Western Animation / Pinocchio

"Someday, I'm gonna be a real boy."

"When you wish upon a star,
Makes no difference who you are,
Anything your heart desires will come to you."

— Jiminy Cricket, singing the opening theme of the film (which would later become the theme of Disney as a whole)

Released in 1940, Pinocchio is the second film in the Disney Animated Canon, based very loosely on The Adventures of Pinocchio by Carlo Collodi.

The woodworker Geppetto creates a puppet, which he names Pinocchio. Before going to bed, he notices the wishing star and wishes on it that Pinocchio would become a real boy. The Blue Fairy hears his wish and brings Pinocchio to life. She promises him that he will become a real boy if he can prove himself brave, truthful, and unselfish, and she assigns Jiminy Cricket to be his guiding conscience in the meantime.

The opening song, "When You Wish Upon a Star", is arguably the most well-known and beloved song of any Disney movie, and has since become the theme song for the Disney Theme Parks. A brief excerpt of the melody is used in Disney's Vanity Plate (the one with the castle) at the beginning of many of their movies.

There are licensed platform games released in 1995 for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System, Sega Genesis and Game Boy. In The '90s, Disney created a Made-for-TV Movie musical, Geppetto, that switched the P.O.V. character to that of the toymaker and focused on his Character Development as he learns how to be a good father. Featuring songs from the original alongside new Stephen Schwartz numbers, it was adapted for the amateur theater circuit as My Son Pinocchio in The New '10s.

A live-action/CGI remake of the film was released exclusively to Disney+ on September 8, 2022 directed by Robert Zemeckis. With Benjamin Evan Ainsworth voicing the titular character, Tom Hanks as Geppetto, Joseph Gordon-Levitt as Jiminy Cricket, and Keegan-Michael Key as Honest John.

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Disney's Pinocchio provides examples of:

• Abnormal Limb Rotation Range
  • Pinocchio turns his whole body around in a circle while maintaining eye contact with Geppetto when Geppetto examines him before he was about to go to school.
  • Pinocchio is just full of this in general. He shows off several spinning limb moves in the Stromboli performance. Justified, as he's a puppet and has joints different from those of a human.
• Accidental Tickle Torture: See Squirrels in My Pants below.
• Ace Of Spades: Honest John tricks Pinocchio into going to the dangerous Pleasure Island by giving him his "ticket", an Ace of Spades card.
• Act of True Love: At the end of the film, Pinocchio dies saving Geppetto's life. It's this sacrifice that proves to the Blue Fairy that Pinocchio is brave, truthful and unselfish, and she brings him back to life and turns him into a real boy.
• Adaptational Karma: Inverted with the Fox and the Cat. Unlike the book, without counting their miserable condition and pathetic existence from the beginning, they seem to avoid, at least onscreen, all punishment in the film. There was originally a scene where the two were going to be arrested for their crimes (most likely for their usual petty crimes on a daily basis in the Village), but this was cut from the final script and is instead left to the viewers to deduce their ultimate fate after Pinocchio's escape from Pleasure Island.
  • However, there's the fact that many book and comic book adaptations released since just after the release of the film (and also the book ''Mouse Under Glass'') state, or better confirm that Geppetto found out of Pinocchio's presence on Pleasure Island and embarked with his ship accompanied by Figaro and Cleo to save him before getting swallowed by Monstro on his way to the island, and the only people who could know that information were Honest John & Gideon and probably some villagers who heard and saw the duo taking Pinocchio to the coach for Pleasure Island at the crossroads while loudly singing "Hi-Diddle-Dee-Dee, It's Pleasure Isle For Me" in late evening, not to mention that Pleasure Island, as mentioned by Honest John at the Red Lobster Inn, is a notorious destination declared illegal by authorities.
• Adaptational Nice Guy
  • In the original novel, Pinocchio is a Jerk with a Heart of Gold who starts off being quite reckless and disobedient, learning his lessons the hard way. Disney's version portrays him in a much more sympathetic manner. Here, he is a generally well-meaning but naïve child who is talked into bad things due to his innocence.
  • Collodi's Geppetto was clearly a loving father, but more of a Grumpy Old Man and not very friendly. Here, he is far nicer and better tempered.
  • The Cricket in the book was not the cheerful, friendly cricket of this film. He was stern whenever he admonished Pinocchio.
• Adaptational Villainy
  • Stromboli's incarnation in the original novel, Mangiafuoco/Fire-Eater, was actually one of the nicest characters Pinocchio encounters. While he did attempt to use Pinocchio for firewood to finish cooking his roast, that was only after Pinocchio interrupted his puppet show, and when he learned of Pinocchio's plight regarding Geppetto he took pity on him, even giving him money to help pay for what the puppet needed, and decides to eat a half-cooked roast instead of burning another puppet in Pinocchio's place.
  • While the book's counterpart of Monstro, the Terrible Dogfish, swallows Geppetto and Pinocchio, it's not portrayed as a malicious creature, but rather a wild animal uncaring of what it's causing while feeding itself, it doesn't even chase after the two when they escape (which they do more easily by taking advantage of the Dogfish sleeping with an open mouth due to its asthma).
• Adaptation Distillation: This film leaves out many of the subplots of the book.
• Adaptation Dye-Job: The Blue Fairy, originally called the Fairy with Blue Hair, has her hair changed from blue to blonde. Instead, her eyes and dress are blue.
• Adaptation Expansion: In the original story, Jiminy Cricket was a minor character and was never even given a proper name, being referred to simply as the "Talking Cricket". He has since become something of the anthropomorphic (well, cricket-morphic) personification of conscience.
• Adaptation Name Change: Mangiafuoco (Fire-eater) to Stromboli, the Fairy with Blue Hair to the Blue Fairy. Lampwick (Lucignolo) also has his name translated as "Candlewick" in some English versions of the book. Plus, the Talking Cricket is now Jiminy Cricket, the Fox and the Cat are Honest John Worthington Foulfellow and Gideon, and the unnamed Geppetto's cat has been given the name Figaro and a much more prominent role.
• Adaptation Species Change: Monstro the whale book equivalent is a "terrible dogfish" (that is, a shark).
• Adjective Animal Alehouse: The Red Lobster Inn, which is where the Coachman tends to hang out whenever he's not kidnapping boys, taking them to Pleasure Island, turning them into donkeys and shipping them to either the salt mines or the circus.
• Adults Are More Anthropomorphic: Figaro, who is a kitten, is a Nearly Normal Animal, while John Worthington Foulfellow and Gideon are Funny Animals.
• Advertising by Association: In the Disney Animated Canon's earliest known example of this trope, the original trailer appealed to fans of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, by playing an excerpt of "Heigh-Ho," then boasting, "Walt Disney brings you his first and only full-length feature since Snow White."
• Aesop Collateral Damage: When Pinocchio plays hooky and ends up on Pleasure Island, Geppetto gets trapped inside Monstro the whale so his adopted son can learn the lesson about being a good boy.
• Affectionate Nickname: Jiminy Cricket tends to call Pinocchio "Pinoke", while Geppetto sometimes calls him "little wooden head," and on Pleasure Island, Pinocchio and Lampwick call each other "Slats" and "Lampy."
• Alcohol Hic
  • One of the cuckoo clocks features an inebriated character whose hiccups are its chimes.
  • Gideon also hiccups while guzzling beer at the Red Lobster Inn - the only vocalizations from Mel Blanc that were left in the film after Disney decided to make the character mute.
• All Men Are Perverts: Jiminy Cricket goes from angrily not watching Pinocchio's show to excitedly watching it with eyeglasses on when he sees the French girl puppets doing the can-can.
• All Part of the Show: Stromboli becomes so livid with rage at Pinocchio's initially messing up on his puppet show performance, tripping and falling down the stairs as he did, that he becomes borderline violent toward the puppet, but when he hears the audience laughing, he calms down and tries to make it look like it's all part of the act. "Cute kid!" Stromboli says of the puppet.
• All There in the Script: Honest John's last name, Foulfellow, is never revealed at any point in the movie, but is brought up when referred to by the cast and crew, as well as storybook adaptations, (and one episode of House of Mouse).
• Ambiguously Human
  • The Coachman. His possible identity ranges from simply an evil and greedy man with access to a cursed island to Satan himself. And he, unlike the other human characters in the film (including Pinocchio turned into a real boy), has only 4 fingers per hand instead of five, and his face changes suddenly and drastically at one point in the Red Lobster Inn, terrorizing almost to death Foulfellow and Gideon.
