Pinocchio is a Disney film produced in
the early 1940s after the successful Snow
White and the Seven Dwarfs. It is
the second animated film made by Walt Disney and was based off of the story The Adventures of Pinocchio. The movie
itself has many themes and morals in it, both direct and slightly hidden,
present through characters and experiences in the movie, and of these themes,
the greatest overlying one is the presence of temptation in one’s life and
resisting it.
Pinocchio
begins as a lifeless wooden puppet until his maker, Geppetto, expresses a
desire to be the father of a little boy. One night, a blue fairy comes and
visits Geppetto. She makes Pinocchio come to life and promises that after he
proves himself a goodhearted being, he can become a real boy. He is gifted a
conscience, Jiminy Cricket, to guide him along the correct path of life as he
endures through trials and temptation. Although Pinocchio makes a lot of wrong
choices and ends up in bad places, in the end, his virtue wins over and he
becomes a real boy. Then, he, Geppetto and Jiminy Cricket live happily ever
after.
The
characters in the movie Pinocchio represent
many different kinds of real-life characters that can be found in an average
person’s life. One of these individuals, and the most prevalent of them, is
Pinocchio himself, the protagonist. In the movie, Pinocchio can be related to
one’s self. He represents us—moving along in this life, being tempted and tried
by people who we might think are our friends or by nature itself. Especially as
latter-day saints, we believe that we start out as innocent, naïve spirits who
just want to become like our Father. We want to become “real boys” and so does
our Father. So we are gifted with life through our bodies, but with that life
also comes tribulation. After we are tested and if we come out strong, we are
blessed to be just like our Father and we all live happily ever after.
Along this
path of life though, we need help just like Pinocchio did. There is no way that
he could have endured through all that temptation without someone there to tell
him what was right and what was wrong. That little voice that helped him choose
the right, even though it didn’t have much success during the journey, was his
conscience and this conscience of his happened to be his friend Jiminy Cricket.
Jiminy is a cricket who is constantly trying to help Pinocchio do good things
so that he may reach his ultimate goal—to become a real boy. For the most part,
Jiminy is always by Pinocchio’s side, telling him what he should be doing, but
because Pinocchio finds the looks of evil very appealing, he eventually makes
such bad choices that Jiminy cannot follow him. When Pinocchio chooses to go
within the walls of Pleasure Island, where little boys enjoy evil so much that
they become donkeys by making “jackasses of themselves,” Jiminy is shut out and
cannot get to the puppet boy to warn him of the danger he is getting himself
into. This is like a strong belief of Mormons. We believe that everyone is
blessed with the Light of Christ to guide them to make good decisions
throughout life. We also believe that members are blessed with the constant
companionship of the Holy Ghost, as long as they are choosing right. But once a
person has gone a certain distance down the wrong path, the Spirit can no
longer stay by his side to warn him of evil and temptation.
Another
character present who is responsible for much of the temptation presented to
Pinocchio is Honest John, along with his speechless silent Gideon. On Pinocchio’s
first day of school, he meets this sly fox and right away, Honest John is
trying to mislead Pinocchio and trick him into choosing wrong. Not only is his
name deceiving and ironic, but also the way he tempts Pinocchio. He makes evil
look fun, exciting, desirable and even necessary. The first time he tempts
Pinocchio is when he convinces him that he needs to join Stromboli’s puppet
show. Instead of going to school, Pinocchio decides to do this and ends up
locked in a birdcage with no escape. The second time Honest John deceives the
puppet boy, he convinces Pinocchio that he is ill and the only cure is to go to
Pleasure Island. Instead of being cured from his illness, Pinocchio
miraculously escapes with donkey ears and a tail. Honest John can be compared
to the devil. Both tempt people to do evil and are conniving and deceiving in
their ways. They make bad look fun and even good.
The last
main character of Pinocchio is
Geppetto, Pinocchio’s maker. He is a humble toymaker whose only desire is to be
the father of a real boy. One night, he creates a marionette and names
Pinocchio. Before going to bed, he makes a wish upon a star, asking that his
wooden puppet can come to life. The star turns into the Blue Fairy who makes
Pinocchio come to life. Then by the end of the movie, he becomes a real boy,
just like his father Geppetto. This modest toymaker can represent God. They are
both fabricators of intricate creations, whether it’s a wooden puppet or human
beings. Both of these creations became or will become like their makers—alive and
whole. While Gepetto isn’t as grand and perfect as Heavenly Father, he can be
compared to Him on a smaller scale.
The
characters of Pinocchio represent
characters of life in a very real way. It presents a moral to its audience that
would normally be quite heavy to undertake, but is made lighter through an
innocent, more playful story which is great for children and even adults. The
characters help develop this moral and make Pinocchio a movie that not only
teaches its audience the importance of making good choices, but does so in an
enjoyable and intriguing way.
-Brianna
