The Disney version of Pinocchio is drastically altered in Guillermo del Toro’s film, with the scariest sequence cut out.
Stop-motion animation directed by Guillermo del Toro The new Pinocchio movie is a refreshing twist on the famous story, altering several aspects previously established as canon (including the film’s scariest scene in comparison to Disney’s Pinocchio). Disney’s Pinocchio features some rather frightening scenes for a children’s cartoon film, including human trafficking, sea monsters eating people, and a youngster being transformed into a donkey. Some of these components are absent from Guillermo del Toro’s Pinocchio, and while this eliminates the scariest scene from the Disney version, it also makes del Toro’s film far poorer.
In Pinocchio, directed by Guillermo del Toro, the adventures of the famous wooden puppet are relocated to early twentieth-century fascist Italy. This necessitates several plot adjustments to make the picture work within its new historical context, such as the introduction of the malevolent Podesta and the death of Geppetto’s son as a result of an air attack during World War I. Some of the film’s more fanciful parts are cut; for example, in del Toro’s adaptation, the Fox and the Cat merge with Mangiafuoco to form Count Volpe. Disney’s deadliest scenario is transformed into something even more terrifying after the magical elements are removed, and fascism is added.
Pinocchio director Guillermo del Toro swaps out donkeys for child soldiers.
on their trip to Pleasure Island, Pinocchio and the Boys
Near the end of Disney’s Pinocchio, the titular wooden boy travels to Pleasure Island, also known as Toyland, where children are free to indulge in their every whim. After seeing his pal Lampwick’s horrifying transformation into a donkey, Pinocchio barely makes it off of Pinocchio’s Pleasure Island before the other kids start changing into donkeys, too. Instead of changing into donkeys at Toyland, the children in del Toro’s Pinocchio are transformed into child soldiers at an Italian training camp, a more realistic and, thus, darker scenario.
In the training camp scenes, the children are taught to kill and are eventually turned against each other, reiterating Del Toro’s themes of fascism and free thought. It’s far more beneficial to have the kids go from playing in Toyland to engaging in drills and paintball to transition into real killers if they’ve already had their pleasure there. The children’s breakdown and adoption of fascist ideology began with their free will, given that the camp’s more enjoyable activities led straight to conflict and death. Guillermo del Toro’s Pinocchio is significantly darker thanks to the inclusion of the child army training camp, despite the loss of Toyland and the donkeys.
Scarier than fiction is a realistic take on Pinocchio.
Although many kids were traumatized by Disney’s donkey changes, del Toro’s grounded interpretation of Pinocchio is far superior. Unlike the Pleasure Island scene, this one actually happened, with small children being drafted into the army and the townspeople declaring themselves proud fascists. To many, Guillermo del Toro’s Pinocchio is scarier than Disney’s version because the events shown here genuinely occurred in Italy a little over a century ago.
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