Pinocchio

On Disney+ Day (September 8th), Pinocchio was released onto Disney+. Pinocchio is the live-action remake of the 1940s classic of the same name. It follows a puppet brought to life as he goes on a quest to become a real boy.

This movie was entertaining enough in its attempt to bring a classic story to modern audiences. It has a few funny moments in there that these remakes try to throw in. It also added a few songs that were not in the original but were decent enough. The main standout of the film was Tom Hanks as Geppetto. Being such a standout actor, he adds a bit of star power to the film and draws intrigue into why he chose to do this film. There is also just a certain bit of nostalgia and novelty to seeing classic cartoons as live-action films.

Unfortunately, that is about as good as it gets, as overall this film is just not good. Starting off, Pinocchio is such an odd film to choose to remake as the original film is inherently episodic and does not have enough substance for a 2-hour film. Because of this, there was quite a bit of extra padding to the film just there to inflate the run time, and doesn't add anything of value to the film. Unlike the other live actions remakes which at least try to add some depth to the characters, this film doesn't even attempt to add anything new and just goes a shot-for-shot remake with some added fluff to get a runtime close to two hours. The other main issue of the film is that the CGI is just not good. The lower quality level of CGI makes the characters come across as creepy more than cute and really just makes the CGI characters look so out of place. The CGI in general was also just a bit overused with the filmmakers feeling the need to CGI the cat and fish instead of just using real animals. Finally, as with most of the other live-action remakes, this film just feels unnecessary. It gives off the vibe that Disney ran out of ideas and is just remaking every animated film they have done instead of filtering through which films actually deserve to be remade.

Overall, this film is just another unnecessary remake from Disney that doesn't add anything new to the story and has low-quality CGI. If I am ever in the mood for Pinocchio, I am just going to watch the original.

Score: 4.5/10 Grade: C- Recommendation: Skip it