Pinocchio (1940)

Just to be clear, I was not alive in 1940. I wasn't around when this film first came out, but for a long time when I was a little boy, this was my favorite film. When I heard it was coming out on two-disc Platinum DVD, I got really excited and didn't hesitate in purchasing it, even though I have a VHS copy back home. Flashes of the movie kept flying into my head from different scenes that I hadn't visited in years (that's how good my memory can be), and I couldn't wait to give it another look, and one thing that always surprises me about this movie is how it doesn't seem to age. There are many great movies from the 1930's and 1940's that have scenes and moments of dialogue that feel so ancient when we hear them nowadays. As much as I love Casablanca, it feels dated at times, and I took another look at Rebecca (also from 1940), and it really feels dated (creepy as it is), but Pinocchio still feels fresh and entertaining, and it contains scenes that we regrettably don't see in Disney movies anymore, because the industries feel they have to dumb everything down to cater to the children, and parents worry that children are fragile and can crack at any time, which in my opinion, it depends on the child, but I'll get to that as I get further into the review.
For those who may not know, Pinocchio is the film about Italian puppet-maker Geppetto who wishes that his latest puppet (a little boy he names Pinocchio) were a real boy. As he sleep, a Blue Fairy comes into his house and brings Pinocchio to life. She tells him if he proves himself brave, truthful and unselfish, he'll be made into a real boy. With the help of Jiminy Cricket (who becomes his self-appointed conscience), Pinocchio tries to be a good boy for his father, but he runs into temptations that get him into trouble, which include becoming a string-less puppet at a theater and joining a troupe of disobedient boys to Pleasure Island.
What I used to love about this film were the characters and the imagination that went into a every sequence. When I saw it this time, I marveled at the opening sequence in Geppetto's house, before Pinocchio comes to life, with the imagination that went into every music box in the house, every clock, every toy, everything has its own distinct personality, and they are all an extension of Geppetto. I especially loved Jiminy's reaction to every object and to Pinocchio particularly. One of my favorite moments is when Geppetto has just painted a mouth on Pinocchio, Jiminy says "very good, very very goo-", he looks at the sculpture next to him, which is a face with a low expression, looking very angry, and Jiminy says, "well, you can't please everybody." Then, when the Blue Fairy beings Pinocchio to life, that's one very magical moment, and we're introduced to Pinocchio's personality, a happy little boy willing to become flesh and blood. I saw in one of the special features that the character of Pinocchio was changed drastically, both physically and emotionally, from the stories by Carlo Collodi. Originally, Pinocchio was supposed to be an arrogant wooden puppet who is not very likable and goes on all these adventures to prove himself as a real boy, but he does it the wrong way. He also looked physically more like a dark brown wooden puppet. Disney decided to make him look more like a real boy, with only his wooden arms and legs and that stub he has for a nose to let us know he's made of wood (and his hands are covered with Mickey Mouse gloves), and his personality was changed to a well-meaning, naive little boy who easily gives in to temptation. This was made so children would have a protagonist they could easily root for and feel for. I don't know if it would have worked if they had left him the way he was in the books, but all I can say, this version of Pinocchio works.
Now I want to talk about my favorite character, Jiminy Cricket. Another view of this film made me love the character even more, not just because he's the sidekick, but I love his humor, his perseverance, his faith, but above all, his loyalty. No matter what happens, no matter how badly Pinocchio screws up, Jiminy always comes back. My favorite moment with Jiminy comes after he and Pinocchio have just found out that Geppetto was swallowed by a whale, and Pinocchio wants to go after him. Jiminy tries to talk him out of jumping into the water, but as soon as Pinocchio says goodbye to him, Jiminy's line is, "Goodbye? I may be live bait down there, but I'm going with you." I also love how seriously he takes his job as a conscience. He's committed to helping this wooden boy, and he's hard on himself, particularly in the scene where he and Pinocchio find themselves locked in Stromboli's cage. Before that, there's another scene that breaks my heart, and that's the scene where Stromboli locks Pinocchio in the cage, starts the carriage, and the cage is swinging back and forth, and Pinocchio is desperately whistling and calling for Jiminy. He known he's nowhere in sight, but he's desperate, and he needs Jiminy, and as soon as he realizes he may not be back, he sits down and cries. Meanwhile, Jiminy is outside, looking at the carriage, wanting to go away, but instead, he goes to say goodbye to Pinocchio, and that's when he discovers him in the cage. He's that committed to the job. He doesn't leave Pinocchio, even when he feels he's failed him.

