Product: Pinocchio
Rating: 3.0
Pinocchio (1940 Disney) was a "message movie" for adults as well as children,
Pinocchio (1940 Disney) was a "message movie" for adults as well as children.Pinocchio (1940 Disney) starring Dickie Jones, Cliff Edwards, Walter Catlett, and Frankie Darro (voiceover talent for major cartoon characters in the movie) is a satisfying, simple, well done movie set in the Swiss Italian mountains of northern Italy, and is based on an Italian folk tale by "Collodi." It was Walt Disney's second feature length cartoon following the epic success of Snow White And The Seven Dwarfs (1937 Disney), which made more money than any in movie history up to that time (and this was the Golden Age Of Big Studio Hollywood) and which lit the fire under the MGM studios to create The Wizard Of Oz (1939 MGM) starring Judy Garland to cash in on the same unexpected and spectacular success Disney's Snow White movie had achieved.Pinocchio (1940 Disney) was a simpler movie, not set in a grand palace or peopled by elegant royalty or ending with a final reward for the main character of being taken by Prince Charming to a golden castle in the sky with celestial choirs grandly singing "Someday My Prince Will Come" punctuated by sonorous wedding bells. The audience is not expected to cheer for victorious and righteous royalty at the conclusion of Pinocchio (1940 Disney).It's a story about a lonely bachelor artist and craftsman, Gepetto, who makes toys and entertaining clocks which "perform" mechanically.Gepetto creates a marionette type puppet in the shape of a little boy, and wishes in his prayers the boy would come alive and become real, thus making Gepetto a father. After he prays and goes to sleep, his home is visited by "The Blue Fairy" who grants half of Geppetto's wish as a reward for the old man's goodness and kindness. The puppet comes alive, but is still made of wood, and will only achieve status as a "real boy" (i.e. a human boy with real flesh and bones) if the puppet earns that by doing good things, and listening to his conscience. A visiting cricket named "Jiminey" is recruited for the job, and after Gepetto awakens and learns to his joy that Pinocchio has come alive, the puppet goes out into the world where he must make good by doing good, and in the end, after several set backs, does that. He rescues his puppet maker father from a giant whale named "Monstro."The movie ends happily with no departure from the happy old man's small home which celebrates the end of his loneliness, and the arrival of human company in his life. Jiminey Cricket ends the movie (the incredible, lilting, haunting voice of "Ukelele Ike" Cliff Edwards, the voice of "Jiminey Cricket") with the simple song "When You Wish Upon A Star" and a final portrait of the lovely star lit night time sky casting it's friendly light over the small Swiss Italian village. A simple, beautiful end to a great movie.Before the main character, Pinocchio, achieves success, he has two set backs. Both are set in the world of entertainment.He becomes a success as an actor, a star. But Pinocchio's actor success is not rewarded. Instead, his producer, Stromboli, locks the new actor star in a bird cage, and Pinocchio becomes a miserable prisoner beholding to the big money bosses who profit from his work (a realistic comment on the reality of show business.)The entire movie is great entertainment, often touching, and filled with worthwhile and humane messages about the human condition, it's follies, and it's ultimate (at times) nobility.Pinocchio (1940 Disney) is a wonderful movie worth screening often, as great in a proletarian way as Snow White And The Seven Dwarfs (1937 Disney) was great at portraying the world of story book royals, both good and bad.--------------Written by Tex Allen, SAG Actor.