Gregory Mann voices both Pinocchio and Carlo, with some additional lines being recorded by Alfie Tempest.
Tilda Swinton as the wood sprite who brings Pinocchio to life, and Death.
Tom Kenny voices Mussolini and his right hand man, as well as the Sea Captan.
Athena Greco voices the Podestà and Dottore's wives, plus the Parishioner woman and one of the twin daughters.
Sandro Carroti as the Fruit Vendor and the Butcher.
Francesca Fanti as one of the twin daughters, the old woman and the street sweep, as well as being in the ADR group.
Tim Blake Nelson voices all four of the Black Rabbits in the afterlife.
Awesome, Dear Boy: In the making-of documentary, Cate Blanchett and Del Toro confirm that she requested to be in the movie while wrapping Nightmare Alley (2021), only to be told that there was no-one left to cast but Spazzatura the monkey. She enthusiastically told Del Toro "I'll do anything. For you, I would play a pencil".
Children Voicing Children: Pinocchio and Carlo, young boys, are voiced by Gregory Mann, who would have been somewhere from 11–13 during production. The same goes with many foreign language dubs.
Development Gag: One of the workers in Count Volpe's circus troupe reuses a concept design for a more traditional, Stromboli influenced, Mangiafuoco that was seen prominently in the film's initial promotional concept art.
This film was released a mere three months after Disney's Pinocchio (the live-action remake of the 1940 animated film). Rather amusingly, both films have VFX work done by Moving Picture Company, and both make a number of very similar departures from the original story. The duel between the two Pinocchio remakes resulted contrasting outcomes: del Toro's version won the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature, while Disney's remake ended up with a Golden Raspberry Award for the "Worst Remake, Rip-off or Sequel".
With Puss in Boots: The Last Wish: both are animated films whose central theme revolves around mortality. The latter film features Pinocchio in a cameo, as well as an Expy of the Talking Cricket in a supporting role. Both were nominated for and seen as the main frontrunners for the 2023 Academy Award for Best Animated Feature.
Saved from Development Hell: Guillermo del Toro announced the project in 2008 and planned to release it in 2013 or 2014, but the project went into Development Hell. Del Toro later confirmed in 2017 that the project was cancelled because no studios were willing to finance it because of Del Toro's intentions to make it a Stop Motion film. It was finally Un-Cancelled in 2018 by Netflix and active development started from then onwards. It finally premiered at the BFI London Film Festival in 2022.
Mangiafuoco was originally going to be the main antagonist and was going to be voiced by Ron Perlman. Guillermo del Toro did not like the character of Mangiafuoco as a villain, since del Toro thought it was a Fat Bastard villain cliché. As such, Mangiafuoco was discarded and replaced by Count Volpe as the villain (some of the concept art for Volpe's wagon in the Museum of Modern Art exhibit for the movie calls it Mangiafuoco's wagon alongside concept art calling it Volpe's wagon), but the doll already made for Mangiafuoco would end up being repurposed as one of Count Volpe's circus employees.
The Cat was supposed to be human as shown in concept art, but was replaced by Spazzatura.
The Land of Toys was supposed to appear, based on a concept image of Pinocchio being thrown off a cliff while having some donkey characteristics, but was replaced with an Italian kids training camp.
In the script, it is written that the Wood Sprite and Death's masks are based on the face of Carlo's mother, but it's omitted in the final film.
The Talking Cricket was originally given a non-anthropomorphic design and colored black compared to his final design where he's colored both black and blue.
Word of Saint Paul: Gregory Mann thinks that Carlo's soul was taken for Pinocchio, who in turn thinks Geppetto knows who he is, unaware that Geppetto is still grieving too much to realize that.
Unsorted Trivia:
The movie holds the distinction of being the first stop-motion animated film in 17 years to win the Academy Award for "Best Animated Feature" since Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit.
Guillermo Del Toro's Pinocchio was released on Blu-Ray as apart of the Criterion Collection on December 12, 2023.
◊ was notably cartoony and lankier with longer white hair, longer mustache, wore glasses, and much older which closely resembled Disney's version of the character.
