There are a number of conspiracy theories around the new Lionsgate animated picture Pinocchio: A True Story. I believe in all of them. Here is a film that is so mesmerizingly incompetent and "off" in so many respects that it seems meticulously devised, in its own sense -- even, dare I say, intentional.
Yes, the popular theory states that this movie (or at least, its US dub) was made into a baffling mess on purpose so as to attract attention and that the myriad of TikTok memes about the film -- mostly revolving around Pauly Shore's vocal performance as the wooden child Pinocchio, now sounding more like a fruity middle-aged man -- was totally part of the plan. I mean, when the official Lionsgate TikTok page posts "sigma male Patrick Bateman" memes and this film's official IMDb page boasts a world premiere in the United Arab Emirates, it might be safe to assume we're officially being trolled by an entire movie studio.
Not to be confused with the upcoming Del Toro film, the Disney remake, and a bunch of others that I'm probably forgetting about, this particular Pinocchio features Pauly Shore as Pinocchio and Jon Heder in the role of his talking horse, which is the best news that I've received about now-forgotten comedic actors since I learned of Rob Schneider and Norm of the North. Early on in the film, we're advised to forget what we think we know of Collodi's tale of the puppet child who longs to be a real boy.
Gone are the giant whale and the cursed island with the children turned into donkeys. In their place are a trigger-happy cat, a song number that seems to have been translated directly from Martian, and a few jokes that must have been scavenged from the wastebasket of the Shrek writer's room.
You have surely seen some of these things in the trailers and memes, but really, you've only been catching glimpses of this film's insanity.
Despite the talking horse's aforementioned warnings that this won't be the fairy tale we're used to, and despite the fact that I actually saw a different English dub than the meme'd one, will anyone truly be ready for the first shot of Pinocchio and Gepetto (Tom Kenny), where the latter casually carries the former's disembodied, bored-looking head into frame, plonks it down on the carpentry table, and starts hammering it onto the body? Or the fact that almost every line we hear -- not just the trailer highlights -- is gloriously bizarre in its own right?
I mean it, folks. Pretty much every second of this opening is surreal: Gepetto popping Pinocchio down on a chair and saying straight out, "Now I will be less lonely"; Gepetto musing that Leonardo might've been an appropriate name for the boy, hadn't there been the possibility that he'd grow up into a "selfish actor" or a turtle who likes pizza a bit too much; Gepetto initiating a conversation with the Jon Heder horse character by declaring that he is "probably" the only talking horse in the world; the subsequent images of Pinocchio gaining sentience... I could, quite literally, go on for another 90 minutes.
It helps that the editing is horrendous, ergo many of these disgusting/baffling/hilarious sights just sort of show up (yet again, Heder's warnings are of little comfort). While I don't typically wish to humor stoners, I must profess that this might be the Best Movie to Watch Under the Influence of Pot ever made.
What do I really need to tell you about a film like this? There are Barbie movies with better animation, Dingo Pictures joints with more moving stories, and fever dreams with more sensical dialogue. Watch the Japanese film 964 Pinocchio for a less maddening experience (I'm almost entirely non-sarcastic when I say that).
