Pinocchio (1940)

Pinocchio is a 1940 American animated musical fantasy film produced by Walt Disney Productions and based on the Italian children's novel The Adventures of Pinocchio by Carlo Collodi.

Directed by Norman Ferguson, T. Hee, Wilfred Jackson. With Dickie Jones, Christian Rub, Mel Blanc, Don Brodie. A living puppet, with the help of a cricket as his conscience, must prove himself worthy to become a real boy.

Pinocchio (1940) on IMDb: Plot summary, synopsis, and more...

When the gentle woodcarver Geppetto (Christian Rub) builds a marionette to be his substitute son, a benevolent fairy brings the toy to life. The puppet, named Pinocchio (Dick Jones), is not yet a human boy. He must earn the right to be real by proving that he is brave, truthful, and unselfish. But, even with the help of Jiminy (Cliff Edwards), a cricket who the fairy assigns to be Pinocchio's conscience, the marionette goes astray. He joins a puppet show instead of going to school, he lies instead of telling the truth, and he travels to Pleasure Island instead of going straight home. Yet, when Pinocchio discovers that a whale has swallowed Geppetto, the puppet single-mindedly journeys into the ocean and selflessly risks his life to save his father, thereby displaying that he deserves to be a real boy. Based on a series of stories by 19th century Italian author Carlo Collodi, Pinocchio came under fire for being a sugarcoated version of its original tale, but the film's moral did have a strong educational effect on children. Soon enough, a 16 mm excerpt from the picture, titled

Pinocchio (1940), Disney's second feature-length animated film followed after the success of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937), and was produced during Disney's heyday from 1937-1942 of animated classics, along with Fantasia (1940), Dumbo (1941) and Bambi (1942).

When the Russian director Sergei Eisenstein saw Disney's "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs," he called it the greatest film ever made. High praise from a man whose "Battleship Potemkin" then topped lists of great films.

Now a part of the celebrated Walt Disney Signature Collection, the timeless story of Pinocchio inspires a new generation with its masterful animation, award-...

A living puppet, with the help of a cricket as his conscience, must prove himself worthy to become a real boy.