Il re Leone

And I'm not talking about (reliving) Mufasa's death. I'm talking about Hollywood tarnishing yet another classic that needed no remake or reboot whatsoever. Despite the movie being almost two hours, the movie was rushed - they rushed into the songs, which were artless and dull regarding the setting; one of the songs was tragically shorten; and Beyonce (adult Nala) had very little screen-time in the film.

Worst of all, there was NO EMOTION, MAGIC, HUMOR.

Only good things were Hans Zimmer, Elton John, and James Earl Jones. The visuals were good, but they don't make up for the movie at all.

This remake manages to suck all the life out of the original. It really is like watching National Geographic while hearing The Lion King (1994) on in the other room. There is a total disconnect between what you are seeing on-screen and what you are hearing or supposed to feel-so much that I am surprised this was not noticed early on and left on the cutting room floor. Baloo in Favreau's The Jungle Book (2016) alone should have been a warning sign.

At its best, the soundtrack is only as good as the original. I was waiting out for Beyoncé and Donald Glover hoping maybe they would save it with charm, humor, or chemistry, but Beyoncé oversings/overacts and Glover's few moments just aren't enough. John Oliver does steal his scenes as Zazu and I'm a fan of Scar's character design. Visual effects are extremely well done, but for a production that looks so true-to-life, most of the film is lifeless.

Very disappointed.

... with real, life-like animals. The lack of emotion and facial expressions makes you not get so attached. Very much disliked the new song. Very much disliked Beyonce's unnesessary changes to the great song that is Can you feel the love tonight. Was also not too fond of other voice choises in this movie. Six starts for the great story that The Lion King still is, but not even close to the same league with the original in the execution. But I do not doubt that the children who have not seen the original would not love it.

If only it could move us inside...

Let's be honest, Disney has never been a non profit-making organization and Uncle Walt was a man of vision AND economical flair. Still, before turning into a voracious corporate blob, Disney was still the quintessential dream factory and nostalgia builder for many, many, many generations. And even for these direct-to-video sequels that spread all over the 2000s like a bad cold, some brain cells of imaginations were mobilized.

But now Disney's not even trying to pretend, investing all the efforts on a pure technical level and the kind of marketing-that-speaks-for-itself. It is one thing to adapt fairy tales into live-actions, before "Cinderella", there was "Enchanted", "Maleficent" or even Tim Burton's "Alice in Wonderland". And yet Disney executives found the trick: it's not about adapting the fairy tale but the Disney version of it. Thorns are still invisible over the head with the two round ears but right now in 2022, it seems that "awakening your inner child" isn't a motto anymore but a formula.

The formula could have interesting results: the 2016 "Jungle Book" film could center on little Mowgli and diverged from the 1967 film. Same with "Dumbo" or "Aladdin". But exclusively animal-centered movies like "The Lion King", "Bambi" or "The Lady and the Tramp" are a different challenge. You've got to humanize the way animals could act, react or display emotions. Take the kiss between Lady and the Tramp, the magic is not within the moment their mouths meet but the cute and genuine embarrassment that follows. You can't "animate" these emotions with live-action animals with all the technology of the world.

Indeed if your purpose is that your lion looks real, you can't expand the range of facial expressions: remember in "One Hundred and One Dalmatians" the way Pongo and Perdita looked at each other at the end of the garden scene: reproducing that with real-looking animals is inconceivable, couldn't work, wouldn't work. And that's the ultimate wager of photorealistic remakes: achieve documentary-like realism with storylines that were designed for hand-drawn or at the very least CGI animation, "Toy Story" CGI I mean.

And that leads to even more perplexing results when it comes to 'surreal' sequences like "I Just Can't Wait to Be The King" where two normal-looking cubs are casually running across pink flamingoes, or the moment that precedes Simba's epiphany where the figure of Mufasa is barely visible in the sky (not to mention that some lines were cut from the original). Now, maybe Disney takes for granted our passion for the "Lion King" and considers that we're there to "fill the gaps". It's true I did enjoy the film to the degree that it reminded of "The Lion King", which is a high point of my childhood, but at the end of the day, my mind was full of afterthoughts. To put it simple, I realized it was an enjoyment by proxy.

The problem of "The Lion King" isn't that it's good or bad. It is certainly a remarkable achievement on the field of animation. The problem is that it is problematic. Yes I'm talking in circles but that's a circle Disney has just taken us into and that makes it rather impossible to figure what is wrong with these photorealistic films, we know there's something that doesn't look right, maybe on a pure reason-to-be way.

"The Lion King" is one of the classics of animation, a masterpiece that speaks highhy of the dedication of old-school Disney team of animators. 1995 would change the games with the first CGI and so in a way, "The Lion King" was the culmination of that traditional hand-drawn art. Not only that but its story, very simple and straightforward carried the gravitas and dramas or movie classics. Characters like Scar, Mufasa, Simba are all printed in our memories, the songs became pop culture monuments, scenes have been parodied countless times. "The Lion King" became a household name for Disney excellence. And certainly one of the greatest opening sequences of history, the shivers down your spine sent by the sight of Rafiki carrying little Simba is one of these moments you can't just 'duplicate'.

As viewers pointed out, many things are missing: where is the friendly nod Mufasa gives Zazu? Or that hug between Rafiki and Mufasa? Mufasa comes across as a stone-faced patriarch posing like a library statue... and waiting for our nostalgic pheromones to instill some life in him .... Maybe we were just curious to see how they'd pull this out. I guess if I was told about an animated version of "The Godfather" no matter how ludricrous it sounds I would have given a shot. "The Lion King" was such a big deal, viewers did came to see and made it one of the highest grossing films of the year.

Fair enough, but what's that does say exactly? That half the job was done and make a copy of something great to make something of equally promising greatness? The purpose of a remake is to bring something new. But "The Lion King 2019" doesn't bring anything new except for the realistic animation that doesn't look like an improvement anyway.. Scar looks like a washed out lion who shampooed his mane with paint thinner, without one tenth the suave charisma of the original. James Earl Jones' voice looks like he was only testing the microphone or was bored to death, which actually matched the look of the used-to-be majestic lion.

And I swear the savannah and jungle never looked so dismal with tones of beige and yellowish green that reminded me of that Water Truce sequence in "The Jungle Book". So much for the bright colors and the escapism.... And the only thing visible right now are the thorns on the head, and the round ears have turned pointy... no it's not the devil, but a cow, a cash-cow.

Another Hollywood smack in the face, great animation with so much promise until the characters started talking, the new actor replacements were HORRIBLE! NO emotions in the voices NOTHING...NOTHING! ZERO emotion, as if these actors didn't care or were just reading there lines in a room by them selves. This was just a travesty, a classic... RUINED by terrible acting , TERRIBLE Direction, just HORRIBLE! WHO the HELL made these decisions??!! With the very few dialog add ons WHY would you re cast WHY????? Why would you remove Jeremy Irons as Scar?? WHY??? Why would you put emotionless actors as Simba, Nala etc.. Yes Beyoncé was not good not at all, no emotions just terrible and ruined the original music. Seth Rogan was ok, yeas just Ok not close to as funny as the original Pumba.. AVOID AT ALL COSTS!