Pinocchio Platinum Edition BD and DVD

[MichaelB]

My kids (five and three) are currently refusing to watch anything else (I think it must have been on a dozen times since it arrived on Friday) but with a transfer this gorgeous that's not exactly cruel and unusual punishment.

[Michael]

My aunt still has the first DVD edition of Pinocchio so I was able to compare this to the new edition. I took a few looks last weekend. The new edition easily pulverizes the old one to ashes.

[Antoine Doinel]

Family Guy 1, Pinnochio 0

[HerrSchreck]

Good LORD.. I picked this up yesterday and watched the sd dvd (me no go blu yet)-- ECSTASY! This restoration is amazing, the level of vibrancy and detail (the visions of the fairy are just unbelievable to look at, all the brush strokes in her hair, in Pinocchio's hat feather, etc), it's like seeing the film for the first time. Absolutely beautiful, and I haven't even seen the Blu yet....

This work is such a masterpiece.

[Gregor Samsa]

It seems even better artistically when you compare it to some of Disney's attempts to do similar things in earlier cartoons. The one that most comes to mind to me is King Neptune (1932), a fairly off-the-wall Silly Symphony with naked mermaids, a gay stereotype pirate and King Neptune being a dick. But that aside, watch the way they animate the underwater scenes in that short as compared to Pinocchio, made less than eight years later, its a pretty huge difference. I was surprised the bonus features on the DVD didn't play it up more, actually.

[HerrSchreck]

I find it impossible to account for the massive accomplishment of this film-- beyond the astounding animation, the fabulous backgrounds, the amazing score, etc-- without getting right down to the most simple aspect of the production, which is its sum effect as a film on me, a viewer. The unity of all these elements as they come together-- the voices chosen to be married to the character images, the songs chosen to be married to the narrative and to enliven its look and feel, the Louvre-quality visual execution of the scenes... particularly the little extras thrown into each and every scene (like the flock of doves flying out of the bell tower during the tracking shot into the town that marks the start of Pinocchio's first morning as a living puppet, the funhouse mirroresque pov shots viz Chloe watching Gepetto make Pinoke dance, all the little clocks in motion, which could just as easily been painted into the background as static images... just like all the little bubbles in Chloe's tank-- not to mention the mindbending masterwork that constitutes the whole scene with Monstro the whale.. all the little bubbles, waves, the foam, it'a all so amazing, an incredible achivement of labor and talent in combination, uttterly meticulous and a real peak in the zone of highly detailed animation cels), one and all, the performances of the actors, etc etc etc (so many incredible individual contributions seamlessly welded together)-- is just unbelievably enchanting.

This is what I have to mention when describing why I love the film so much. The sum effect of its unspooling in front of me is profoundly, gently enthralling. I tend to enjoy pretty much the majority of these vintage Disney animated features... some standouts are Bambi, Fantasia, Dumbo, Lady & the Tramp, Cinderella... of course who doesn't love the Jungle Book... a little known film which is a favorite of mine is The Great Mouse Detective (w Vincent Price as Prof Ratigan.. with my beloved little Fidget, , Ratigan's sidekick, the peglegged sinister little bat).

All these films are magical and enchanting to greater and lesser degrees. But Pinocchio is a high water mark on so many levels. It's like a psyhological/emotional brassiere: it lifts the spirits (or at least mine) throughout the period you have it on. No matter how many times I've seen it, it remains timeless and its effect is forever preserved.

Another aspect that really gets me going when watching Pinoke: Disney always liked to keep his characters-- at least some of them-- reflecting contemporary ideas of "cool", even if the word wasn't even in existence yet; maybe a better word is "hip". (Interestingly enough, the director in the live action realm who I think most resembles this Directorial Eye For Cool was Sternberg.) The movements of his characters, their poses when stationary, the way they dance, little bits of business... utter coolness abounds. Watch Jiminy's movements during the "Give A Little Whistle" routine. The hangout between Pinoke & Lampwick in the 8 Ball pool hall... Pinoke talking outa the side of his mouth, Lampwick spitting (with a metallic *ding* when the gob hits) and strutting.. the pinkie-out, street-cool strutting of Honest John & Gideon.. they look just as hip as Vaughan Bode' characters; these guys were born to be on the side of a NYC subway whole car back in the late-70's/early 80's. In fact hanging over the whole Pleasure Island dealie is a Bowery Boy flavor, especially the place called The Rough House.

Despite the sly hipsterish nature of some of the animation/characters, the film just turns me into a little kid again when I watch it. It feels like an utterly sincere film. Not surprisingly, Oskar Fischinger's collaborative contribution to the film was to the magnificent renderings of the magical aspects of the fairy. The breathing warmth and seeming sincerity of the thing, the fullness of its: hominess in Gepetto's cabin; feeling of a bleak doom in the poolhall scene; terror of the Monstro scenes; the happiness and beauty of the fairy scenes and the slight little kick in their conversations (and Jiminy's harmless flirting)-- one could go on forever.

Since I don't have a Blu player, I have only watched the SD disc in the PLatinum set (I bought the Blu version, even though there's a 2-disc SD edition out there w/out Blu) so I haven't seen the extras. Thus I don't know the full story of all the phases of preproduction to production. I only know that Disney was not happy with the flavor of the thing, the balance of the action, the tone of the lead character. Jiminy was a critical brainchild added after the fact and vastly expanded to knit the whole thing into a perfect tapestry. Walt's touch was amazing-- his nose for the flavor of the nonexistent "Perfect Family Hearth & Home", of love and goodness and all-American dreams-fulfilled... this was a pulse the man magically had a finger forever on. A family would go to a film like this, come out of the theater and be more of a family for it. Then in time the spell breaks and they're all just a bunch of people with connected DNA again, retreating to their own private, separate mindsets heading for their respective rooms for the night.

[knives]

Damm it! Wrote a page long thing and the computer craps out on me. Summary

God this is such a great movie. Better then I even remembered or possibly realized. Everything from the colors, actors, improving on the source (mostly in the character of Pinoke), and of course the technical achievement. Monstro was an absolute feat with the waves swelling around him and that dark, black ink. What amazed me even more though was the cat, can't remember how to spell his name. His design was kept in the real world, yet from stroke one he was full of more personality then most real people. I should note that my favorite part of this release was finding out that Fantasia, my favorite Disney, is coming next March.
My one sticking point is the Blue Fairy. Her design seemed off and very awkward. I suspect it was rotoscoping. Either way she was rather distracting.
Also H. Schrek The Great Mouse Detective is one of my favorites too. That is another discussion though.