As everyone knows, Pinocchio just wants to be a real boy.
In the trailer for “Pinocchio Unstrung,” the next blood-splattered battering of beloved children’s IP by the creators of 2024’s micro-budget smash hit “Winnie-the-Pooh: Blood and Honey,” he wants to be a real boy so bad he’ll go on a gory murderous rampage to get there.
possibly the most twisted take on the much-adapted classic story sees Geppetto’s (Robert Brake) famed creation, having discovered that the difference between wooden dolls and boys is “organs and stuff,” look to acquire the necessary body parts in the most slasher-friendly way imaginable.
We see him use his razor sharp wooden nose to impale a girl’s foot as she comes out of the shower, rip the skin from the face of a screaming man and appear to collect a load of intestines from another casualty. All the while, Pinocchio is goaded on by probably cinema’s most evil Jimmy Cricket (voiced by Robert Englund, best known for playing Freddie Krueger).”Piece by piece, we’ll take everything you need to be real,” he tells him.
If anyone thought Guillermo del Toro’s Pinocchio was a little on the dark side and perhaps not something for their children, that film was basically Disney compared to this.
“Pinocchio: Unstrung” is directed by Rhys Frake-Waterfield and produced by Scott Jeffrey, the duo behind “Winnie-the-Pooh: Blood and Honey” and their prolific horror banner Jagged Edge Productions.
Alongside Brake and Englund, the cast also includes Cameron Bell, Jessica Balmer, Jack Art Gray and Peter De Souza-Feighoney, while Emmy winner Todd Masters oversees the the practical animatronics. ITN Distribution is overseeing the release, with theatrical date currently being scheduled worldwide. Premiere Entertainment Group is repping sales.
“We built Pinocchio as a fully practical animatronic because I wanted him to feel real,” said Frake-Waterfield. “This is a twisted coming-of-age story told from the puppet’s perspective: a creation struggling for autonomy while being manipulated by the sinister forces around him, from Robert Englund’s sinister ‘Jiminy Cricket’ to Richard Brake’s obsessive Geppetto.”
“Pinocchio Unstrung” is the latest standalone addition to Jagged Edge’s growing low-budget Twisted Childhood Universe, which currently includes “Blood and Honey” and its sequel, “Bambi: The Reckoning” and “Peter Pan’s Neverland Nightmare.” A third “Blood and Honey” is set to shoot soon, while “Poohniverse Monsters Assemble,” the Avengers-esque crossover film bringing all the characters together for an IP bloodbath is in development.
Added Frake-Waterfield: “Our Twisted Childhood Universe continues to grow in darker and more ambitious ways as we’re gearing up for Poohniverse Monsters Assemble!”
See the “Pinocchio Unstrung” trailer below:
Source: variety.com
