film that Disney ever produced.

That morality was one of the few aspects that Walt Disney preserved from the original book.

The Adventures of Pinocchio, written by Italian author (and former seminarian) Carlo Collodi, was a sprawling morality fable that, originally, was just a horrific cautionary tale. In the original 1881 serialized installments, Pinocchio was a big ol’ jerk. He kicked Geppetto while he was being carved, smashed Jiminy Cricket with a hammer and, by installment 15, had been hung for his heinous crimes and all-around bad attitude.

Well, Collodi’s editor wasn’t sure if having the protagonist executed was really a great way to end a children’s book. So the author dutifully tacked on another 21 chapters, showing Pinocchio grow into a decent upstanding puppet and, eventually, a human boy.

When Disney took the tale and turned it to its own uses, it softened Collodi’s edges quite a bit. Pinocchio wasn’t a jerk anymore—just sweet, naive and wholly out of his depth in a fallen world. Jiminy survives and becomes the kid’s worldly-wise conscience, helping the puppet navigate all of the world’s pitfalls and perils.

And those pitfalls remain. When you think about it, the world Disney gives us in Pinocchio is pretty grim. Devilishly so, you might say.

The fox “Honest” John and his sidekick, Gideon, lure the poor Pinocchio astray. They encourage him to skip school and fall in with the evil puppeteer Stromboli. Then, they push Pinocchio (and a bevy of other boys) to Pleasure Island, a place filled with cigars and billiards and all manner of amusements. Pinocchio barely escapes becoming a donkey and being shipped off to the salt mines.

Pinocchio has learned his lesson by then: He heads back home, determined to be the sort of lad that the woodcarver Geppetto would be proud of. But then he learns that Geppetto—in a desperate effort to find Pinocchio—has been swallowed by the whale Monstro. And in a show of self-sacrifice, Pinocchio heads off to rescue him.

The morals in Pinocchio couldn’t be clearer. What must you learn on the road to becoming a “real boy”? What must you do to grow up to be the sort of person your own mother and father would be proud of? Hard work. Self-denial. And, in the end, love—love strong enough to risk your life for someone else.

You could even, in a pinch, pull some theological musings out of the original Pinocchio: We, like Pinocchio, are also fallen creatures, fractured facsimiles of who God designed us to be. We’re puppets, in a way, prone to be swayed by a fallen world. While you can’t read too much into this story (lest we imagine that works are the way to salvation), God does ask us to be living sacrifices. And Pinocchio, in the end, becomes that. He loses his life for a greater cause. And on the other side, he realizes he didn’t lose anything. In fact, he becomes more himself than he’s ever been before.

Disney’s original 1940 Pinocchio mirrored the morals from the time it was made, when the United States was still reeling from the Great Depression and nervously eyeing war-torn Europe. This was made for children of the Greatest Generation and embraced its values—values necessary, in my opinion, to see them through the trials at hand.

Today’s values are a bit different. The concept of self-denial seems rather antiquated in many circles. We are encouraged to embrace the moment and follow our dreams—even, sometimes, at the expense of others. We’re pushed not just to chase personal happiness, but we’re told that we deserve it. In some ways, Pleasure Island has become a capital of what our culture values today: unfettered freedom, unbridled pleasure, untethered from responsibility.

Disney, of course, has long peddled some of these more modern cultural values. Even the original Pinocchio encouraged us all to wish upon a star to make our wishes come true (though the rest of the film emphasized just how hard it was to truly realize those dreams). Certainly, the Pinocchio of yesteryear seems out of step with our 21st-century ethos, and I’d not be surprised to see the remake embrace some significant changes.

But Disney still often stresses a more time-honored ethos, too: an ethos where family, friendship and sacrifice often are still honored and even embraced.

Disney+’s 2022 Pinocchio, which is scheduled for release Sept. 8, will definitely be different from its forebears. How different? We won’t have long to wait to find out.

paul-asay
Paul Asay

Paul Asay has been part of the Plugged In staff since 2007, watching and reviewing roughly 15 quintillion movies and television shows. He’s written for a number of other publications, too, including Time, The Washington Post and Christianity Today. The author of several books, Paul loves to find spirituality in unexpected places, including popular entertainment, and he loves all things superhero. His vices include James Bond films, Mountain Dew and terrible B-grade movies. He’s married, has two children and a neurotic dog, runs marathons on occasion and hopes to someday own his own tuxedo. Feel free to follow him on Twitter @AsayPaul.

7 Responses

  1. -I have not seen any Disney remakes yet, and the latest new movie I have seen was Ford v Ferrari (I am still in high school). The latest TV series is Douglas Wilson’s “Man Rampant” and select episodes of “The Mandalorian.” I last saw Pinocchio a few years ago, which was the time I watched most of the Disney classics. Now, I have lots of college applications and work, so I normally will just pick up a game of “Mario and Sonic” or watch Dave Ramsey/Comedy Skits on YouTube for humor.

