"The Lion King" Movie Review - Roars But Not Quite

After the death of Mufasa and his brother Scar taking the throne as the Pride Lands' new king, Simba must return to his home and reclaim his rightful place to restore peace and order. 

The Lion King
- Photo from IMDb

If there's anything that we should take pride of in the new Lion King live action (which is technically isn't) is that it is a majestically crafted adaptation that manages to transform the colorful and vibrant 1994 2D-animated film into a realistic, living and breathing world that's lush, vast and wonderful all at the same time. Thanks to Jon Favreau's visual antipasto, much like in his previous work with 2016's live action The Jungle Book, this movie has of course achieved a milestone when it comes to a refined CGI and probably Favreau's best looking film to date. 

The movie opens up as the sun rises, beaming its gleeful radiance as it shine grazes the furry backs of the animals that colors the pride lands, from the humble gazelles, the imperial zebras, up to the towering giraffes, before it slowly invites us to the prideful and yet royal presence of the lions, with the leadership of Mufasa and Sarabi at his side, as we also dutifuly await the arrival of the future king, Simba. At this moment, I was struck with a heavy breeze of nostalgia as I fully remembered the time when I first saw The Lion King as a kid and for the most part, I was truly ablazed with such an emotional trip to the past. 

But as soon as the animals starts to open their mouths, or I should say barely, and spoke their first lines, I was a bit underwhelmed and took me out of the film because something felt wrong. And then as I continue watching, I just realized what's missing — emotions. 

Yes, this adaptation lacked the most important aspect of a movie composing of non-human characters. And because the animals doesn't have anthropomorphic features to further stress their reactions to the events that's happening around them, the movie extremely struggled to pull off a punch and personally, that was a huge bummer especially for a film that deals with guilt, anger and joy, all of which requires a moving and persuasive facial acting that probably must be rejected at this movie's pitch meeting in an attempt to go for a truly realistic route. 

Don't get me wrong, the movie looked gorgeous and it actually reminded me of Netflix's Our Planet, which in itself possessed some of the most striking visuals of all the documentaries about the animals and the wilderness. But there lies the problem too, and because The Lion King was too realistic, it also feels as if we are watching a documentary that happens to have great voice acting, playing its powerful narration along side it. 

Speaking of voice acting, I really enjoyed Donald Glover as the voice of Simba. His speaking voice in itself is charming and a welcome addition to an already star-studded cast and as we all know, he sings very well too. Beyonce as Nala was okay but I thought she mostly came off as herself rather the character that she was giving a voice too and it felt a bit disconnected at times. Of course, it wouldn't be complete without James Earl Jones reprising his role as Mufasa and what he offered this time is nothing but pure love letter to the fans of the original film. 

Overall, The Lion King didn't actually added anything new to the story or elevated any character as what Aladdin did with Jafar in their live action film, which begs the question of why even bother remaking an already beloved and high-praised film. 

Let's Be Reel

The Lion King was a scene-by-scene reimagining of its original counterpart. It's a beautiful film that happens to be short of emotion, giving as a rather bleak and uninteresting interpretation of our favored beasts. If anything, it sometimes feel like a successful tech demo rather than an actual film. 

"Can you feel the love tonight?", the song and a question that the movie asks it audience, and quite frankly, I'd say "not tonight, sir, not tonight". 

6/10

Reel Points

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