The Lion King 1994
The Lion King got raves and was a huge hit for Disney, but I remember being a little disappointed with it. My first problem was the whole idea of this baby inheriting a kingdom just for being born and all the animals bow down, etc. Then the only real thing we see of Simba as a kid is disobeying his father and putting himself and his friend (and eventually his father) in danger from the hyenas. After his father is killed, he runs away and learns to take it easy and even when Nala comes and finds him, she is able to beat him in a fight. So he’s a goof off, not brave, and not really that strong. I think maybe I was being a little too hard on the kid version of the lion, but I would have liked to have seen at least one scene where he does something to show he deserves to be king before the face off with Scar, which ultimately does redeem him, but only in the simplest way possible (and Pumbaa seems to fight off more hyenas than Simba).
Watching again 20 years later and having watched a lot more Disney animated features to compare against, my opinion of the movie has gone up some. I still have those issues, but there has to be a story and the story isn’t the whole movie. The songs are very good, the animation is good, and many of the characters are very good, including Mufasa and Scar along with Timon and Pumbaa. It is a very large cast, made even larger by having different voices for young Simba or different singing voices. And it moves very quickly though the ending is a little drawn out. I am not sure how Simba becoming king makes it rain or why everything dried up when Scar was king. I still kind of feel like Simba should have led everyone to where he grew up instead of somehow saving the kingdom from global warming. It’s still not my favorite Disney movie, but I can understand why people like it and admit that it has some great touches, scoring on really everything except the story, and even the story is still okay.
Written: 29 Jul 2018
Owned on: Blu-ray, DVD, Digital