No Disney film is complete without villains, and this film has a diverse cast of villains, and the odd thing about this film is that none of the villains gets their comeuppance (except maybe Monstro the Whale, but he's more a freak of nature). My favorite villain is Honest John (quite an ironic name for a character such as himself), a fox with a hat and a seductive British accent that acts as an agent of temptation for Pinocchio. He leads him into two of his most perilous adventures and trades him in for money. The man lies and cheats just to get in a pay day, and he doesn't care what happens to him after he's sold. Giddeon, his sidekick, a silent cat who walks next to him provides a perfect partner for Honest John to play off of for comedy. I love the scene where Honest John is diagnosing Pinocchio before taking him to Pleasure Island, and has Giddeon scrible in a notepad. That's just hilarious.
Now, I want to talk about Pleasure Island, because I was hit with something there that didn't happen when I was a kid. I thought that part was really scary, but the way I think of it, it's scary because it serves the story. Films back then had no problem exploring some darker places and scaring children out of doing things they shouldn't do, and in this case, that's smoking and drinking, and just plain acting like a jackass (nowadays, the word jackass warrants an automatic PG rating, and yet in this film, the word is uttered twice, and it's still G). One scene that I found particularly scary was the scene where Lampwick (Pinocchio's friend on Pleasure Island) turns into a donkey. We already saw the Coachman earlier (by the way, that character is also scary when he says earlier, "they won't be back..... as BOYS!!!!") selling donkeys and shipping them to different places, and we find out, from one donkey who can talk, that these donkeys are the boys who spent the entire day on Pleasure Island. In the following scene, we watch Pinocchio's face as Lampwick slowly grows ears, and then a tail, and then his face turns into a donkey's snout, and as cool Lampwick realizes what happened to him, he begs Pinocchio to help him. We see him kneeling next to him, we see his hands begging for help, and his hands turn into donkey legs right in front of him. It's a really scary scene, and then we see the same thing starting to happen to Pinocchio, and the tension grows. I wish more scenes like that could be written into more animated films nowadays, because I'm sure this scene scared a bunch of children out of drinking and smoking (at least for a while), and Dumbo also has a scene where he gets drunk and starts seeing elephants on parade that I heard gave people nightmares (and the Fantasia number from the Sorcerer's Apprentice gave my mom nightmares), but I honestly believe children are not as fragile as we think they are. They are more open-minded and can handle more than we give them credit for, so it bothers me that children's entertainment these days appeals to the lowest common denominator (with PIXAR as a glorious exception).

One thing I noticed with Pinocchio is that none of the villains get a punishment. They all continue with their villainous ways, but we don't really care, because we just want Pinocchio to get away from them. As soon as Pinocchio is out of the cage and away from Stromboli, he's still out there looking for a new act, and as soon as Pinocchio and Jiminy escape Pleasure Island, the coachman is still selling boys that turned into donkeys whose futures don't look too bright. It's disturbing when you think about it, but it works beautifully.
There's a couple of characters I forgot to talk about, and that's Geppetto's pets Figaro, the spoiled cat, and Cleo, the seductive female fish. These two are characters that depend more on their expressions and body movements for us to know who they are. We know Figaro always craves for attention, and Cleo loves to be kissed, even if it's just on her fishbowl, because it makes her feel pretty. This is something I hadn't noticed in the film until I saw her this last time, which made that scene at the end in which Figaro jumps into Cleo's bowl and kisses her all the more rewarding. Another character that was made quite frightening with no dialogue is Monstro, the whale that swallows Geppetto and Figaro and Cleo, and later Pinocchio as he searches for him. I remember the intense experience of watching Geppetto and Pinocchio trying to paddle away from the whale, and then the whale destroying their raft and Pinocchio having to pull Geppetto to shore, even when he tells him to swim for shore. This is the act that finally makes him worthy of being a real boy.
I remember hearing a rumor once that Jiminy Cricket was based on Cri-Cri, a cricket character who was the identity of Francisco Gabilondo Soler (the most important children's composer in Mexico). Apparently Walt Disney wanted to buy Cri-Cri for his films, but Gabilondo refused to do it. I don't know if that rumor was true, and from what I heard in a documentary on the DVD it may not have been (since they took a talking cricket character that Pinocchio squashes from the Collodi book and made him into Pinocchio's conscience), but since I grew up listening to Cri-Cri, hearing that made me even closer to Jiminy Cricket. It's probably just a rumor, but I love making that connection, because Pinocchio and Cri-Cri were huge parts of my childhood. It's fun to remember what used to be a part of our childhoods, and it's funny for me that my childhood memories were released to the world in the 1940's and 1950's (though I also grew up with Beauty and the Beast, Aladdin, The Lion King, and other cartoons from the 1990's). It was produced by Walt Disney, released in theaters by RKO Radio Pictures on February 7, 1940, and even though it didn't do very well in the box office on its first run (it only recouped 1.9 out of its 2.6 million budget). The film started catching on with re-releases, with the tradition that Disney films were re-released in theaters every 10 years (starting in 1944 for Snow White, and 1945 for Pinocchio) up until 1992 with a digital restoration. It remains a classic, and the Academy-Award winning song "When You Wish Upon a Star" has now become the theme of the new Disney logo.
So, is there any film you'd like to discuss that was this much a part of your childhood? Anything that hasn't aged for you? Or anything you may have re-visited lately?