  • The Coachman's hairy, shadowy minions as well. It's not clear if they're humans, anthropomorphic animals like Honest John and Gideon (probably gorillas based on their body proportions and black fur), demons, or something else. One illustration for a storybook based on the movie shows the thugs in a more well-lit scene, and it depicts them as human: they're ordinary men with hairy forearms who wear executioner's hoods. However, whether this is also the case in the original movie is still unclear.
• Amusement Park of Doom: Pleasure Island turns the hedonistic children who linger there into donkeys.
• Anachronism Stew: Pleasure Island is covered with neon lights and other mechanical animatronics too advanced for the era. Also, there are parade balloons seen, which would not be invented until 1927.
  • Some of Geppetto's cuckoo clocks make beeping and buzzing sounds similar to those of modern electric and quartz alarm clocks.
• And I'm the Queen of Sheba: Jiminy Cricket's outraged reaction after Pinocchio sticks up for Lampwick:
  Pinocchio: Don't hurt him, Jiminy. He's my best friend.
  Jiminy: Your best friend? And what am I, just your conscience? Okay, that settles it!
• And I Must Scream: Done to children by the demonic Coachman. They have mouths, but all they can do is bray... trapped in a nightmare of slavery, torture and anguish that will end only with their Cruel and Unusual Death.
• And Your Reward Is Clothes: When Jiminy offers to be Pinocchio's conscience, the fairy rewards his generosity by giving him a nice set of new clothes to replace the rags he wears at the start of the movie.
• Angrish: Stromboli unleashes quite a bit of this.
• Animate Inanimate Object: The eponymous Pinocchio.
• Animated Musical: As usual.
• Animorphism: Pleasure Island is cursed to slowly turn the naughty boys into donkeys the longer they stay there.
• Annoyingly Repetitive Child: The movie has a moment of repeatedly saying, "Why?" when Geppetto puts him to bed.
  Geppetto: Now close your eyes, and go to sleep.
  Pinocchio: Why?
  Geppetto: Everyone needs to sleep. Figaro, Cleo, and tomorrow, you've got to go to school.
  Pinocchio: Why?
  Geppetto: Oh, to learn things, and get smart.
  Pinocchio: Why?
  Geppetto: (Falling asleep) Because...
• Anti-Alcohol Aesop: In the Pleasure Island scene, children being allowed to drink is one of the many things that ruins many of the children's lives into a life of slavery as donkeys. Pinocchio tosses his beer away when he rightfully suspects that he may turn into a donkey like Lampwick if he continues drinking it.
• Apple for Teacher: When Pinocchio starts for school, Geppetto hands him an apple to give to his teacher. When he encounters Honest John and Gideon, the former eats the apple and gives him back the core.
• Artistic License – Animal Care: The Food Porn feast Geppetto prepares to welcome Pinocchio home from his first day of school (which unfortunately is never eaten) includes a whole roasted fish for Figaro with a lemon slice, olives, and butter, and a chocolate-frosted cake, of which even Cleo gets a slice. In real life, lemon and butter are not good for cats, and it probably goes without saying that goldfish shouldn't be fed cake.
• Artistic License – Marine Biology: Monstro the whale looks like a demonic cross between a sperm whale and a baleen whale; the body shape is that of a sperm whale, but he has a head much too wide and teeth on both jaws when real sperm whales have laterally-flattened heads and only have teeth on their very thin lower jaw. He also has belly pleats, which is a trait of baleen whales. He's seen deeply sleeping at the bottom of the ocean - whales don't sleep that way; they sleep hanging vertically in the water and half of their brain is actually still awake to ensure that they surface and breathe or else they would drown.^note Although it's eventually revealed he's just pretending to sleep so he can ambush passing schools of fish.
• Artistic License – Physics: While underwater, Pinocchio floats as expected. However, once he ties a rock to himself, he suddenly stops floating and can simply walk along the sea floor, dragging the rock behind him. And then he suddenly starts floating like normal again.
• Ascended Extra
  • Jiminy Cricket in the original story, he was a nameless cricket who was squashed by the title character early on and appeared later as a ghost. In the Disney version, he was given the name Jiminy Cricket and promoted to narrator. Not only did he practically steal the movie away from its title character, but he's gone on to host/narrate other Disney films, short subjects, and theme park shows. He's also a notable character in several of the Kingdom Hearts games.
  • Figaro was based on a minor cat in the book which Geppetto had. He has shown up in a lot of other Disney material whenever a character needs a cat.
  • Jiminy went on to become a recurring character in the Disney Animated Canon (appearing again in Fun and Fancy Free), as well as host a series of educational cartoons in the 1950s called I'm No Fool, and his theme music became the theme for Disney in general.
  • And is now played in Once Upon a Time by the same actor who was Revan and Shepard's "voice of conscience".
• Awesome, but Impractical: Jiminy describes Geppetto's wish for Pinocchio to become a real boy as this.
  Jiminy Cricket: A very lovely thought. But not at all practical.
• Awesomeness by Analysis: Pinocchio comes up with the idea of building a big fire on the boat to get Monstro to sneeze.
• Ax-Crazy: The Coachman. Despite his friendly appearance, he is a sadistic maniac who has a rather twisted idea of punishment.
• Bad Guy Bar: The Red Lobster Inn, where Honest John and Gideon discuss business with the Coachman.
• Bad Guys Play Pool: One of the vices on Pleasure Island. Jiminy specifically invokes this trope, listing pool along with the vices of drinking and smoking.
• Bad Liar: Pinocchio, when the Blue Fairy rescues him from Stromboli's wagon:
  Blue Fairy: Pinocchio, why didn't you go to school?
  Jiminy Cricket [prompting Pinocchio, whispering]: Go ahead. Tell her.
  Pinocchio: I was going to school 'til I met somebody.
  Blue Fairy: Met somebody?
  Pinocchio: Yeah, two big monsters, with big green eyes! [His nose starts to grow] Why, I...
  Blue Fairy: Monsters? Weren't you afraid?
  Pinocchio: No, ma'am, but they tied me in a big sack. [His nose grows longer]
  Blue Fairy: You don't say? And where was Sir Jiminy?
  Pinocchio: Huh? Oh, Jiminy...
  Jiminy Cricket: Psst! Leave me out of this.
  Pinocchio: They put him in a little sack. [His nose grows even longer]
  Blue Fairy: No!
  Pinocchio: Yeah! [His long nose sprouts flowers]
  Blue Fairy: How did you escape?
  Pinocchio: I didn't - they chopped me into firewood! [A birds' nest forms at the end of Pinocchio's nose]
  Pinocchio: Oh look, my nose! What's happened?
  Blue Fairy: Perhaps you haven't been telling the truth, Pinocchio.
  Jiminy Cricket: Perhaps?
  Pinocchio: Oh, but I have! Every single word! [The leaves and the birds' nest wither away, with the birds flying away]
• Ball of Light Transformation: The Blue Fairy first appears as a bright light that looks like a star before taking the form of a beautiful woman. Then she departs in the same way.
• Barefoot Cartoon Animal: "Honest" John Worthington Foulfellow and Gideon.
• Batman Can Breathe in Space
  • Pinocchio and Jiminy can breathe and speak underwater.
  • Geppetto and Figaro lived in Monstro's belly, at the bottom of the sea, for days if not weeks.
• Beard of Evil: Stromboli, the puppet master. He's a very unpleasant man backstage.
• Big Bad Ensemble: Honest John, Stromboli, The Coachman, and Monstro.
• Big Good:
  • The Blue Fairy, who brings Pinocchio to life.
  • Geppetto, who takes care of Pinocchio like a son.
• Big Ol' Eyebrows: Stromboli has them.
• Big "SHUT UP!":
  • Jiminy Cricket can't sleep because of all the ticking clocks in Geppetto's shop, so he yells "QUIET!" They all stop. This was moments before the Blue Fairy enters.
  • Also used by Stromboli after he imprisons Pinocchio in the cage and Pinocchio cries out to be let out.
    Stromboli: QUIET! SHUT UP! Before I knock-a you silly!
  • Again used by the Coachman to some boys-turned-donkeys that still talk when they protest and likewise cry to be let out.
    Coachman: QUIET! You boys have had your fun! Now pay for it!
• Bittersweet Ending: Pinocchio gets reunited with Geppetto and becomes a real boy, but the Coachman is never punished. And those hundreds of innocent children who were taken from their families, turned into donkeys, and sold into slavery? They're still donkeys. No one comes to their rescue. Like in the original story, it's implied they're from other villages and towns, or the Coachman wouldn't have asked Honest John and Gideon to bring him some little bad boys late in the evening in Pinocchio's village with no one around by midnight and giving them barely the time to take him only Pinocchio just escaped from Stromboli.
