The director of the Oscar-winning The Shape of Water has turned the timeless fable into a magical Mussolini-era parable Death and fascism may not seem ideal subjects for a life-affirming fantasy animation for grownup children of all ages, but Guillermo del Toro has turned it into a Mussolini parable about a “lethal form of control and paternity”.
The Tale of Pinocchio
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Carpenter Geppetto (voiced by David Bradley) has lost his beloved son, Carlo, in the Great War
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He builds a puppet to replace his lost child, but when a blue spirit breathes life into the puppet, he is initially terrified
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The film’s sheer strangeness – that peculiarly magical, lapsed-Catholic sensibility that runs throughout Del Toro’s most personal works – that makes this sing very sing-songy fare indeed
