Even Disney sycophants seem to be catching on (mostly)

Rating: 2/10 (18 July 2019)

It seems I am impossible to please, doesn't it? When you take a Disney movie and remake it into edgy emo fanfic with a "relevant" girl power theme á la Maleficent, I complain that you made needless modifications to the fairy tale. When you follow the original beat-for-beat, I complain that it's so similar that it takes the pointlessness of the "remake" to new heights. Why can't I ever be happy?
Well, it's because you've yet to see the point: you shouldn't be doing ANY of this, to ANY already existing film version of something (provided you don't have actual updates to offer and are indeed just doing it for the money). If you're this allergic to coming up with new ideas, why can't you at least do, say, a unique interpretation of the Beauty and the Beast fairy tale? Why not do a Jungle Book adaptation that retains the darkness of the novels? Why not rip off Kimba the White Lion and Hamlet in a different sort of way this time?
This, naturally, brings us to The Lion King, which raises a question of how much of your film can consist of CGI before you lose the permit to even call it a "live-action" remake - or how much of a copy it can be of a more expressive and colorful animation before failing to qualify as its own movie at all. Maybe I'm just not smart enough to get it. Maybe this is the best thing to happen to cinema since Michael Haneke made a shot-for-shot remake of his own film Funny Games in 2007.
James Earle Jones (sounding just as tired of all this as I am) still voices Mufasa, the first king of Pride Rock, and his child Simba is played by JD McCary as a cub and Donald Glover when he's an adult, hiding from the treacherous Uncle Scar (Chiwetel Ejiofor). Need I tell you what Scar does and then pins on Simba, to chase the latter away from Pride Rock and claim the throne? Probably not, but I can tell you that this supposedly bigger film does not remotely do justice the "stampede" sequence of the original. Again: why do you think more grounded-looking visuals and fewer colors make something more spectacular? Even the maddening Simba King Lion is more fun to look at than this.
Nala, love interest of Simba, is voiced by Beyoncé because who needs voice actors? John Oliver is decently funny as Zazu, the sycophantic hornbill. Billy Eichner and Seth Rogen provide comic-relief annoyance as Timon and Pumbaa. John Kani is Rafiki, the wise but eccentric mandrill who observes everything. Alfre Woodard gives motherly warmth as Queen Sarabi. Lastly, Keegan-Michael Key, Florence Kasumba and (most welcome of all) Eric André play the bumbling hyenas who answer to Scar. So there you have it. It's celebrities you recognize and characters you recognize, which is apparently all it takes. Tag a friend you HAVE to see this with!
Jon Favreau has now answered the question that, judging by fan comments on Facebook, has been on everyone's mind since seeing the original Lion King: what if I could see this exact movie again only this time I'm just looking at regular lions, Rafiki stares at me blankly, and the lovable Pumbaa is just kind of a pig? The Lion King is too real-looking to be as fantastical as the 1994 film, but too obviously artificial to be as awe-inspiring as the beasts of the real world (Favreau ain't no Jacques Perrin). Even what Disney did with Dinosaur made more sense than this, as there's a shortage of real-life dinosaurs that we can photograph.
I can hear your arguments already. "If you don't like it, don't watch it!" "Let people like what they like." "I think it's fun to see my favorite movies with updated (sic) visuals and more hip-sounding music." I get all of this, and I wish it were that simple.
On some level, you have to know what you're voting for when you elect to pay for a film like this. You're telling Disney that you're satisfied seeing the same thing over and over again, hence their creative bankruptcy is not an issue, and even worse: you're apparently okay with the fact that those who made the original storyboards, wrote the original dialogue, invented the characters, and actually MADE THIS MOVIE in any meaningful sense reportedly don't get much of the cash.
In case you didn't catch it: this remake is not only a "f-ck you" to 2D animation as an art form (with its implication that a graphics update is at all necessary to "introduce the film to a new generation") but a bigger one to the artists who created it, doing the heavy lifting for those who are now making the money. That, in a nutshell, is the 2019 Lion King.
When a film is this repulsive, not because of content but because of what it essentially stands for, I usually give it 0. Don't be too shocked about my 1 rating. I'm being generous (mainly to the tormented VFX crew).