• Bizarre Dream Rationalization: When Geppetto discovers late at night that his wooden puppet has come to life, he assumes he's dreaming in his sleep and douses himself with a pitcherful of water to wake himself up.
• Blink-and-You-Miss-It: When Pinocchio startles Geppetto, Figaro jumps up, right under his night shirt. No wonder Geppetto's gun goes off.
• Body Horror: The donkey transformation scene.
• Book Ends
  • The movie both starts and ends with Pinocchio and Geppetto dancing, although the first time Pinocchio's still an inanimate puppet, and the last time he's a real boy. Jiminy Cricket even lampshades it by saying, "Well, this is about where I came in!"
  • The film also starts and ends with "When You Wish Upon A Star" being sung, although it's only two lines sung at the end.
  • The film starts and ends with Jiminy Breaking the Fourth Wall.
  • The very first thing Pinocchio does, both as a puppet and as a real boy, is to sit up and rub his eyes.
  • When Pinocchio comes to life, Geppetto is initially unaware of the fact. Then when Pinocchio is brought back to life as a real boy, Geppetto is initially ignorant of the fact his son has been brought back to life.
• Bootstrapped Theme: "When You Wish Upon a Star" for Disney in general.
  • Outside of Disney, the song so influenced Steven Spielberg when he was writing Close Encounters of the Third Kind that it got a musical Shout-Out in the film.
• Breaking the Fourth Wall: Jiminy does this at the beginning after singing "When You Wish Upon A Star", and again briefly at the end, lampshading the Book Ends example.
• Breakout Character
  • Jiminy Cricket. He has become a representative of Disney second only to Mickey himself, and about on par with Tinker Bell.
  • Figaro the cat reappeared in some Disney shorts, usually as a pet of Minnie Mouse's (a role he also occasionally plays in the Mickey Mouse Comic Universe) and/or a foil to Pluto.
• Brick Joke: When Jiminy is dubbed Pinocchio's conscience by the Blue Fairy, he asks her if he would get a badge, and she replies, "We'll see." Jiminy does indeed get a badge in the final scene.
• Bumbling Henchmen Duo: Honest John and Gideon are a pair of Laughably Evil con artists. The former is actually competent and cunning, but the latter is dim-witted and just wants to bash people with his mallet. They do jobs first for Stromboli, then for the Coachman.
• Bumbling Sidekick: Gideon to "Honest" John.
• Carnivore Confusion: When waiting for Pinocchio to come back for dinner, Figaro the pet cat is chastised by the goldfish, Cleo, to not eat his dinner just yet, as they are to wait for Pinocchio. Said dinner is a fish.
• Cats Are Mean: Gideon, Honest John's feline stooge. At least once, he tries to hit Pinocchio on the head with a mallet, only to be stopped by the fox.
  Honest John: No, no, stupid! (snatches mallet) Don't be crude! (whacks Giddy on the head with mallet)
• Clamshells as Mouths: Jiminy Cricket asks a clam for the direction of Monstro. Upon hearing Monstro's name, the clam panics and (continue below)...
• Clam Trap: said clam snaps shut and traps him inside. He gets out inside a bubble as the clam digs down.
• Clockworks Area: Jiminy enters the mechanism of a music box, and is almost crushed.
• Colossus Climb: During the song scene "An Actor's Life for Me", Jiminy catches up to Pinocchio, Honest John, and Gideon by grabbing onto Honest John's tail and then hopping up onto his hat. At one point, Honest John is bobbing his head while singing, causing Jiminy to hang on for dear life.
• Compact Infiltrator: Attempted. Jiminy tries to free Pinocchio from his cage by climbing into the padlock and opening the mechanism, but this fails, and he ends up being sprung across the room.
• Constantly Curious: Pinocchio is full of questions. Although, when he doesn't know what school is, let alone what other children are, one would think one would question his ability to get to school all by himself.
• Contrived Clumsiness: Honest John gets Pinocchio's attention by tripping him up with his cane.
• Contrived Coincidence: Works against Geppetto who searching for his son cried out for Pinocchio, but his shouting was drowned out by the thunderclap of a lightning strike. Works for the two later, when escaping Monstro who wasn't underwater and not too far offshore, otherwise their efforts would've been in vain.
• Cool Old Guy: Geppetto.
• Covers Always Lie: Most of the posters or video covers look pretty cheery. The film itself, on the other hand, is pretty dark for being so early in Disney's animated canon.
• Covert Pervert: Believe it or not, Jiminy Cricket. He is shown being attracted to female humanoid characters, including and especially the Blue Fairy, and nothing wrong or bad with that so far, what puts him in this trope, however, is the fact that he "innocently" puts his glasses on to better see under the dress of the puppets resembling French can-can dancers during Pinocchio's musical number "I've Got No Strings".
• Crapsaccharine World: Pleasure Island is a textbook example of this trope. The Coachman takes disobedient boys here to allow them to do anything at all that they want, including smoke cigars, drink beer or play pool, but eventually, they are turned into donkeys and sold off by the Coachman. (Of course, the fact that Pleasure Island is a gigantic carnival world — and not the wholesome kind of carnival, either — should have tipped somebody off.) Worst of all, it is implied that the Coachman will continue his evil ways regardless.
• Creating Life Is Awesome: The titular character is created by the joint efforts of Geppetto (who built his body) and The Blue Fairy (who gave him life). It is all treated as a good thing.
• Creator's Culture Carryover: The Italian or Tuscan context of the book is all but nonexistent here.
• Cub Cues Protective Parent: Jiminy is being hassled by a little fish while on the ocean floor. He starts to shoo it away when its mother appears.
• Cuckoo Clock Gag: Geppetto has a large array of imaginatively designed clocks at his workshop with different figures sounding the time — a hunter shooting at a turkey, a mother spanking her child, a drunk in a bar hiccupping, and even a traditional cuckoo bird with three hatchlings.
• Cunning Like a Fox: Honest John.
• Cute Kitten: Figaro who is also the oldest Disney cat in the Disney Animated Canon.
• Dangled by a Giant: While Jiminy Cricket is scolding Pinocchio for smoking, Lampwick picks him up by his coattails and asks "Who's the beetle?". Jiminy angrily demands that he put him down before getting twisted up in his dangling coat.
• Dark Reprise: A much more somber and slower variation of "When You Wish Upon A Star" performed on a violin is briefly heard as Geppetto and the others are mourning Pinocchio after Pinocchio died saving Geppetto's life.
• Death by Adaptation: The Coachman in the video game.
• Delusions of Eloquence: Honest John Foulfellow, when pretending to give Pinocchio an examination before guiding him to Pleasure Island:
  Honest John: We must diagnose this case at once, ahem. Quick, Doctor, your notebook. [Gideon pretends to write down notes] Bless my soul! Hmm... mm-hmm... My my. Just as I thought: A slight touch of monetary complications with bucolic semi-lunar contraptions of the flying trapezius. Mm-hmm. Say "hippopotamus".
  Pinocchio: Hi-ho-ha-amus.
  Honest John: I knew it! Compound transmission of the pandemonium with the percussion of spasmodic frantic disintegration. Close your eyes! What do you see?
  Pinocchio: Nothing.
  Honest John: Open them! Now what do you see? [Honest John holds his spotted handkerchief in front of Pinocchio's eyes]
  Pinocchio: Spots.
  Honest John [He pretends to listen to Pinocchio's heart]: Aha! Now, that heart. Oh, my goodness! Palpitating syncopation of the killer diller with a wicky-wacky stamping of the floyjoy.
• Demoted to Extra: In the book, the Blue Fairy had a much bigger role, being a mother figure and fulfilling the role of his conscience. Here, most of her actions are done by the cricket character.
• Desperate Plea for Home: The fun at Pleasure Island is cut short when the boys are transformed into donkeys, doomed to be sold off to salt mines. While the newly-transformed kids are being caged up by the Coachman's crew, one of the few still capable of human speech can be heard crying that he wants to go home.
• Diabolus ex Machina: Right after a frantic Geppetto crosses paths with the carriage carrying his missing son, a roar of thunder drowns out the one cry of "Pinocchio!" that he and Jiminy would probably have heard.
• Digital Destruction: The 1992 restoration shifted the color scheme too closely to red tones.^note Unlike most instances of "restored" Disney movies boasting different color schemes than on an older video release, Disney has confirmed that this deviated too strongly from the movie's original appearance, due to the restoration team using a print generations removed from the original negative.
• Disney Death: Pinocchio loses consciousness rescuing Geppetto from Monstro the whale. However, by proving himself in doing so, the Blue Fairy finally makes him a real boy, also bringing him back to life.
• Disneyfication
  • The original book was more grim (and considering how nightmarish this movie can get, that's saying something!) Pinocchio is constantly a little jerk, Geppetto is more temperamental. The very first appearance of the Fairy is ghastly: when Pinocchio begs her for help when he's in danger, she refuses by claiming to be dead and waiting for a hearse to take her away. The Cat and the Fox (Gideon and Honest John) try to steal money from Pinocchio disguised as street bandits and later hanged Pinocchio from a big tree. When the Cricket first appears, Pinocchio kills it with a hammer (then we see it again like a ghost and again alive in the house of the Fairy). Lampwick dies from overwork in donkey form in a gut-wrenching scene near the end of the novel. Oh, and Pinocchio bites off the Cat's paw.
  • The original Geppetto was a very, very poor carpenter in Tuscany. The setting of the film looks more like Tyrol, with its quainter, more "storybook" architecture and mountains, and Geppetto's house is more cozy and charming.
• Disproportionate Retribution:
  • The boys who go to Pleasure Island are turned into donkeys and sold into slavery, apparently as punishment for drinking, smoking, gambling, and...playing billiards like tough adult men?
  • Monstro pursues and tries to kill Pinocchio and Geppetto purely because they made him sneeze a couple of times (to escape from his mouth that he unknowingly put them into in the first place).
• Does This Remind You of Anything?: The Coachman. A strange but charismatic old man tells young children that they'll have lots of fun if they come back to his place, but once they arrive the children discover that the man is evil, their lives are much, much worse for their troubles, and they likely will never see their families again. Hmm...
• Double Take
  • A few of them.
    Geppetto: Who's there?
    Pinocchio: It's me.
    Geppetto: Oh, it's me. ... Wh-HUH?!
  • And this one.
    Honest John: (upon seeing Pinocchio for the first time) A little wooden boy. Now— a wooden boy?!
  • And when the Coachman tells of his scheme to Honest John:
    Coachman: I takes 'em to Pleasure Island.
    Honest John: Ah, Pleasure Island. (beat; becomes alarmed) Pleasure Island?!
• The Dreaded: Monstro, less a whale and more Leviathan incarnate. The mere mention of his name causes sea creatures to swim away in terror. Also the Coachman, if his Nightmare Face is any indication.
• Drunken Song: Honest John's reprise of "An Actor's Life For Me" at the Red Lobster Inn.
• Ear Worm: "Hi-Diddle-Dee-Dee" seems to be one In-Universe; Lampwick is heard whistling it during his time in the pool hall.
• Earn Your Happy Ending: The Blue Fairy flat-out spells it out for Pinocchio at the very beginning, and even Jiminy notes that it won't be an easy task.
  "Prove yourself brave, truthful, and unselfish, and someday, you will be a real boy."
• Easily Forgiven: Pinocchio by the Blue Fairy in Stromboli's cage, after she sees through his lies and he fesses up to his mistakes.
• Enemy Eats Your Lunch: Sort of. Honest John eats Pinocchio's apple and gives the core back to him.
• "Eureka!" Moment: Geppetto saying they will have a fire to cook some of the fish he previously caught gives Pinocchio the idea to use a fire to make Monstro sneeze and get them out of him.
• Even Evil Has Standards: Honest John and Gideon are perfectly fine with conning small children out of their money and freedom, and if one scene is to be believed, with doing hits as well. However, when the Coachman mentions taking boys to Pleasure Island, they're absolutely horrified. And when the Coachman assures them that the boys will never return as themselves to talk around and makes a Nightmare Face for emphasis, the fox and cat cower in fear. And yet, regardless of their morals, they trick Pinocchio into going there anyway, mainly because they're too scared to refuse the Coachman's proposition after that.
• Everyone Calls Him "Barkeep": The Coachman.
• Everybody Cries: During the scene before the Blue Fairy brings Pinocchio back to life as a real boy, Geppetto, Jiminy, Figaro, and Cleo all cry over Pinocchio's lifeless body back at home.
• Evil Laugh: Stromboli and The Coachman lashes out at some of these (they are both voiced by the same actor, so the laugh sounds almost the same).
• Evil Overlooker: The Coachman and/or Stromboli and/or Monstro in some posters.
• Evil Puppeteer: Stromboli, who has his own circus of puppets and hires Pinocchio, but treats him badly: he underpays him, locks him up in a cage, and threatens to chop him into firewood. He also pays Honest John with misery for Pinocchio, a literal living, talking, and stringless wooden puppet.
• Explain, Explain... Oh, Crap!:
  • During the meeting between Honest John and the Coachman.
    Coachman: ...and I takes them to Pleasure Island!
    Honest John: (pleasantly) Ahh, Pleasure Island... (eyes bulge) Pleasure Island?! But, the law!
  • Jiminy Cricket's epiphany of what happens to the boys on Pleasure Island.
    Alexander: Please! Please! I don't wanna be a donkey. Let me out of here!
    Coachman: QUIET! (cracks his whip) You boys have had your fun, now pay for it!
    Jiminy Cricket: "Boys"?! So that's wha... PINOCCHIO! (races back to the billiard hall)
• Exploited Trope: A bizarre example. Since this is a morality play for children, this world operates by some strange logic, such as the Space Whale Aesop that acting like a jackass will literally turn you into a donkey. The Coachman seeks to profit from this by luring children into a mischief-themed amusement park where they're encouraged to misbehave, and then selling them as livestock after they literally make jackasses of themselves.
• Extremely Short Timespan: It doesn't feel it, given the sprawling story it was adapted from, but the movie is strongly implied to take place within less than two days.
• Eyebrow Waggle: Honest John gives one to Pinocchio when talking him into becoming an actor, which Pinocchio playfully imitates.
• Eyelash Fluttering: After building Pinocchio, Geppetto shows him off to Cleo, who flutters her lashes in a coy greeting.
• Failed Dramatic Exit: After Pinocchio and Jiminy argue in the pool hall, Jiminy angrily tries to stomp away but falls into one of the holes on the table instead. When he finally leaves the room properly, his clothes are disheveled and twisted up from his previous fall.
• False Camera Effects: When Cleo the fish watches Pinocchio as he is made to dance using his strings, he is seen distorted by the water in her fish bowl.
• False Utopia: Pleasure Island, where the theme park turns into a place where kids do all sorts of sinful stuff like vandalizing buildings, smoking cigars, drinking beer, and playing in pool halls, only to end up making jackasses out of themselves and they get sent to slavery in the salt mines.
• Fat Bastard: Stromboli and the Coachman.
• Fate Worse than Death: See Forced Transformation.
  • The ones who could still talk were thrown in a pen. The ones who could only make donkey noises were shipped off. Now remember what people use donkeys for; working in harsh environments, breeding more donkeys... In the original book, Pinocchio himself almost ends up skinned.
  • This might fall under Disproportionate Retribution as well.
• Faux Affably Evil: "Honest John" and Stromboli.
  • The Coachman as well: "Give a bad boy enough rope and 'e'll make a jackarse of 'imself (laughs evilly)"
• Fisher Kingdom: The longer you stay on Pleasure Island, the more you start to transform into a donkey. The transformation stops once you leave.
• Follow Your Heart: "When You Wish Upon a Star".
• Food Porn: On Pinocchio's first day, we get to see the dinner Geppetto had prepared in loving detail, most notably a lemon-covered fish with butter melting over it in real time and lots of steam coming out of it.
• Forced Transformation: The boys in Pleasure Island turn into jackasses and get forced into labor.
• Foreshadowing
  • We're first clued to Pleasure Island's actual nature when Honest John and Gideon are freaked out by the mention of it, mentioning an unexplained law not even they want to deal with. Also, before the boys start being transformed into donkeys, look carefully at the chair Pinocchio is sitting on at the pool hall, it has a donkey face carving on the head. Further hints: the Coachman's dialogue stating that "They never come back... AS BOYS!" and our seeing a team of donkeys pulling his coach as he cracks the whip over them.
    • Another moment that foreshadows this is when Jiminy confronts Pinocchio at the billiard hall. As he leaves in a huff, Lampwick laughs at him, to which he snaps in response, "Go on, laugh! Make a jackass out of yourself!"
