Simba, the latest-born lion in a line of kings, is raised expecting to be king one day. But tragedy strikes, and Simba chooses to run away, shirking his responsibilities. One day, he will have to make the decision whether to live out his life in isolation or return home and deal with the consequences of his actions.
(I mean, who doesn't know the plot of The Lion King by now? Still, I kept it as spoiler-free as possible)
This movie was ridiculously faithful to the original cartoon film. Most of it was scene-for-scene, line-for-line, the same. Jon Favreau, the director, claimed his goal for this film was to reinvent it with a different visual medium, while keeping the same character to it as the original. He didn't want to mess with a classic masterpiece, so a lot of the film remains practically unchanged.
There were still a few minor changes here and there. Probably the biggest change is that the female hyena is sort of the dark and ruthless leader of the hyena pack. The other two hyenas were just random members of the pack who got more screen time than the others. The goofy one (Ed in the original, but he had a new African name, Azizi, in this one) actually had speaking lines, and his personality quirk was just that he didn't understand personal space. Which was a hilarious take on the character. I chuckled every time he meandered onto screen and into his buddy's space.
Scar was more ruthless and violent in this one. Instead of being the lazy, mopey guy who talked the hyenas into doing his bidding, he actually played a more active role in this version.
Scar's song, "Be Prepared," was originally supposed to be omitted from this movie. Disney didn't want to deal with the Nazi-esque themes, and the voice actor for Scar didn't have the right voice for the song. However, there was enough fan backlash that they relented. Although it's a very different version. More of a quiet march than the minor-key pop-ish tune of the original.
On the subject of music, all of the music was performed heavily with African-sounding instruments, giving a little more authenticity to the setting than the big orchestral music from the original. I really enjoyed the music. Timon and Pumbaa sang an a capella version of "The Lion Sleeps Tonight," with backup vocals from several other animals. It was a lot of fun to listen to and watch.
Of course, I can't forget to mention the visual aspect of the film. The CGI was absolutely breathtaking. I kept forgetting that there were no real animals filmed in this movie. It felt like watching a nature documentary, until they started talking. They did an excellent job in capturing the essence of Africa; I almost felt like I was back there again.
If there was anything I had to complain about, it was the minimal facial expressions on the animals. They took CGI realism a step too far and kept the animal faces as true-to-life as possible, which made it harder to read emotions. When the stampede starts pouring into the valley, the original Simba's ears drooped while his face gave an "oh shit" expression; whereas this CGI version of Simba just looked like a lion cub intrigued by a shiny object. When you're already breaking the realism with talking animals, having them emote realistically kind of takes away some of the emotional impact.
Also, I wasn't a fan of the pacing of the film. Because they were trying to keep a near-perfect faithful recreation, some lines and scenes felt like they didn't flow that well; like they were just there because they were in the original, not because they made sense with the new "live action" feel.
I was kind of on the fence with the new Timon and Pumbaa. I grew up with Nathan Lane and Ernie Sabella's wonderful voices, so Billy Eichner and Seth Rogen just sounded off at first. But they quickly became my favorite part of this movie. Unlike the rest of the film, which was practically a word-for-word copy of the original, Timon and Pumbaa got to improvise a lot more with their lines. Which made Pumbaa's infamous "censored" fart song all the more hilarious!
Overall, I really enjoyed this film. I wouldn't say it surpasses the classic version, but it was faithful enough to be a visually appealing version, even if it was toned down a little bit from the more cartoony original. I'd recommend seeing this one in theaters, for the wonderful "National Geographic" imagery.
