WOODEN DOLL

Wairarapa Times-Age, 9 August 1940, Page 9

WOODEN DOLL

COMES TO LIFE TN DISNEY FILM. Walt Disney’s tenderly jocose attitude towards the creatures of his fancy is displayed deliciously in •'Pinocchio,” his successor to “Snow White." The tale of a wooden doll which comes to life is admirable material for the expression of the Disney gifts. Reviewing the film, a London critic, A. C. Lejeune, wrote: In “Pinocchio” Walt Disney has made a film so good that it crowns the whole of the first fifty years of cinema. In colour, movement, imagery, and sheer vigorous use of a medium 'there has never been anything to equal it. Beside Disney’s sure grasp of the cinema all the others are apt to seem like tumblers. This is picture making

as it should be —the film, the whole film, and nothing but the film.

You can’t attempt to compare it with “Snow White” as a technical work, so far have the artists and the medium developed. You can, I think, say fairly that the music has a less bewitching quality. You may miss the Frank Churchill melodies of “Snow White” and many of the earlier Disneys, and believe as I do that Mr Churchill has got to be brought back into the Disney fold at any cost whatever. You can. too, I think, sentimentalise over a certain missing wistfulness in the present work.

There is no sequence in “Pinocchio” that catches at your throat quite like the animal scenes in “Snow White,” the moment at the glass coffin, the touching bits with the baby animals. But these are not lost. I am sure, only set aside. It is. as it should be. a question of mood, and "Pinocchio” is cast in a tougher, more vigorous mood than its predecessor.

The great point is that here is a piece of visual entertainment that has been richly imagined and superbly executed. You don't have to find excuses for cartoon flicker because there is practically no flicker.

Most people by now know the outlines of the story. Gepetto, an old wood-carver, makes a wooden boy, Pinocchio, and wishes he could come to life. His wish is granted—up to a point. The child can talk and run and sing and dance but he is still made of wood. An absurd little creature, Jiminy Cricket, is appointed as his official conscience. If Pinocchio is good and brave and obedient, he is told he can. become a real boy.

But Pinocchio does not listen to his conscience. He falls into one bit of trouble after another. He is kidnapped by a puppet showman and locked in a cage. He is taken to Pleasure Island, where bad boys smash and smoke and play pool and over-eat and then are turned into donkeys. In the end, a sadder and wiser puppet, he goes home, only to find that Gepetto has been swallowed by a whale.

Pinocchio plunges into the water to save him and is drowned. But as Gepetto sits by the broken puppet, slowly the eyes open, the wooden nose turns into a freckled snub, and ihe hands become flesh and blood, and Pinocchio is a real boy at last, alive and happy. Everyone who sees the picture will have his favourite characters. The men I find prefer the spry, wise-crack-ing Jiminy Cricket. The women like the velvet-coated kitten Figaro. Pinocchio himself has an oddly endearing quality in his wide wooden gaze, and many people will have a sneaking affection for Lampwick, the Mickey Rooney bad boy. Indeed, there isn’t a drawing in the whole cast who does not act like a veteran. Mr Disney, messieurs, the animators, ladies and gentlemen, one and all. I thank you for what is quite simply the best film ever made!