Summary: The movie starts with Jiminy Cricket singing "When You Wish Upon a Star". Then we see a dark, night street and the workshop of the woodworker Geppetto. Jiminy walks in the workshop to warm himself from the cold. He notices a puppet Geppetto is working on. Geppetto names the puppet Pinocchio and after make his marionette dance around for the amused and bewildered eyes of Figaro, his cat, and Cleo, his goldfish he decides to go to bed. He notices a falling star in the sky and wishes that Pinocchio could be a real boy. While everybody is sleeping Jiminy wakes up and notices a Blue Fairy entering the room. She makes Pinocchio come alive since Geppetto has always been a good man and deserves his wish to come true. Pinocchio is alive, but still nothing more than a puppet. If he wants to become a real boy of flesh and blood he must prove himself to be brave, truthful and unselfish and able to tell right from wrong by listening to his conscience. Pinocchio doesn't understand what a conscience is and Jiminy appears to explain it to him. The Blue Fairy then assigns Jiminy with the official title of acting as Pinocchio's conscience and disappears again. Jiminy teaches Pinocchio that whenever he needs guidance he should whistle, as exemplified in the song "Give a Little Whistle". Pinocchio tumbles over some furniture during the song and wakes up Geppetto, Figaro and Cleo who were still all asleep. When Geppetto discovers his wish has become true he is filled with joy and starts to celebrate. The next day Pinocchio goes off for his first day of school. He never arrives at his destination since two crooks, the fox Honest John and the mute cat Gideon convince him to become an actor in the puppet show of Stromboli while singing the song "Hi-Diddle-Dee-Dee". Pinocchio immediately becomes a sensation singing "I've Got No Strings" at the theater and makes a lot of money for Stromboli. Stromboli however refuses Pinocchio to return home and locks him up in a bird cage. During his captivity Jiminy reappears who warned Pinocchio not to walk away with strangers, but was pushed aside by Honest John and Gideon. The Blue Fairy appears and asks Pinocchio what happened? Pinocchio lies and to his surprise his nose starts to grow longer. The Blue Fairy explains to him that his nose grew because he lied. But when Pinocchio admits he lied, the Blue Fairy forgives him and helps him escape. Meanwhile, Honest John and Gideon have met The Coachman in a tavern. The Coachman promises them a large sum of money if they can bring him little boys he can lead to Pleasure Island. The mentioning of the island and the evil grin of the Coachman scare Honest John and Gideon, but again they lure Pinocchio away and deliver him to the Coachman. Jiminy Cricket, again unable to warn Pinocchio of the danger, travels with him incognito. During the travel to Pleasure Island Pinocchio befriends Lampwick, a misbehaving and destructive boy who is older than him. On the island boys are able to have fun and do all the things adults usually forbid them to do: such as gambling, drinking, smoking and vandalism. Pinocchio imitates Lampwick and has fun doing all these mischievous things. A furious Jiminy Cricket tries to make Pinocchio leave the location, but he is only ridiculed by Lampwick. Filled with anger and humiliation Jiminey leaves them alone, but while he tries to discover a way to leave the island he makes a horrible discovery. All the misbehaving boys on the island transform into literal donkeys for "behaving like jackasses" and are then sold by the Coachman as work forces in salt mines. Jiminy rushes back to warn Pinocchio, but it's already too late. Lampwick transforms into a real barking donkey and Pinocchio has already developed donkey ears and a donkey tail. Jiminy and Pinocchio quickly escape and swim back to their hometown, hereby stopping Pinocchio's further transformation into a donkey, yet he still keeps his donkey tail and ears. Back home, they discover Geppetto is not home. He went to search for Pinocchio and took Figaro and Cleo with him on a raft to cross the sea. Pinocchio and Jiminy are informed by the Blue Fairy of Geppetto's whereabouts and decide to travel underwater at the bottom of the ocean to find him back. Pinocchio is swallowed by a large black whale called Monstro and discovers his father, Cleo, Figaro on the raft inside the whale's stomach. After a happy reunion Pinocchio comes up with an escape plan by burning wood on the raft to create smoke to make Monstro sneeze. The plan works, but the enraged sea mammal chases them. He destroys their raft and Geppetto almost drowns, only to be saved by Pinocchio who tries to swim him to the shore. Monstro swims after them, but bumps into a boulder of the rocky coastline and causes a tidal wave. Everyone washes onto shore and survives, except Pinocchio who either drowned or was killed by the enormous crash. In Geppetto's home everybody mourns over Pinocchio's death. But the Blue Fairy decides that Pinocchio has proven his worth in being a brave, good boy and brings him back to live as a real boy. Everyone celebrates Pinocchio's revival and Jiminy is awarded a medal by the Fairy for acting well as Pinocchio's conscience. The movie ends with Jiminy once again singing "When You Wish upon a Star".
Review: Who could ever forget that huge-ass whale? The the cute little cricket that told Pinocchio what to do...I would have flicked that little guy with my index finger across the room...Anyways, this is a cute movie, and the creators at Disney have done it yet again. This hasn't been released on Platinum Edition yet, not until March of this year...And in October of this year, Snow-White is being re-re-released so that it can come out on Blu-Ray, so grab your DVD or Blu-Ray copy while it's out of the vault, because when it gets locked up, it ain't getting released for another 10 to 15 years. Also in 2010, Fantasia and Fantasia 2000, and Beauty and the Beast are being re-re-re-released to Blu-Ray and DVD aswell. After the final Beauty and Beast is released, that will complete the limited Platinum Edition series, and hopefully I'll have them all by then...
