Guillermo Del Toro opts to direct upcoming stop-motion Pinnochio

There’s a new version of the age-old Pinnochio fable in production. Not very exciting, right? Over the years there have been dozens of different films based on the tale, most prominently the 1940 Disney animated film, which, statistically speaking, you’ve all seen at least once.

What makes this new version intriguing however, are the names attached to the production. Its long been known that Guillermo Del Toro (director of the Hellboy films and Blade II) would be producing this movie, however this morning, news appeared that Del Toro has also decided to co-direct the feature alongside Mark Gustafson. You likely don’t recognize Gustafson’s name, but he served as animation director on Wes Anderson’s The Fantastic Mr. Fox — which should come in handy given that this adaptation of Pinnochio will be stop-motion animated film.

Also intriguing is word that Nick Cave is attached to the film as a music consultant, and while no casting decisions have been finalized, Del Toro claims that he would like to cast Tom Waits as Pinnochio’s father Geppetto, and Donald Sutherland as the tale’s fox.

As for the film’s plot, Twitch reports that it will be set in Italy between World War I and World War II, and deal heavily with themes stemming from the region’s fascist ruling class. “It was when everyone was behaving like a puppet, except for puppets,” Del Toro is quoted as saying. Unfortunately, beyond that, the film is a bit of a mystery. We don’t know when it will enter production, when it will hit theaters, or just how “adult” this version of the story will skew.

Say what you will about the Disney flick being a classic, but it certainly never included a scene of our little wooden protagonist spitting on the corpse of Benito Mussolini. Not that we have any inside information indicating that Del Toro’s movie will include such a scene, but one can always hope, no?