It’s a tale as old as time — OK or at least as old as 1883, when Italian author Carlo Collodi first introduced the story of the eponymous wooden puppet with the famed growing nose in The Adventures of Pinocchio.
Disney has dabbled in the Pinocchio Cinematic Universe since 1940 when it released Pinocchio, its second animated feature after 1937’s Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs.
And the now Mouse House is bringing a new live-action adaptation of the story to Disney+ next week with the arrival of the Robert Zemeckis-directed Pinocchio, which you can get a first look at in the exclusive clip above.
The film stars Tom Hanks (reuniting with his Forrest Gump, Cast Away and Polar Express director) as Geppetto, the gentle-hearted woodcarver who builds and raises Pinocchio (Ben Ainsworth). Joseph Gordon-Levitt plays Jiminy Cricket and Cynthia Erivo is the Blue Fairy (stop us if you’ve heard this one before, but the casting of Erivo, an Oscar-nominated Black British actress, triggered the usual racist troll backlash online).
In the clip featured above, the Blue Fairy appoints Jiminy Cricket as “the temporary conscience” of the still-growing boy.
“Henceforth, you are the high keeper of the knowledge of right and wrong,” she tells Jiminy.
It’s something they could use more of in certain dark corners of the internet.
Pinocchio premieres Thursday, Sept. 8 on Disney+.
Watch the trailer:
