The Lion King (2019) Movie Review or Animal Planet presents Lion King: The Documentary

Hello guys and welcome back for another round of movie reviews with Movie Nerd, a place where you can be nerdy about movies and that's OK!

So, I think everybody knows the story of Mufasa, Scar, Simba and Nala plus the other animal characters that appear throughout the movie. Also, I believe everybody saw the 1994 animation and knows the story thread and how it ends. But, for those that have not seen the original animation and the 2019 remake, here is a bit of a synopsis for you: Simba idolizes his father, King Mufasa, and takes to heart his own royal destiny on the plains of Africa. But not everyone in the kingdom celebrates the new cub's arrival. Scar, Mufasa's brother -- and former heir to the throne -- has plans of his own. The battle for Pride Rock is soon ravaged with betrayal, tragedy and drama, ultimately resulting in Simba's exile. Now, with help from a curious pair of newfound friends, Simba must figure out how to grow up and take back what is rightfully his.

For those who have seen the original animation, they will be somewhat disappointed because this ''live action'' remake does not offer anything new in terms of story and characters. It does the complete opposite being faithful to a fault of the 1994 animation, retelling the same story all over again, shot by shot and frame by frame.

Personally, I have seen the original animation a couple of years ago and I wasn't expecting any new development story wise so I was not that disappointed with what I got. Even though I knew what was going to happen in every single scene, the story still impressed me, with a new level of emotions.

What this remake does extremely well and can take pride of is the special effects, the CGI animals and the soundtrack. Taking about the CGI, we are in a point that you have no idea what is real and what is not, if done right and this movie does it very right. The animals look so real and so humanized by the facial expression and the mouth movement that it's almost unreal how incredible they look. Throw in the mix a perfect soundtrack, with some well known songs from the original and a new one and some great camera shots, accompanied by incredible visual effects and you forget about the lack of originality and creativity story wise.

The voice cast was also great, some good voice performances, some even better that the ones from the original animation. Also, this version is a bit more darker than the original, in tone and also in color and you might wanna cover your kids eyes in some moments.

It's tricky with these remakes, especially the ones Disney are making, remaking old school animation into live action because, sometimes, it's good to keep the same recipe and give the people the same story in a different wrapping like The Lion King, Alladdin, Beauty and the Beast, The Jungle Book and Cinderella. All of these movies were successful, from a commercial point of view but, sometimes, it's also good to change the story a bit like Dumbo, which felt like a sequel to the original but with some elements of the original story, the Maleficent movies and the Alice in Wonderland movies.

My point with all of this is that Hollywood and, especially Disney, are in a point of lacking any type of creativity and originality. Also, Disney has become a bit comfortable with this situation because they are not even trying to do anything remotely original that would require a bit of thought. They're game plan is to remake things that they have done in the past and selling them either for future generation or simply for nostalgic purposes for those who have seen those original creations when they came out. It's sad but that's Hollywood for you!

Overall, like I said, the ones that have seen the 1994 animation will not be very impressed by this remake story wise but they will be impressed by the visual extravaganza that goes on the screen and forget how extremely familiar this story is. Also, forgot to mention it, the movie is extremely funny, especially with the parts of Timon and Pumbaa but it also has some toilet humor which I was not a fan of. Also also, young Simba looks extremely quite. Very impressed by the visuals not so the story. 7.2/10

OK guys, that is my review for this one. Some new reviews coming next but not sure when. Until then, take care, stay movie nerdy and keep on reviewing!