    I state all of this because I feel like the film industry was mainly good from 1977-1985, 1995, 2003-2017. The remakes/sequels trends were only decent during that later time period (mainly 2012-2017). Now it feels like they are just remaking every film to make money, which is a shame. This has been going on since 2018, with the Incredibles 2 starting the trend. Toy Story 4 feels more childish than the original, but it was at least decent. Therefore, you could say since summer 2019 we have had a more childish trend with animated movies in general. What is even more unfortunate is that movie companies that made good movies started this. Illumination had an epic Despicable Me franchise and then got the often rude Secret Life of Pets and Sing. Sony Pictures had the decent Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs and then decided to make a simply weird, rude Angry Birds movie franchise. Disney had Toy Story and then decided to just make unoriginal sequels/remakes or just odd movies that will never have sequels to them (we’re looking at you, 2020-2022 movies from Disney).

    As a result, 2018-present is where the movie industry is suffering the most, but I believe we will need one movie to change the franchise a second time just like Toy Story from 1995 did. 1985-1995 was struggling in decent movies, but then moviegoers were redeemed with Toy Story, which then had a ripple effect with the Incredibles, Cars, Kung Fu Panda, and Despicable Me.

    I am hoping that we get something innovative in the midst of these Pinocchio and other “Disney Classic” remakes. I am not going to waste more time discussing this, but I just had some thoughts that I am not finding to be popular.

    1. -Not to be too harsh my guy, but you need to expand your palette a little bit before talking about the trajectory of the film industry. There’s a bunch of incredible stuff waiting out there for you. Many of the best films ever made came out long before 1977 – and in places other than America. There are *loads* of incredible movies between 1985 and 1995; Pulp Fiction, Forrest Gump, The Lion King, Shawshank Redemption, Die Hard, Terminator 2, Jurassic Park, Schindler’s List, Reservoir Dogs, Silence of The Lambs, Aliens, Full Metal Jacket, Goodfellas, Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, Groundhog Day, Beauty and The Beast, My Neighbor Totoro, The Princess Bride, Kiki’s Delivery Service, and Rain Man just to name a few. Toy Story pioneered a new form of computer-generated animation that did change the game, but it didn’t suddenly generate a bunch of great new movies. You’re very right that we’re drenched in sequels and remakes today (and that started long before 2018) but we’re also still getting amazing movies every year if you look for them. Watch The Oscar nominees every year for an easy list of some generally solid stuff. Go see Top Gun: Maverick. Pay attention to filmmakers like Phil Lord and Chris Miller, who made Cloudy with A Chance of Meatballs and more recently made Into The Spider-Verse and Mitchells vs. The Machines! Watch Dune. Watch Nomadland. Watch Parasite. Check on sites like Mubi and Criterion for even more widening of the palette. There’s a lot of beautiful art out there, and there always will be!

      1. – I was going to raise this same point (and cite some of the same movies, like Pulp Fiction and Schindler’s List!), but after I reread it I suspected the comment was referring to movies geared toward kids, since it mostly cited animated kids movies.

        The movie industry has changed for the worse with the rise of CGI-driven sequels and reboots, but there are still brilliant directors at work: Scorsese, the Coen brothers, Tarantino, P.T. Anderson, Fincher, Lynch, Cuaron, Spielberg, etc. And yes, folks should definitely check out some of the classic stuff on Criterion, which has become my favorite streaming service. I hadn’t heard of Mubi, but I’ll look into it.

  2. -Pinocchio is also very similar to the story of Jonah. Pinocchio is told he his creator to go a certain way (to school), but he instead chooses his own path and eventually gets swallowed by a whale, and I do not believe this is coincidental. I much prefer Pinocchio to Snow White, because unlike Snow White, Pinocchio actually changes throughout the story, whereas Snow White stays naive. It’s a much stronger story that serves as a cautionary tale. I’m very excited to see if the donkey scene will be just as creepy in live action and am also very much looking forward to Del Toro’s version later this year as well.

    1. -Nice insights, Josh. That is a great analogy to Pinocchio that I hope they will try to have in upcoming Disney movies.

  3. -Great points, Paul. The original Pinocchio reflects an era when kids were expected to grow up in a hurry, without the prolonged adolescence that’s common today. It scared me to death when I was a kid, but I loved it anyway.

  4. -As Christians I don’t think it’s good for us to watch a show on everything the Bible speaks about we should be more supportive of America and the Bible than what the world says about us that’s what being a light to others means showing the love an light of the gospel instead of being of the world let’s be part of other people and give em what Jesus has taught us in His word I think that’s a good start and it begins with leaving worldly things behind us and focusing on the lord more than we do other non important things.

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