Eugene Arenhaus Notes on "The Lion King" ...In the royal family of one small country a son was born. This caused general excitement, except in the king's brother, who was the heir of reign till now and lost his heritage with the little prince's birth. So the young heir's uncle had built a plot against his brother the king, with assistance of the lowest classes of the society, to whom he had promised power and freedom under his ruling. Soon they managed to cause the king's death in an accident, using the prince as a 'bait'. The prince was also supposed to be killed, but survived, and so his uncle managed to convince him that he was to be blamed in his father's death, advising him to run away. And the prince ran, and by miracle managed to escape the killers sent after him by the uncle... None was heard of him for a long time and he was presumed dead. This way the wicked uncle usurped the power. Under his reign the country suffered a lot, and the scum who assisted him in his plot, having got the freedom, were robbing and stealing, destroying the state. The government (or court) was ignoring the usurper, which made things even worse. Meanwhile, the real heir was enjoying himself in a company of punks whom he met in his exile. He accepted their do-not-worry philosophy and was not bothered by anything happening in his native land. But one day he was found by his girlfriend of long ago, almost forgotten - she was sent by the court to arrange forces against the usurper. Although the heir was in love with her he refused to go and retake his throne. The old pontific of his home land was the person who convinced him in his high position and duty, made him to refuse the philosophy of idleness and return home. He returned and was accepted by the court, being son of his father. The usurper first tried to blame him in the death of old king, and then to blame the scum in the land's plight. That did little help; he was overthrown and exiled. The scum who gave him throne shortly found their revenge on him. Since then, the young king who regained his heritage ruled the land in honor, and soon a new heir was born - to be the next king of that land... Well, you'd ask, why did I write all this feudal intrigue story (not very convincing too)? Okay, I'll tell you why - this is the summary of the new Disney Oscar-winning big animation film - "The Lion King". Just in a minute I'll tell you also why I wrote it without names and places - not in a way of "In a lion pride in Africa, lion Mufasa and lioness Sarabi had a cub born and named him Simba..." The film is the recent work of Walt Disney studio. It lasts 80 minutes, and is noted for its music and songs written by Elton John and Tim Rice (yes, yes!) for which it received the Academy Award. As for the technical side of 'The Lion King' it is the top of the contemporary animation. The movement is perfect and smooth, and very natural - the Walt Disney Co. artists have not spent time in zoos and reservations in vain. The characters are most close to the real appearance of the animals - somewhat like a pure extract of a lion or hyena, they are more than alive. A great deal of efforts was spent for making it most realistic: all characters cast shadows, the colors are thoroughly selected depending on current lighting, and as for details - imagine a flock of zebras running a-splashing across the water, all these stripes and drops! The camera work is resembling conventional cinema - the focusing, zooming and panoraming effects are all present, and the points of view are various and sometimes tricky. All this resembles the technique in which "Beauty and the Beast" is made, shadows, animated backgrounds and sliding cameras are the same. This is fascinating, even when you find out the actual amount of job (when I've counted names in titles after the film, there were about 750 people mentioned - presumably 500 of them being artists). Each character (and by character I mean here every version - for example, Simba young and Simba adult were made by separate groups) in fact was animated by a group - a supervising animator, from 3 to 6 animators and in addition up to 15 cleanup animators - a company big indeed for one "actor"! In fact, I recommend to go and see this film - it is a masterpiece of painted movement. But (and I'm afraid there will be too much buts here...) the film itself cannot be named a great event in the cinema history. This begins from the very script - you've read it above, but could you tell that the story was about African animals? There's a conflict between realistic nonhuman characters which should act like lions or monkeys - but they act like men! This conflict is emerging here and there - why a lion cub, even from a royal family, has to be anointed? Isn't it a human, namely Christian custom? And why should that old baboon carry a staff along with him and paint pictures on treetrunks, if he is drawn just like a real baboon and must act so too? Baboons never use sticks in fact. And I doubt that a lion, even a really hungry lion, would eat worms - to say, this section of film is not very entertaining... or am I too sensible to it? That pretendence to show ANIMALS and after that make them behave like MEN prevents from believing in the film as in reality. It is even more strange if we recall that many other Disney films do not have such a conflict inside - "Bambi", for example, or "Lady and the Tramp" - animals there have _personalities_ close to our human ones, but they never mimick human _behaviour_. The next "but" will be about the style. As it appears, the film is overloaded with effects, which make it look more like cabaret. Each time the song begins, the background usually changes from naturalistic painted landscape into a fantastic stage in bright colours. And then a great show is performed - with dancers and pyramids of athletes; by the way, in one of these clips (namely, "I Just Can't Wait to Be King!") appear... American ant-eaters, never found in Africa! Those shows are most innatural as they can be (I don't mind them in "Beauty and the Beast" where the whole world of enchanted castle is fantastic and weird, but again, "The Lion King" pretends to be reality!). And of hyenas (whom the usurper used to kill the rightful king) marching like Nazis I'd better say nothing... The very forces of nature are on beck and call of the scriptwriters. When Simba returns, the land, desolated by hyenas, meets him with dark clouds, making a grim, 'gothic' stage for his dialog with Scar, the usurper. Furthermore, when a duel breaks out between them, a "sudden" lightning sets (I do not know what, for there's no grass or anything) on fire, thus making a fascinating fiery ocean to fight above. And when at last Scar is defeated (of course noble Simba does not kill him, this dirty work is done by offended traited hyenas) - only then, when the fire is no more needed, strong rain storms, putting it out, washing the land and returning life to it. Well... in "Bambi", to say, the fire was far from being just a scenery - it was a dreadful evil force, deadly and terrible, leaving wounds on the land and killing many. In "The Lion King" all this more resembles theatre and looks rather unreal. And (not to make you tired of all this) many places of the film look quite familiar. Very familiar are, for example, vague "ecologic" phrases of Mufasa the King, explaining about "the circle of life" - I've certainly heard something like that somewhere! (By the way, the ecology idea is present also in other way - like "Why, a lion's not a mate for us, he's from the top of food chain!" - seeming that the food chain replaces in the film the social hierarchy of human beings, which in real life it never does.) The characters are rather schematic, but that's not relevant in fact. But (BUT!) if you have a good look on Scar, on all his ways and behaviour, sly phrases and looks... and he starts to look very familiar... and suddenly you realize that Scar is just Jaffar from "Aladdin"! Check it yourself, I'm not kidding - Disney Co. steal characters from themselves! Really there is little difference between the thin and tall unpleasant wizard and the thin and tall black-maned lion... even in expression of face. Well, I even don't know how to comment this. (To say, Shere Khan from "The Jungle Book" is also of the same type.) I was waiting to see this film eagerly, but when I finally watched it, I liked it, but it sort of disappointed me. The perfect technique is not everything after all, and the film cannot be built only of long-used cliches. There is a great gap between the best animation in the world and with inexpressive characters, stock phrases, feeble story. What is good, that's the songs... but (oh yes, BUT again) the music, beautiful as it is, is not however a part of the action as it is sometimes in best Disney's films, it's just a background for it. Well... for me it was a disappointment in Disney, and let us hope that next film will be better and titanic efforts of more than seven hundred men would not be spent on another usual colorless drama. Yet the best choice is to see the film yourself, for, of course, my opinion is not the ultimate one. Post Scriptum. At 1995 Academy Award (Oscar) show, though there was a 'best small animation film' nomination and winner, 'best animation film' was never nominated. There were no candidates. (If anyone would like to express his/her opinion on the point, please write, we could discuss it. If anyone wants, I could also publish articles on other films, animations, computer games, books and other entertainment subjects.)