  • Honest John convinces Pinocchio to go to Pleasure Island by giving him his "ticket", which is an Ace of Spades card...Remember the Black Spot from Treasure Island? The real-life inspiration for that is the Ace of Spades, sometimes given to pirates to announce their imminent ruin.
• Forgot He Was a Robot: Pinocchio is seen blushing, turning green from cigar smoke, and shedding tears (among other things) while he's still a puppet.
• Four-Fingered Hands: Pinocchio (never mind that poster). He gains an extra digit when he becomes a real boy. Jiminy, Honest John, Gideon, and the Coachman all have four-fingered hands as well (which lends credence to the idea that the Coachman isn't entirely human).
• Funny Background Event: During "An Actor's Life For Me," Gideon ends up going in the wrong direction and has to catch up with the others.
• Furry Confusion: Features normal animals, Nearly Normal Animals, and Funny Animals with little rhyme or reason as to the difference. For example, Figaro the pet cat and the mute Funny Animal Gideon the Cat.
• Getting Eaten Is Harmless: Pinocchio and Jimminy Cricket (following Geppetto) are swallowed by Monstro the whale but are all perfectly fine and later manage to escape.
• Go On Without Me
  • After he's washed up on the beach, Geppetto says "Pinocchio, save yourself..."
  • Originally, Lampwick was supposed to join Pinocchio and Jiminy in their escape but he is caught and he utters these words, some story book adaptations keep the scene.
• Gosh Dang It to Heck!: Averted. Jiminy Cricket calls Lampwick a jackass even BEFORE he learned of the whole "turning boys into donkeys" plot.
• Got Me Doing It: Occurs when Jiminy Cricket reprimands Pinocchio, only to be taken aback by Lampwick's remark about him, which causes him to stumble upon his words.
  Pinocchio: (to Lampwick) He's my conscience. He tells me what's right and wrong!
  Lampwick: What?! You mean to tell me that you take orders from a grasshopper?
  Jiminy: (offended) Grasshopper?! Look here, you - you impudent young pup! It wouldn't hurt to take orders from your grasshopper — (stutters as he realizes what he just said) Your conscience!
• HA HA HA—No: Stromboli does a terrifying version when Pinocchio mentions that he's going home to Geppetto and will be back in the morning. The showman laughs uproariously, scoops Pinocchio up, and then throws him in a birdcage and starts screaming at him.
• Hair-Trigger Temper: Stromboli to be sure.
• Hammerspace: Gideon pulls the mallet he tries to hit Pinocchio with out of nowhere.
• Handing Over the Crap Sack: After eating Pinocchio's apple, Honest John gives the core back to him.
• Hands Looking Wrong: The titular living puppet first realizes his body is no longer made out of wood whilst waving his hand trying to get Geppetto's attention.
• Happily Ever After: By the finale, all ends well for Pinocchio and his family. He becomes a real human boy, Geppetto finally has the son he always wanted, and Jiminy ends up becoming an Official Conscience, courtesy of the Blue Fairy.
• Hats Off to the Dead: Jiminy removes his hat as he, Geppetto, and the others mourn Pinocchio's apparent death after returning home.
• Have a Gay Old Time
  • "What do I look like, a jackass?"
  • "Hi-Diddle-Dee-Day, an actor's life is gay." Admittedly, this was long before the word gained its modern connotations.
• Heaven Above: The magical fairy who blesses Pinocchio with life lives within the wishing star. The Blue Fairy descends from her home in the heavens only when Geppetto prays up to the sky in his petition to be blessed with a son.
• Heroic Sacrifice: Pinocchio gives his life to save Geppetto from Monstro; don't worry, he gets better.
• Hidden Depths: Despite barely being a teenager, if that, Lampwick shows remarkable skill at pool, given the numerous trick shots he plays. Makes you wonder how often he frequented bars.
• High-Dive Escape: Pinocchio and Jiminy Cricket escape Pleasure Island by jumping off a cliff into the sea below.
• Homeless Hero: Jiminy Cricket starts out as a drifter, dressed in shabby clothes, sneaking into Geppetto's shop to warm himself by the fire.
• Honesty Aesop: The iconic scene where Pinocchio's nose grows when he lies to the Blue Fairy about how he got inside a birdcage.
  Blue Fairy: You see, Pinocchio, a lie keeps growing and growing until it is as plain as the nose on your face.
• Hurt Foot Hop: Jiminy Cricket does the hurt foot hopping after he kicks a billiard ball.
• I Want My Mommy!: Dramatic example for the captured donkeys who can still talk on Pleasure Island. One of them, Alexander, cries for his to the Coachman. "Mama!" is also one of the last things Lampwick can say before he turns into one.
• I Will Only Slow You Down: After Monstro destroys their raft, Geppetto tells Pinocchio to "save yourself" as he sinks under the water. Pinocchio gives his life getting him safely to shore, and even then Geppetto, still barely conscious, continues to say it.
  Geppetto: Pinocchio... save yourself. Don't mind me, son. Save yourself...
• Ignorant About Fire: The title character sees a candle for the first time and tries to grab the flame, eventually setting his finger on fire. As he's still made of wood, he doesn't feel a thing, but Geppetto freaks out and frantically looks for some water to dowse the flame, eventually dunking Pinoch's hand on Cleo's fishbowl.
• Improbable Infant Survival: Double-subverted with Pinocchio. He dies saving Geppetto from Monstro and is mourned by Geppetto, Jiminy, Figaro, and Cleo before being brought back to life as a real boy.
• Improvised Lockpick: Jiminy tries to free Pinocchio from his cage by climbing inside the padlock, and opening it with his umbrella, but does not succeed.
• Informed Species
  • Monstro doesn't look like any real species of whale. From the side, he looks a bit like a sperm whale, but a sperm whale's jaw is narrow, unlike Monstro's shovel-jaw. Which, by the way, is pleated. Only rorquals (like the blue whale and humpback whale) have grooved lower jaws (but no teeth; instead they have baleen fringes). He looks like a demonic caricature of a whale; more like the biblical Leviathan than any real sea creature.
  • Jiminy Cricket doesn’t really look like a cricket. He somewhat resembles Lowly Worm from the World of Richard Scarry.
• Innocently Insensitive: The Blue Fairy tells Pinocchio "Boys who won't be good might as well be wood", which seems rather harsh after Pinocchio has been told what Stromboli does to old marionettes.
• It Can Think: Monstro does have one thing in common with real cetaceans: He's pretty clever to pretend to be asleep in order to catch the school of tuna. Besides, if he keeps on chasing Pinocchio and Geppetto, it's quite obvious he has a brain.
• Jealous Pet: Implied. Figaro the cat doesn't like Pinocchio at first. It's never revealed why, but the man who made Pinocchio wonders if Figaro is jealous.
• Jerkass: Lampwick.
• Jingle the Coins: Honest John drops his money bag on the table, with a little tinkle. The coachman looks disapproving, and then drops his own much bigger money bag with a crash.
• Just Whistle: What Jiminy tells Pinocchio to do if ever he needs him. It becomes the basis for the song "Give a Little Whistle".
• Karma Houdini
  • In the book, the Cat (Gideon) lost a paw and became blind, while the Fox (Honest John) became lame and had to sell his own tail, and both are begging for food. Although there is no specific connection to their deeds, it is stated that they got all they deserved. In the film, no punishment is seen, nor any suggestion that punishment will come their way.
  • A planned scene that was ultimately deleted from the final film would have had him and Gideon get caught by the police after running into Pinocchio a third time. However, this was more or less adapted into a small book, Pinocchio's Promise, where Honest John is chased by a policeman.
  • Stromboli doesn't get any punishment other than not being able to use Pinocchio for his show and surely going furious and desperate after discovering too late that he lost his "little wooden gold mine" - he even gets to keep all the money from the first night, although certainly he will not be able to find utility in Pinocchio and to exploit him as a real boy in the flesh.
  • The Coachman, just like in the original Collodi's story, is not punished in the film; it is only in the SNES game that he is kicked off a cliff by Pinocchio (and even in this case his ultimate fate is ambiguous).
• Karmic Jackpot: The Blue Fairy remarks in her first appearance that as Geppetto has made so many others happy, he deserves to have his wish of Pinocchio becoming a real boy come true.
• Kid Hero: Pinocchio.
• Kindhearted Cat Lover: Geppetto with his kitten Figaro.
• Large Ham: Stromboli's voice actor: "Going-a home-a to your father!" Also, Honest John's flamboyant gesturing.
• Last-Second Word Swap: In the opening scene, as Jiminy stands by the fire warming his bottom, he narrates "I was warming my...".
