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Disney Rewatch: Pinocchio
Aug. 24th, 2019 08:42 amI haven’t seen Pinocchio for years because the whale scene scared me when I was small. Rewatching it, I was amazed that I got as far as the whale scene: the evil fox and cat who sell Pinocchio to the evil theater manager who locks him in a bird cage didn’t get me? And neither did the island where the bad boys got turned into jackasses after drinking, smoking, and playing pool?
Actually, that may have appealed to my sense of vengeance at the time. The bad boys brought it on themselves! Now the donkey who can still talk and begs to be sent home to his mother just strikes me as tragic.
The animation in this film is gorgeous: the early scenes especially show it off when we see ALL of Gepetto’s fancy novelty clocks and music boxes, as if the animators were having a competition to see who could come up with the funniest and most intricate clock. Actually, I really appreciate the willingness in these early Disney films to stop the action dead just to appreciate the fancy clocks, or to have Figaro the kitten climb up to open the window, which is irrelevant to the plot but cute as the dickens. It gives the story room to breathe, it enriches the world, and the pacing doesn’t suffer at all. I was in fact surprised when we got to the whale, because I knew that meant we were near the end, and it really didn’t feel like we’d been watching that long at all.
It also struck me, not so much in a Disney-specific way but as a side-note, how many folk tale versions there are of the story about an old person (an old man, or an old woman, or a little old man and a little old woman) who make a person out of wood or clay or snow or whatever and some power brings it to life. A common human fantasy? At least at some point in time.
Next up! Fantasia. I’m super looking forward to this: it’s a chance to revisit a lot of old favorites (the fairies! the mushrooms! the waltz of the flowers!) and also to see if the final sequence with the giant Satan looming over the mountain is really as terrifying as I remember.
Actually, that may have appealed to my sense of vengeance at the time. The bad boys brought it on themselves! Now the donkey who can still talk and begs to be sent home to his mother just strikes me as tragic.
The animation in this film is gorgeous: the early scenes especially show it off when we see ALL of Gepetto’s fancy novelty clocks and music boxes, as if the animators were having a competition to see who could come up with the funniest and most intricate clock. Actually, I really appreciate the willingness in these early Disney films to stop the action dead just to appreciate the fancy clocks, or to have Figaro the kitten climb up to open the window, which is irrelevant to the plot but cute as the dickens. It gives the story room to breathe, it enriches the world, and the pacing doesn’t suffer at all. I was in fact surprised when we got to the whale, because I knew that meant we were near the end, and it really didn’t feel like we’d been watching that long at all.
It also struck me, not so much in a Disney-specific way but as a side-note, how many folk tale versions there are of the story about an old person (an old man, or an old woman, or a little old man and a little old woman) who make a person out of wood or clay or snow or whatever and some power brings it to life. A common human fantasy? At least at some point in time.
Next up! Fantasia. I’m super looking forward to this: it’s a chance to revisit a lot of old favorites (the fairies! the mushrooms! the waltz of the flowers!) and also to see if the final sequence with the giant Satan looming over the mountain is really as terrifying as I remember.
