Pinocchio Unstrung will be released in theaters on July 24.
Just when I thought the Twisted Childhood Universe — aka the Poohniverse — couldn’t get any worse, it didn’t. It got better… exponentially better in fact.
In 2023, filmmakers Rhys Frake-Waterfield and Scott Chambers kickstarted what would become their TCU with the quite rotten Winnie-the-Pooh: Blood and Honey. Since then, they’ve overseen horror spins on Peter Pan, Bambi, and Pooh’s Hundred Acre horde to varying results (Winnie-the-Pooh: Blood and Honey 2 is a Terrifier-inspired hoot). But there’s hope yet for these lower-budget public domain horror adaptations; Pinocchio Unstrung is a legitimately funny and brutally bloody take on Carlo Collodi’s 1883 novel, The Adventures of Pinocchio, and while short of perfection, it’s easily the TCU’s crowning release to date.
Frake-Waterfield writes and directs a nightmarish comedy about Pinocchio (voiced by Jude-Evan Lloyd), a living wooden figure who wants to become a real boy. In this scenario, he’s brought to life by Geppetto (Richard Brake) as a forever companion for his grandson, James (Cameron Bell), after enduring the loss of his parents as well as his best mate. Pinocchio is immediately protective of James; he learns that an alpha always protects the herd while watching wildlife documentaries. With the aid of a nefarious cricket (voiced by Robert Englund), Pinocchio starts punishing anyone who harms James — dentists, drunk drivers, prep school bullies— while turning himself into a real boy with flesh, organs, and a newfound family.
Frake-Waterfield is channeling the Child’s Play universe here, specifically Seed of Chucky’s goofier bits and SYFY’s gonzo Chucky television show. It’s whimsical, silly, and vicious out of naivety, with a supernatural outcast seeking compassion and acceptance amidst grief and pain. There’s an enchanting connection to nature in Geppetto’s craftsmanship — what’s born from soil and grows into trees — but also a putrid darkness about his methods. Funnily enough, The Adventures of Pinocchio doesn’t shy away from terrifying imagery with pages that feel torn from horror authors, yet Frake-Waterfield finds fresh avenues to inject genre flourishes. And surprisingly, he nails the corrupted vibe of a twisted fairy tale, with Geppetto serving as a Dr. Frankenstein with a green thumb.
Pinocchio Unstrung boasts an old-school genre personality thanks to Todd Masters and MastersFX, who built a fully functional Pinocchio puppet; shades of Guillermo del Toro’s interpretation, but eerily inhuman. He looks fab, down to feathered bark that mimics hair and sunken eyes for a solid creep factor. Frake-Waterfield’s team of puppeteers gives Pinocchio eerie life paired with lil’ Lloyd’s prepubescent voice acting. There’s wonder behind Pinocchio’s words, brimming with curiosity, and a sweetness behind his jumbled motivations. Yes, he might be bludgeoning a catty schoolgirl with a sledgehammer, but Lloyd’s delivery juxtaposes the softness of a youngling we want to protect. It’s never as simple as “Pinocchio bad, people good,” which yields more thematic warmth than expected and coddles Pinocchio with an empathetic touch.
However, the script’s folkloric invocations don’t stop Pinocchio Unstrung from being a face-clawing, spine-snapping, appendage-removing gorefest. The first kill brought a howl out of me like a cartoon character, and the slaughtering only gets more gruesome from there. Gym equipment, toolshed objects, and Pinocchio’s own pointy fingers are all implements of death, as bodies are mangled beyond recognition. Frake-Waterfield leans heavily on cheeky references to everything from The Texas Chain Saw Massacre to Jaws, but never as a distraction. Pinocchio’s murder spree recalls the brutality of Jay Baruchel’s Random Acts of Violence, where dead bodies become a psycho’s art pieces, while still keeping that bouncy Chucky-esque energy. Just when you think Frake-Waterfield won’t push another boundary, his effects team tests their limits by snapping a meathead in half or ripping someone’s scalp off like a tortured Barbie doll.
Kudos to Richard Brake for anchoring the film’s seediest bites, since — let’s be real — he’s never played squeaky clean. You know Geppetto’s arc from the minute Brake smiles at James, despite his promises of friendship and pizza. As Pinocchio Unstrung spirals into a descent of hacked-up corpses and destroyed childhoods, Brake is there to hoist an underlying nastiness into the spotlight. He’s the kind of villain the TCU deserves, which is not to ignore Englund, whose devilish take on Jiminy is like a bug-sized Freddy Krueger if he were more interested in mentoring than maiming. Together, these veteran genre baddies ensure Pinocchio Unstrung stays balanced between shock-and-awe laughs and the rooted evil that lurks in the shadows, pulling Pinocchio’s strings without the not-so-real boy even knowing.
There are rougher aspects that pull the film back down to Earth. Despite how far Frake-Waterfield’s TCU has advanced — and while it’s inspiring to see the franchise reinvest box office returns into better quality products — Pinocchio Unstrung can’t escape some wonky digital backgrounds. Granted, they’re leaps and bounds beyond the work in Winnie-the-Pooh: Blood and Honey, but there are cracks in execution. Some supporting dialogue is hammy, jokes don’t always land, and other horror-comedy pitfalls stack on top. Again, it’s a massive upgrade for the TCU… but there’s more room to develop.
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