The Lion King Still Reigns

Review by Shirhan Manan with intro by Peter W. Allen

I was unable to attend the advance screening of The Lion King (2019) this week but fortunately I had the perfect backup to take my place. A long time friend (and previous student of mine from many years ago) Shirhan Manan. Shirhan was born in South Africa and has a strong personal connection to the animals and locations of The Lion King, and he also credits Disney’s original The Lion King (1994) as the film that inspired him to become a professional animator. 

There may be some very minor spoilers below, but honestly anyone who doesn’t already know the story of a hugely successful Disney film from 1994 is very unlikely to be reading this blog.
Take it away Shirhan…

Watching the intro took me back to ‘94 when I was just a young teen and first saw the original film in the cinema. It was very emotional for me, as that was a pivotal point in my life that has helped shape me to what I am today. I must admit, I shed a few tears during that intro sequence. 
The intro was pretty much identical to the original, I thought it played out amazingly well. Dialogue throughout was very similar to the original, but a lot of lines have been omitted where I think it would have been a bit too corny for this more realistic style of imagery, which I thought was sensible. The original was more targeted towards younger audiences, whereas the new one I think is great for all ages. Maybe it’s a little darker in few instances.

I was happy to see that not everything was identical to the original, a lot of scenes were flipped/mirrored which created some contrast to the original. All songs from the original are present. A few lyrical changes, especially to “Be Prepared”, sung by Scar, which made it more fitting for this  film. I noticed there was a song I’m not familiar with during the time Simba returns home which might be a new addition.
The story plays out in the same order as the original and is a good length, it didn’t feel too short or too long. I couldn’t tell what time the film actually started as our phones were sealed up but Google says the run time is 1 hour 58 mins.
Mufasa was a great character and it was good to hear James Earl Jones voicing the character again, though I feel his take on the original was much more expressive and more powerful than the new one.
Young Simba (J D McCrary) was fantastic, I probably enjoyed the younger characterisation more than grown up Simba. Good voice casting, and a good performance. the same goes for young Nala (Shahadi Wright Joseph).
Zazu (John Oliver) is good once you get used to the way he looks, Zazu is still a funny character, much like the original. His open/close beak for dialogue looked a bit strange at first, but I got used to it.

From the teasers and all the marketing imagery released before the film I thought Scar (Chiwetel Ejiofor) looked really odd, but watching his performance on screen, I think the design was well suited to the film. I enjoyed his character a lot.
The hyenas were alright, not as funny as the original. In this version there seems to be a slightly different relationship between the hyenas and Scar at the beginning compared to the original. There is a tension between Scar and the hyenas til Scar suggests his evil plan and they come to common ground, where both will benefit from taking control of the pride lands.

Timon (Billy Eichner) and Pumba (Seth Rogen) were great. The voice actors did a good job with the characters. They delivered a lot of good one liners from the original, but also some new ones.
As much as I love the original Rafiki design I am happy to see this version of Rafiki without the long tail as his species don’t have tails. He seems a little older and of course very wise as expected.
The film looks super realistic. I don’t know if I can believe Nat Geo docos anymore lol. The CG animals are done that well. Environments are absolutely breathtaking. Animation, top notch! There is a lot of good subtle animation. One scene that stood out for me, was when Nala and Simba go to elephant graveyard and she pins him to the ground, there is a lot of great secondary animation going on there that I thought was amazingly well done. Characters lacked many facial expressions since it’s super realistic they can’t express as much as humans do. It might have been weird to exaggerate expressions so it didn’t bother me too much since story was cool and the music provided the underlying emotion of the characters. Hans Zimmer’s score was much darker/heavier than original but still using all the same motifs from the 1994 version.
Overall, the film is almost identical, with just a few differences. It’s the same story and same ending, but a few variances which worked well for the film.
I really enjoyed it a lot. Looking forward to seeing it a second time.

‘The Lion King’ opens in Australia on 18 July, 2019.

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