This is not going to be a typical film review, in which the critic praises or puts down a movie. It’s not going to be another collection of 700 or so carefully chosen words meticulously arranged to get the reader to either fork over your hard-earned money at the box office or save that money for more important or maybe more entertaining things.

No, this is going to be a warning, a warning not to listen to or read things by people who don’t know what they’re talking or writing about. Specifically, turn off your eyes and ears to those naysayers who are trashing Disney’s updating of “The Lion King,” but haven’t yet seen it.

If someone has seen it, didn’t like it, and wants to share that opinion, all power to them. Everyone, they say, is a critic.

But Disney has been getting a lot of grief concerning their recent movies of “Cinderella,” “The Jungle Book,” “Dumbo,” and “Aladdin” (all of which proved popular and made money). The questions have come flying: Why can’t they do anything original anymore? Why do they keep remaking their animated movies into live-action ones? Why do they take things that are good and turn them into something that isn’t as good?

And the negative noise seems to have been turned up for “The Lion King.” Why is that? Did this happen when Julie Taymor adapted “The Lion King” for Broadway in 1997? I don’t recall any fuss, and that play not only recently had its 9,000th performance, it also holds the record for highest grossing Broadway show of all time (somewhere around the $8 billion mark).

No, the venom has been saved for the movie. Which is really a pity because, for instance, the filmmakers ARE doing something original (a word that has many connotations). When an animated feature has its characters and situations transformed into characters and situations that appear to be real, that’s a completely different (pardon the expression) animal; it’s an original. The new version of “The Lion King” is not a live-action film; it’s an entirely digital creation. There could be an interesting discussion of why other films (“A Star Is Born,” “The Great Gatsby,” “Godzilla” keep getting remade or rebooted. The reason they remade the animated “The Lion King” into the new “The Lion King” is because, with today’s technology, they could. Then there’s that other question, about redoing a good film but having it not come out as good as the original. And this is where my critic hat comes off the rack and gets placed firmly on my head. “The Lion King” (2019) blows away “The Lion King” (1994).

The story of the lion cub Simba who, after the death of his father, King Mufasa, is tricked by his nefarious Uncle Scar into believing Simba caused his father’s death, and chooses to exile himself from the pride, stands strong and is retold here, almost note for note. But the new film expands on the story, giving a larger part to Simba’s childhood friend Nala, and providing a great deal more comedy through the antics of Simba’s post-exile pals Pumbaa and Timon.

“TLK19” also has moments that are far more terrifying than the first film. Yes, that’s a trait Disney has come to be known for and is almost expected, but do your 5-year-old a favor, and leave him or her at home till he or she has matured enough to endure what looks and feels like an attack on some innocent lion cubs by some ferocious hyenas.

Which leads to the crowning achievement of this film. Not the voice acting or the music or the direction - all of which is top notch - but the look and feel of it. The technical wizards who put this together have made a film in which everything looks real. They can’t be non-existent digital creations. They’re real! Real animals! And they can talk!

So, to all those people who are putting it down … if you haven’t seen it, go see it. Or be quiet.


“The Lion King”
Written by Jeff Nathanson; directed by Jon Favreau
With Donald Glover, Beyoncé, Chiwetel Ejiofor, James Earl Jones, Seth Rogen, Billy Eichner
Rated PG