About as mediocre as the other live action remakes. Disney is always impressive visually but nothing here improves upon the original, and in some parts, such as Pleasure Island which is much more kiddie here, it’s made much worse.

Well, having finally seen this I now know why it went to Disney+. Not that it couldn't have still made good money in cinemas, and good lord it's better than Dumbo, but I feel it isn't up to the standard of other live-action Disney remakes. Disney are very protective over their IP, so stopping a potential embarrassment of making just, let's say, $80 million, probably heavily outweighed the prospects of it being another Beauty and the Beast.

In terms of visual effects (particularly when involving water) it is not up to the standard we expect from a Robert Zemeckis production, and secondly Tom Hanks' performance is uneven - sometimes he's a dimwitted Italian craftsman and other times he's just Tom Hanks. It also yet again uses the woke brush with its forced diversity, even to the point of creating new characters just so a black person can fill the role (not even one that is respectfully-sounding but one with a slight "saf lund'n" accent). That, along with Cynthia Erivo as the blue fairy just muddies the purity and tradition of a story that is meant to be set in Italy in the late 1800s. So I can understand it dropping on a streaming platform, adding value to that and also reducing any potential public backlash over the aforementioned creative choices - though I believe these are minor, at least to me, and they do not hurt this rendition of such an established and beloved story too much.

I thought it was a wonderfully lavish production with good performances and lots of rich adventure sequences. It may not hit the high notes in terms of comedy or musicality or dramatic substance, and it does feel a bit too low-stakes an adventure for such an iconic character - which is probably another reason expenses were spared on a theatrical release - but I still largely enjoyed it as a sweet, endearing retelling of a classic story. I had also never seen a Pinocchio film before, so this was a treat for me. And I sympathise with the makers here, as it must be difficult to adapt a film from 82 years ago, bring it up to modern standards, compete with the types of adventures kids see nowadays, but also remain faithful to its origin.

Anyway, I particularly liked Jiminy Cricket and Honest John; their CG and voice performances were great, and Luke Evans hamming it up reminded me of Hugh Jackman's Blackbeard. And I loved the joke about Chris Pine. All-in-all, I believe children that come out of Lyle, Lyle, Crocodile with a smile on their face will enjoy this as well, and adults should also appreciate it especially with the feeling of being at home and saving on cinema expenses.