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Guillermo Del Toro’s Pinocchio, which recently hit the screens of Netflix viewers, took a very different approach to the traditional story than many of the other versions of Pinocchio previously created. It has subsequently been immortalized as one of the most heart-warming renditions because it focuses on different themes and elements from the usual, but also because it is a new and unique creation among del Toro’s usually darker movies. It definitely has some of the dark elements that are true to his more usual themes, for example, del Toro’s Pinocchio used the perfect historical backdrop to create a sinister contrast to the warm and lovely themes of the puppet’s journey to discovering life.

The usual message behind Pinocchio is that of obedience and good behavior, and when the puppet finally learns to put others before himself, he is rewarded with the gift of life, and changed finally into a real boy. Whereas in Del Toro’s version, Pinocchio never learns to conform, he is his own true, beautiful self, and everyone around him changes instead because they learn that he was the most real and authentic of any of them, all along.

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By this time in his life, Geppetto has become a drunken, miserable old man full of hatred for the world after the loss of his son, and Pinocchio helps him turn back into his genuine loving, and doting father. Sebastian J Cricket is a pompous and self-focused writer whose only mission in life is to record his great adventures, until he meets Pinocchio and becomes the puppet’s conscience, and turns into a more considerate and social person because he finally cares for others more than he cares for himself. And Spazzatura, the sidekick of Vulpe the circus runner, turns from an angry manipulative fiend into a loyal friend and companion to Pinocchio who audiences love and empathize with, despite the fact that Spazzatura doesn’t talk throughout the movie.

Best Things About Guillermo Del Toro's Pinocchio

There is so much warmth in the colors and the creations of the production that shows why stop-motion is a treasured art form and the rich wealth and magic of the world that has been created only enhances the loving and tender outcomes of the movie. In recent years stop-motion has become a genre that leans towards sentimental, with productions such as Kubo and the Two Strings (one of the best stop-motion films of recent years) playing into family grief, emotion, and an overall feeling of non-belonging.

This shift towards heartfulness is often attributed to the almost obsessive attention to detail required of stop animation, a painstaking amount of time spend on just one micro-expression on the puppet's face. The animators not only need to replicate emotion, but they need to understand it on a level unlike any other kind of filmmaking, producing a result that feels as true, if not more so, as a real actor's face.

Something del Toro was very keen on while making the film was to treat the animators themselves as the actors he would normally direct. He gave them the autonomy to inject much of their own personality, emotions, and characteristics into the figures they animated, playing both into his own skill as a traditional film director, but also giving the animators the freedom to add their own personal flourishes to the film. It results in each and every character feeling real, all the way down to the background extras, figures who are only seen for a fraction of a second, but have likely been toiled over for hours if not days by the animators and character designers.

Best Things About Guillermo Del Toro's Pinocchio Stop-motion

It’s evident to see, when watching the Making Of documentary that can also be found on Netflix, that these actors truly believe in del Toro’s vision, not simply going along with the wants of their boss, but becoming part of, and carrying forth, his vision for the film. It seems like each and every one of them sunk their heart and soul into the story, likely a result of spending nearly 15 years on it. This is where the heartfelt nature of Pinocchio is born, a result of a group of people deeply obsessing and caring about even the little things, a natural necessity to simply create stop animation.

This acted as a great springboard to the heartfeltness of the film, combined with del Toro’s subversion of the tale to be one of acceptance and freedom in the face of conformity led to his iteration to be, perhaps surprisingly, the most tender and emotional renditions of the story. The pitfalls the others often fall into is being too afraid of feeding kids deeply emotional and often scary concepts, like war, conflict, violence, and death, creating a lovely fantasy that really only scratches the surface. Del Toro not only includes but centers the entire narrative on these aspects, using his trademarked gnarly and dark style to heighten the warm bubbly feelings of love, hope, and friendship. He raises the stakes, allowing for the reward to be all the sweeter.

MORE: How Lord Of The Rings Made Guillermo del Toro's Pinocchio Possible