Bambi set in Africa

Rating: Null/10 (10 February 2004)

"The Lion King" (1994) is the third better than average Disney film of the 1990's. This is Disney's first film to use an original story instead of the usual classic fairy tale. However the story follows much the same path as all other Disney stories: the hero or heroine is without one parent. "The Lion King" is best described as "Bambi" set in Africa. The opening sequence of the film is very impressive: the music, African vocals and animation! Though the rest of the film is not quite up to it's great beginning, it's certainly a very good film overall. "The Lion King" also marks the first time an on screen death is shown in an animated Disney film. Excluding the opening, this makes for the other most impressive sequence in the film.
As with "Aladdin" (1992), Disney again uses contemporary dialogue to make the film more appealing to their target child and pre-adolescent audiences. Though this weakens the film a little, I believe it was one of the factors that made "The Lion King" a huge success. The other factor was that it contained only animals, no humans, which certainly appeals to children. "The Lion King" was written by three screenwriters. Instead of having a completed screenplay, prior to beginning animation, the story was created as the film was being made.
"The Lion King" features excellent animation and an excellent music score by Hans Zimmer. The character voices are very good (as usual for Disney). The companion characters to Simba (Pumba and Timone) are entertaining.

"The Lion King" suffers from one major flaw: it's a little preachy and moralizing (more than other Disney films based on fairy tales). Without the preachy, moralizing tone and less contemporary dialogue, "The Lion King" would have been an excellent film.