Woe and wonder: Netflix brings "Guillermo del Toros Pinocchio" to the cinemas

Created: 11/23/2022, 4:07 p.m

By: Michael Schleicher

As a surrogate son, Geppetto (left) looks at his Pinocchio, which he peeled from a block of wood.

© Netflix / dpa

Guillermo del Toro and Mark Gustafson have reimagined the story of Pinocchio for Netflix.

Now the film is coming to the cinemas – and will then run on the streaming service in December.

Sometimes all the woes and wonders of life can be told with the help of a pinecone.

Just like Guillermo del Toro and Mark Gustafson do, who begin – and end – their version of “Pinocchio” with the image of this fruit.

Now the film is coming to the cinemas;

it will be available on the Netflix streaming service from December 9, 2022.

It is a project that has been worked on for many years - it was worth it.

The Mexican director and US stop-motion mastermind adapted Carlo Collodi's (1826-1890) novel about the wooden doll who desperately wants to be a flesh-and-blood boy with respect for the original.

At the same time, the two have discovered and strengthened the dark, existential aspects of the story that allow for new interpretations.

Of course, the woodcarver Geppetto is also reported here,

Guillermo del Toros Pinocchio will be available on Netflix on December 9th, 2022

This history sets the tone that del Toro and Gustafson strike: Ultimately, they negotiate the crucial questions of being human, questions about expectations and (unconditional) love, about grief, longing, loss, loneliness.

And above all this is the question of what constitutes a fulfilling life.

The answer of the two directors is clear.

They moved the plot to the 1930s, when Mussolini was celebrated everywhere - and the Italians followed him enthusiastically, as unthinkingly and mechanically as puppets.

It takes someone like Pinocchio to show people the insanity of their behavior - and on top of that to take the absurdity of the paramilitary training camps for young people that actually existed and to expose them.

These are the most political, darkest scenes in the film.

Guillermo del Toros Pinocchio is set in Mussolini's Italy

But "Pinocchio" is of course also the story of a father who is looking for his son - and a son who has to learn who to trust.

To illustrate the development of Geppetto and Pinocchio, the directing duo even draws on the Bible and the story of Jonah and the whale.

Only when the sea monster spits them out again, neither father nor son fear the divine power of love, which is always accompanied by vulnerability.

All of this is told in a wonderfully smug way by a cricket whose last name is her genus: Sebastian J. Cricket is about to write his memoirs at his desk, over which the portrait of Schopenhauer hangs, when he tumbles into the life of Geppetto and Pinocchio.

The witty author that he is, he recognizes the dramaturgical potential of this wondrous couple.

Guillermo del Toro and Mark Gustafson succeed in playing with moods and atmospheres very elegantly.

The animations - the film is co-produced by The Jim Henson Company, home of The Muppet Show - are visually gorgeous, meticulous and meticulous.

For example, the older Geppetto gets, the more sluggishly the figure moves.

Only the vocals, the makers could have saved themselves.

The film then returns to its first shot at the end.

"It comes as it comes," it says.

"And then we're gone." But the pine cone remains.

And that's comforting.

(More cinema and Netflix? Read our reviews of “Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery” and “Nothing New in the West”, Germany’s nominee for the Oscars 2023, here.)