• Leitmotif: Jiminy gets his own theme that pops up quite a bit during the film.
• Leitmotif upon Death: After the title character sacrifices his life to save Geppetto, a much slower and instrumental version of "When You Wish Upon A Star" is played on violin in the next scene when the other characters return home with his lifeless body.
• Let's Get Out of Here: The words themselves aren't said, but the trope is in full effect when Pinocchio and Jiminy make their escape from Pleasure Island.
• Lighter and Softer: Just like all the Disney adaptations, the movie is much less dark than the original novel it's based on.
• Lions and Tigers and Humans... Oh, My!: Most people in the world are humans, but nobody bats an eye at a human-sized talking fox and cat.
• Literal Metaphor:
  • A visual one. The boys on Pleasure Island figuratively make total jackasses of themselves, smoking and drinking and gambling and so on. Then they end up turning into literal jackasses.
  • A subtle one, which is also a kind of Visual Pun: the scene in which Lampwick and Pinocchio play pool starts from outside, showing that the pool hall in which they're playing is shaped and painted like an 8-ball, and one of Lampwick's trick shots while he's ridiculing Jiminy Cricket sends the 8-ball careening into him. During most of that scene, he's got Jiminy behind the 8-ball, so to speak... just as the Coachman also has them behind the 8-ball, and is about to make his final play.
  • As Pinocchio's nose grew to the size of a tree branch with every lie he told, the Blue Fairy gives him a lesson in this form.
  You see Pinocchio, a lie keeps growing and growing, untill it's as plain as the nose on your face.
• Literal-Minded: When Geppetto introduces Pinocchio to Figaro.
  Geppetto: Say hello to Figaro.
  Pinocchio: Hello to Figaro.
• Little Bit Beastly: Pinocchio looks like a puppet version of a kemonomimi when he gains donkey ears and a tail while visiting Pleasure Island. He loses the donkey ears and donkey tail when he turns into a real boy.
• Make a Wish: When you wish upon a star, makes no difference who you are...
• Manly Tears: Shed by Geppetto and Jiminy when Pinocchio is seemingly dead at the end, before the Blue Fairy brings him back as a real boy.
• Mars Needs Women: Jiminy seems to have a preference for human(ish) women.
• Meaningful Echo: The conditions to Become a Real Boy are repeated in voiceover just as Pinocchio earns it.
• Meaningful Name
  • "Honest" John Worthington Foulfellow, referred only to Honest John in the actual film. Also, there is a volcano off the coast of Sicily called Mt. Stromboli; Stromboli in the film is also quite volcanic.
  • The Red Lobster Inn may seem rather luxuriant to modern eyes, but this has historic precedence; lobsters before the mid 1900s were once seen as unclean, and as food only eaten by the lower class and the poor.
• Mirror Reveal: Lampwick doesn't notice that he's turning into a donkey until he starts braying. he then feels his now-furry head, and confirms his suspicions when he looks into a mirror.
• Missed Him by That Much: When Geppetto is out looking for Pinocchio, Stromboli's wagon passes by him, and, unknown to him, Pinocchio is imprisoned in said wagon at that moment.
• Mixed Metaphor
  • Jiminy: You buttered your bread. Now sleep in it!^note Originally, this was to be one of Jiminy's main shticks, but over the course of the film's production, they were removed (for instance, it was intended that he describe Honest John and Gideon as "a couple of ill winds in cheap clothing"). Only the one line above was used, and in the context of its usage, he was more than a little frustrated and flustered.
  • Coachman: "Give a bad boy enough rope and he'll make a jackass of himself!"
• Mood Whiplash:
  • Pinocchio and Sromboli laughing together becoming this, combined with HA HA HA—No, when Pinocchio is suddenly thrown into a birdcage.
  • The donkey transformation scene, in-universe. Lampwick doesn't realize it's happening to him until he laughs and it becomes a bray. Seconds later, when he does realize what's going on...
  • Again with the donkey transformation. When Lampwick grows ears and a tail, Pinnochio gets scared. Then when Lampwick's face turns into a donkey's snout... Pinocchio laughs.
• Muggle in Mage Custody: As per the original novel, Pinocchio is taken care of by the Blue Fairy who promises to turn him into a real boy if he behaves well.
• Mundane Utility: After being partially turned into a donkey, Pinocchio proceeds to use his tail as a convenient piece of rope.
• My Grandma Can Do Better Than You:
  Lampwick: Ah, you smoke like me grandmother!
• Named by the Adaptation: The cricket, the fox and the cat and the whale had No Name Given in the book, here they're called Jiminy Cricket, Honest John Worthington Foulfellow, Gideon and Monstro.
• Names to Run Away from Really Fast: Every aquatic creature swims away from the mention of the name "Monstro".
• Never Say "Die" : Zig-zagged. During Pinocchio's Disney Death, nobody refers to him as dead, simply mourning his loss. It's only when the Blue Fairy brings Pinocchio back to life as a real boy does Geppetto refer to Pinocchio as dead in a moment of absentmindedness.
• Nightmare Face: The Coachman drops his Glamour at one point and pulls a ghastly one, combined with a truly chilling Evil Laugh. Honest John and Gideon looked scared shitless after that and they had very good reason.
  Coachman: No, no. There's no risk. They never come back... as BOYS!
• Nobody Here but Us Statues: During "Little Wooden Head," Jiminy blends in with the clockwork performers on one of Geppetto's music boxes by moving up and down in time and singing.
• Noisy Shut-Up: Jiminy Cricket does this twice.
  • Jiminy tries to sleep in Geppetto's workshop and is kept awake by a cacophony of ticking clocks and Geppetto's snoring. When Jiminy yells "QUIET!!", the clocks immediately stop ticking and Geppetto stops snoring.
    Jiminy: After all, enough's enough.
  • When Jiminy sees Pinocchio marching with Honest John and Gideon singing "Hey diddlee dee", he tries to get their attention, but they are too busy singing to see him. Eventually he climbs onto Honest John's hat, and whistles very loudly; then Pinocchio sees him.
• No More for Me: When Pinocchio sees Lampwick start to turn into a donkey, he nervously put his mug of beer aside, then tosses away his cigar. The implication is that the drink and cigars are what's transforming Lampwick, and Pinocchio swears them off in order not to follow suit. At one time, the very image of Pinocchio putting his beer aside was the trope image.
• Non-Standard Character Design: The Blue Fairy is a remarkably realistically-drawn character in a film where all other human characters are cartoony looking. This is because while all the other characters were traditional hand-drawn cartoons, the Blue Fairy was rotoscoped — a live actress was filmed, and then the animator simply traced her directly from the frames of that film. This technique tends to produce the Uncanny Valley effect, which is usually considered an undesirable side effect, but in this case was intentionally harnessed to communicate the otherworldly nature of the character.
• Not Now, We're Too Busy Crying Over You: At the end, Geppetto is crying over the dead Pinocchio when the Blue Fairy brings him back to life and makes him a real boy:
  Pinocchio: Father, whatcha crying for?
  Geppetto: Because... you're dead, Pinocchio.
  Pinocchio: No. No, I'm not.
  Geppetto: Yes. Yes, you are. Now, lie down...
  Pinocchio: But, Father, I'm alive. See? And... And I'm... I'm... I'm real! I'm a real boy!
  Geppetto: (finally sees him) You're alive!
• Not-So-Harmless Villain: Gideon may seem like an bumbling, goofy cat, but he is more evil than his foolish demeanor makes him out to be.
• Oh, Crap!:
  • Pinocchio and Jiminy when Pinocchio is trapped in the cage and they realise the Blue Fairy is coming and will know Pinocchio wasn't at school like he should have been.
  • Jiminy when he realizes the true nature of Pleasure Island after seeing all the kids-turned-donkeys and being sold.
  • Lampwick, when he realizes he's turning into a donkey. He starts getting very worried when he notices the transformations, and then, when he sees himself in the mirror, he comes unglued in a way that wouldn't be out of place in a horror movie...
  • The school of fish when Monstro opens his eye right in front of them (actually, all the fish react like this whenever Monstro's name is even mentioned).
  • Pinocchio, when he first sees Monstro swimming at him.
  • Geppetto when he realises Pinocchio's plan of making Monstro sneeze will infuriate Monstro. And it does, because it involves making a fire inside him.
  • Geppetto and Pinocchio when Monstro's tail is about to come down on top of them.
• One-Word Title: Also a Protagonist Title.
