“The Lion King” remake opts for style over substance

By N.B.

DISNEY IS fixated on remakes of its classic cartoons. Already this year, “Dumbo” and “Aladdin” have been added to a roster that included “Cinderella”, “The Jungle Book” and “Beauty and the Beast”. When the company cannot use actors and filmed footage, it does the next best thing: it produces a remake which is not quite live-action, but which looks as if it might be. In Jon Favreau’s “The Lion King”, adapted from the record-breaking cartoon released in 1994, the computer-generated animation is so believable that you could easily mistake swathes of it for wildlife documentary footage.

As awe-inspiring as this digital deep-fakery is, though, it does have a flaw: photorealistic talking animals, it turns out, are nowhere near as charming or as expressive as stylised talking animals. And aside from the David Attenborough-worthy visuals, “The Lion King” does not have much to recommend it. It may not be a shot-by-shot facsimile of the original cartoon, but it is so similar that Jeff Nathanson was lucky to be credited as the sole screenwriter. Irene Mecchi, Jonathan Roberts and Linda Woolverton, the three people who wrote the original, did the lion’s share of the work.

The only obvious change is how much slower the 21st-century version is. Without introducing any notable scenes, Mr Favreau roves around the uncannily convincing savannah at such a leisurely pace that he adds a half hour to the running time, turning a brisk 88-minute cartoon into a dawdling 118-minute movie. That was a mistake. Judging by Hans Zimmer’s tumultuous orchestral score, and the humourlessness of most of the characters, the makers of “The Lion King” see it as a Shakespearean drama with echoes of the Old Testament. Many critics agree. But by stretching out the source material, Mr Favreau shows how thin it is—and how little there is to the titular hero.

He is Simba (voiced as a cub by JD McCrary), a feisty lion who is due to reign over the Pride Lands after the death of his gruffly majestic father, Mufasa (James Earl Jones, who also played the role in the original film). But Mufasa’s bitter brother, Scar (Chiwetel Ejiofor), murders the king, and somehow persuades the extraordinarily gullible Simba that he is to blame. The exiled cub is then befriended by Timon (Billy Eichner, improvising amusingly) and Pumbaa (Seth Rogen), a meerkat and a warthog who escort him to their Edenic jungle home. There he enjoys a life of freedom while dining on juicy invertebrates and singing along to Timon and Pumbaa’s philosophical theme song, “Hakuna Matata”—Swahili for “no worries”. But after what seem to be several weeks, several months or several years, depending on the narrative demands of each scene, the now grown-up Simba (Donald Glover) is coaxed back to the Pride Lands by his girlfriend Nala (Beyoncé Carter-Knowles) so that he can oust the villainous Scar.

Thanks to interludes for Elton John’s and Tim Rice’s songs, this meagre plot just about fills an hour and a half; but over the course of two hours it becomes clear that Simba doesn’t do anything especially brave, noble or clever. Indeed, he doesn’t do anything except leave home, laze around for a while, and then stroll back. His big heroic moment comes when he chooses to abandon his bucolic existence to reclaim his throne, but it feels more like a capitulation than a victory. As a cub, a hornbill (John Oliver) informs him that he will one day be king and that Nala will one day be his queen—and that is exactly what happens. So much for being born free. Like Disney’s other recent African-set adventure, “Black Panther”, “The Lion King” is wholly in favour of a system of hereditary monarchy, whether or not the crown prince is the right feline for the job.

It might have been more inspiring to young viewers if the Pride Lands’ lionesses had stood up to Scar on their own, and if Simba had been bold enough to reject his royal destiny in order to keep frolicking with Timon and Pumbaa. As it is, the film is technologically advanced, but it is as regressive in its politics as any of the company’s hand-painted fairy tales. Still, hakuna matata. The film will no doubt be a box-office smash. Perhaps it will be a different story when Disney produces an immersive, three-dimensional, virtual-reality remake of “The Lion King” a decade or two from now.

“The Lion King” is released worldwide on July 19th