• Only in It for the Money: Honest John and Gideon persuading Pinocchio to go to Pleasure Island is a combination of this and fear for what would happen if they refused the Coachman, given how freaked out they are when the Coachman first mentions the place.
• Ooh, Me Accent's Slipping: Charles Judels briefly slips out of the Coachman's cockney accent when he says "Take him back, he can still talk!" as he throws a talking donkey into a pen.
• Or My Name Isn't...: Honest John tells Gideon the plan to sell Pinocchio to Stromboli in this way:
  Honest John: If we play our cards right, we'll be on Easy Street, or my name isn't Honest John.
• Our Fairies Are Different: The Blue Fairy.
• Outliving One's Offspring: Geppetto wakes up on the beach to find his son drowned saving his life. Fortunately subverted because Pinocchio's selfless sacrifice allows him to become a real boy.
• Overly Long Gag: Jiminy getting disturbed by the thousands of clocks chiming and bonging and Geppetto's snoring before screaming to make it stop, just before the Blue Fairy's entrance.
• Parasol Parachute: Jiminy's umbrella at times.
• Parental Bonus: In addition to Jiminy Cricket's Covert Pervert moment with getting a little too enamored of the risque marionettes performing on stage with Pinocchio, there's a moment earlier while he's in Geppetto's workshop in which he realizes one of the mechanical figurines against which he's leaning is of a shapely woman and he's got his hand planted on her bustle. He then promptly snatches it away and actually apologizes to her.
  • The second half of the "I've Got No Strings" number is pretty much a Dutch, French, and Russian woman saying they want to have sex with Pinnochio. But downplayed in such a way that it would go over most kids' heads. Indeed, Pinnochio himself is clueless about what they are getting at.
• Partial Transformation: Pinocchio's transformation into a jackass merely amounts to ears, a tail, and occasional braying. An early comic book adaptation has one of the Coachman's henchmen, just barely unable to catch Pinocchio before he escapes, comment that he won't fully change into a donkey unless he stays on the island.
• Pauper Patches: Jiminy starts dressed this way before the Blue Fairy declares him Pinocchio's conscience and gives him a clothing upgrade.
• Pet the Dog
  • At the end of "I've Got No Strings", Stromboli pats Pinocchio on the head in gratitude as the crowds throw coins at the stage.
  • Lampwick taking Pinocchio under his wing on Pleasure Island can be seen as this too.
• Pinocchio Nose: Codifier.
• Playing with Fire: In the reprise version of Little Wooden Head.
• Pleasure Island: Trope Namer.
• Possession Presumes Guilt: After Gideon hits Honest John on the head with a mallet while trying to squash Jiminy, he panics and places the mallet in Pinocchio's hands.
• Precision F-Strike: The usage of the word "jackass", spoken by the Coachman ("Give a bad boy enough rope and he'll soon make a jackass of himself..."), by Jiminy ("Go on, laugh! Make a jackass out of yourself!"), and by Lampwick ("What's [Jiminy] think I look like? A jackass?").
• Pre-Violence Laughter: When Stromboli is told by his new money-making star Pinocchio that he is "going home to his father" and "coming back tomorrow", the puppeteer breaks out laughing. Pinocchio is puzzled, then uncertainly starts laughing as well, until Stromboli suddenly thrusts him into an empty birdcage, padlocks the door shut, and tells the puppet that this will be his home from now on, and threatens to chop him into firewood, using a discarded marionette to demonstrate, once Pinocchio fails to continue making money for him.
• Production Foreshadowing: In the Storybook Opening, Alice in Wonderland and Peter Pan can be seen in the background. Both would later become Disney films, and, in fact, both were in initial development at the time.
• Protagonist Title: Pinocchio is the protagonist of this story.
• Punny Name: Jiminy Cricket (a Gosh Dang It to Heck! version of "Jesus Christ"), "Honest" John Worthington Foulfellow, Monstro, and even Stromboli (after a volcano near Sicily).
• Rage Against the Reflection: Involuntarily in Lampwick's case — he destroys the mirror in blind panic after being transformed into a donkey.
• Really Was Born Yesterday: Due to being created suddenly on the night, and being thrown into the world alone the following day with almost no knowledge of how is the world surrounding him, Pinocchio becomes an easy target for awful people to tempt him into going with them for their own shady benefit.
• Red Is Heroic
  • Inverted with the Coachman, who wears a red coat but is the most evil character in the film.
  • Played straight with Pinocchio, who wears red pants and has a red feather in his hat.
• Rhetorical Question Blunder: "What's he think I look like, a jackass?"
  Pinocchio: (amused) You sure do! HAHAHAHA-HAW-HEE-HAAAAW!
• Ribcage Stomach: The inside of Monstro.
• Rule of Three: The film's Big Bad Ensemble features three baddies: Stromboli, the Coachman, and Monstro. When one disappears, another takes their place.
• Satanic Archetype: The Coachman may or may not be Satan himself, but he tempts little boys to live a sinful life, then imprisons them forever. Just as the Blue Fairy rewards people for their good deeds, he punishes them for their misdeeds.
• Say My Name: ""Boys"?! So that's wha... PINOCCHIO!"
  • Also, more sadly done with Geppetto while he searches for Pinocchio during a dark and rainy night.
  Geppetto: Pinocchio !!!
• Scare 'Em Straight: The children do naughty things and are doomed for it for the rest of their lives.
• Scary Symbolic Shapeshifting: In one infamous scene, as the Coachman says that boys who go to Pleasure Island never come back "...as BOYS", he pulls off a Slasher Smile while his face turns red and his hair turns up to look like devil horns.
• Scenery Porn: Most notably the inside of Geppetto's shop with all those fabulous clocks and music boxes. Remember, this was when everything was done by hand.
• Screw This, I'm Outta Here
  • Jiminy is more than a little upset to see Pinocchio enjoying himself on Pleasure Island. It doesn't help that Lampwick laughs at him.
  Jiminy: Go on, laugh, make a jackass outta yourself! I'm through! This is the end! (storms off)
  Pinocchio: But Jiminy, Lampwick says a guy only lives once!
  Jiminy: Lampwick, hmph!
  • However, Jiminy changes his mind later on when he sees that the donkeys used to be boys, and goes back for Pinocchio even after he started growing a donkey's tail and ears.
• Seahorse Steed: Jiminy Cricket rides what appears to be a sea donkey.
• Second-Face Smoke: Done by Lampwick to Jiminy Cricket.
• Serendipitous Symphony: The cuckoo clocks and the music boxes.
• Serendipity Shock: Geppetto wishes to have a son. At the end of the film Geppetto is mourning the dead Pinocchio with his wish of having a son of his own never coming true. However the Blue Fairy, touched by Pinocchio's sacrifice, revives Pinocchio and turns him to a real boy, making Geppetto's wish come true.
• "Setting Off" Song: "Hi-Diddle-Dee-Dee".
• Shadow Discretion Shot: At the final moment of Lampwick's transformation, the view goes to his shadow agonizingly dropping on all fours, his last desperate scream for his mother devolving into a bray. When we see him again, he is a full donkey.
• Shapeshifting Excludes Clothing: Where bad boys turn into donkeys after misbehaving on Pleasure Island. We see this happen to Lampwick, as animal instincts replace his human reason, and a combination of the shape change itself, and desperate braying and bucking casts all of his clothes off.
• Shoo Out the Clowns: Jiminy, Figaro and Cleo are separated from Pinocchio and Geppetto when Monstro's tail destroys their raft during the movie's climax only to safely wash up on shore once it's over.
• Shout-Out
  • The exterior of the pool hall on Pleasure Island is a giant eight-ball and cue stick, a nod to the Trylon and Perisphere of the 1939 New York World's Fair.
  • It's a blink-and-you'll-miss-it moment, but the barker for "Da Roughhouse" (voiced by Clarence Nash, best known for voicing Donald Duck) is, fittingly, channeling Jack Mercer's Popeye.
  • Jiminy Cricket introduces himself as "just a cricket singing my way from hearth to hearth" – this alludes to Charles Dickens's Christmas book The Cricket on the Hearth (which later got its own animated adaptation).
• Sidekick Song: "Give a Little Whistle".
• Significant Monogram: Jiminy Cricket.
• The Silent Bob: Gideon.
• Skewed Priorities: When Jiminy goes to tell Geppetto about Pinocchio joining the theatre, he stops himself, saying that would be "snitching". This is skewed because telling a child's parent that their child has run off to the theatre on his own is obviously not a bad thing, and in the child's best interest.
• Somewhere, an Entomologist Is Crying: Jiminy Cricket bears very little, if any, resemblance to an actual cricket. To be fair, however, Jiminy was originally depicted as an actual (that is, less anthropomorphized) cricket with toothed legs and waving antennae. But Walt wanted something more likable. So he assigned animator Ward Kimball to redesign the cricket. Kimball whittled away at any and all cricket-like appendages until Jiminy became, in Kimball's words, "a little man with an egg head and no ears. And the only thing that makes him a cricket is because we call him one."
• Spared by the Adaptation: In the original book, Pinocchio kills the cricket with a mallet, who later returns as a ghost. Here, that doesn't happen to Jiminy Cricket.
• Squirrels in My Pants: While looking for his father underwater, Pinocchio encounters a massive group of fish, following him and Jiminy. The first one he meets swims into his shirt sleeve and out the other one, which tickles him.
• Stock Money Bag: While meeting with the Coachman, Honest John and Gideon show off a small sack containing the meager sum Stromboli paid them in exchange for Pinocchio. As the Coachman begins to make his proposition, he asks them "How would you blokes like to make some real money?" and produces a much larger sack full of gold coins.
• Super Not-Drowning Skills: Jiminy has no trouble breathing underwater. There are even air bubbles coming out of his mouth, somehow. This may be justified for Pinocchio, being made of wood, but then it is subverted for him anyway, as he apparently drowns a little later.
• Sissy Villain: Honest John, probably due to his Large Ham persona and the fact that he just can't stop waving his hands around.
• Sliding Scale of Anthropomorphism: Cleo, Monstro, and Figaro are real animals. Jiminy, Honest John and Gideon are anthropomorphic animals.
• The Smurfette Principle: Not counting Cleo the goldfish, the Blue Fairy is the only female character in the movie.
• The Speechless: Honest John's henchman, Gideon.
• Spit Take: As Stromboli takes a drink of wine, this is his initial response to Pinocchio announcing that he is going home to Geppetto.
• Stealth Pun: Geppetto wishes for Pinocchio, a marionette, to be a real boy. The Blue Fairy grants him his wish, but adds some requirements that Pinocchio has to meet to become fully real. In other words, the wish comes with strings attached.
• Stock Sound Effect: Figaro's sneeze inside Monstro's belly reuses the sound of a squirrel sneezing from Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs.
• Supernatural Aid: The Blue Fairy.
• Super-Persistent Predator: Monstro. Once he gets pissed off enough he will stop at nothing to devour or destroy whatever made him angry.
• Surprisingly Creepy Moment: Starts off cute and lighthearted, then we get to Pleasure Island that turns it around.
• Take That!
  • "What does an actor want with a conscience anyway?"
  • Some have interpreted the way Pleasure Island is depicted as reflecting Walt's view on what amusement parks were like at the time, which led him to create his own, improved version fifteen years later with Disneyland.
• Tempting Fate
  • After Jiminy Cricket storms out giving up trying to set Pinocchio straight after he finds him making a fool of himself with Lampwick, moments later, Lampwick scoffs "To hear that beetle talk, you'd think something was gonna happen to us!" Don't even ask what takes place right after he says that.
  • Pushed even further when he says "What do I look like, a jackass?"
    Pinocchio: (amused) You sure do!
• That Russian Squat Dance: Done by Russian puppets.
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Sandwich
  • On Pleasure Island, when Lampwick and Pinocchio are outside the rough house tent, Lampwick throws a turkey away after taking just one bite. Likewise, in the same scene, Pinocchio has an ice cream in one hand and a pie in the other. He takes one bite out of the pie (he doesn't touch the ice cream) and then throws both the pie and ice cream away when he enters the rough house with Lampwick. As everything was free, they most likely thought they'd be able to get more food later.
  • Averted with Pinocchio's apple. Honest John eats it and gives the core back to Pinocchio.
• This Is Gonna Suck: When Geppetto hears Pinocchio's plan to escape Monstro by making him sneeze, he has an understated version of this reaction:
  Geppetto: "Oh, that will make him mad..."
• Through a Face Full of Fur: Pinocchio (who is still made of wood at this point) turns red when inhaling too much while smoking a cigar, then green when he accidentally swallows the smoke. Also, the green Jiminy Cricket blushes red when the beautiful Blue Fairy asks him to be Pinocchio's conscience.
• Too Dumb to Live
  • Pinocchio is much too easily swayed by Honest John and Gideon yet again after they convinced him to go to Stromboli; and the second time around, they lure him into something much worse, albeit with a little more resistance on Pinocchio's part.
  • All of the naughty boys who were convinced to go to Pleasure Island; the Coachman even lampshades this as he knows the bad ones will be easy to lure with the promise of beer, sweets, games, and no authority whatsoever. Further lampshaded once they've all turned into donkeys as the talking ones beg to be freed, with the Coachman reminding them of their foolishness.
• Toxic Friend Influence: Honest John and Gideon for making Pinocchio skip school, and Lampwick on Pleasure Island for having him become naughty enough to the point he begins to turn into a donkey.
• Toy Disguise: When Geppetto turns on one of his carved music boxes, Jiminy Cricket hides from him by pretending to be one of the moving mechanical figures on it.
• Transformation Trauma: The donkey scene.
• Tuft of Head Fur: Figaro the kitten has a tuft of fur on the back of his head.
• Underside Ride: Jiminy Cricket hitches a ride on the coach that takes children to Pleasure Island.
• Unusually Uninteresting Sight: Averted when seemingly all the fish within a mile follow behind Pinocchio and Jiminy while they search for Geppetto at the bottom of the sea. Played straight with Honest John and Gideon.
• Villain Song: "Hi-Diddle-Dee-Dee". It's cheerful, but it's sung by Honest John to convince Pinocchio to become an actor.
• "The Villain Sucks" Song: The unused song "Monstro the Whale," which depicts him as the "undersea public enemy."
• Villainous Breakdown: Monstro during the climax in a rather terrifying way. Though seeing as two people just lit a huge fire inside him, you'd think it would be understandable that he'd be pissed, but no, all this act does is merely make him sneeze. When he realizes two people just escaped from his belly, he absolutely flips out. He gets more terrible and wrathful the more they dodge him and get closer to shore, so much so, he doesn't even care he's about to crash into a landmass. He just wants to kill them.
• Visual Pun:
  • When Pinocchio is on Pleasure Island, Jiminy Cricket is behind the eight ball. First figuratively, then literally.
  • Before Jiminy storms out of the pool hall, he tells Lampwick, "Go on, laugh, make a jackass out of yourself!" He has no idea how right he is until he reaches the Coachman's boat...
• Wham Line:
  • "They never come back... AS BOYS!"
  • In-universe for Jiminy: "Quiet! You boys have had your fun! Now pay for it!"
  • After escape Pleasure Island, Pinocchio and Jiminy return home, only to find Geppetto, Figero, and Cleo gone. Then, a magical carrier pigeon appears and delivers a message revealing their whereabouts:
  Jiminy: It says here that (reading) "he went looking for you, and" uh… "he was swallowed by a whale".
  Pinocchio: SWALLOWED BY A WHALE?!
  Jiminy: Uh-huh… A WHALE?! (continues reading) "a whale named Monstro".
• What Happened to the Mouse?: What about that island full of polymorphed child slavery?!
  • Honest John and Gideon aren't seen again after they take Pinocchio to the Coachman.
• When the Clock Strikes Twelve: This is when the coach to Pleasure Island departs.
• White Gloves: Pinocchio has both white gloves and Four-Fingered Hands as a puppet. He loses the gloves when he becomes a real boy, as well as having a proper set of five fingers on each hand, implying that his "gloves" might actually have been wood painted white. All of the Funny Animals in the movie (Jiminy Cricket, Honest John, Gideon) also sport gloves, sometimes with holes in the fingers to show their (deserved) misery and poverty.
• Wind-Up Key: All of Geppetto's music boxes have a key to show they are clockwork. They are started by pressing a button, but are never seen being wound.
• You Can Turn Back: When Pinocchio goes out to find Geppetto after learning he had been swallowed by a whale, he gives Jiminy a chance to leave, offering his hand and saying goodbye. Jiminy seems surprised that he would even do that.
  Jiminy Cricket: "Goodbye"?! I may be live bait down there, but I'm with you!
• You Don't Look Like You: Pinocchio's attire here has Bavarian/Tyrolian influences (the Lederhosen short pants and hat with a feather most notably), far from looking like his Tuscany counterpart from the original tale and its attached illustrations.

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"When you wish upon a star, your dreams come true!"