Film: The Lion King
Starring: Matthew Broderick, Jeremy Irons, James Earl Jones
Released: 1994
I first saw this movie...
1994, in the theater
Why I love it...
This movie is definitely one of the most important animated films ever. It took this genre of kids films and made it deep.
And there are few moments in movies that are more intense than when the spirit of Mufassa speaks to adult Simba.
i don't mean to piss on your parade here, but early disney has inherent depth that is totally missing from the children's genre today. they've gone from telling deep, riveting stories and creating/animating archetypal characters in the past with snow white, the little mermaid and the lion king (based loosely on hamlet btw) to making computer generated crap to compete with Shrek. disney used to dress very adult themes and characters up with song and dance to make it suitable for children, but still captivating for adults. they could never make a fantasia and have it mean anything because quality is no longer a part of their goals.
ReplyDeletei did a paper not too long ago on how awful a role model ariel is for little girls. i mean she runs away from home to make a deal with the devil to become something she's not, and the only way to stay that way is to make the man she "loves" (a man she's only ever seen) fall in love with her (meaning that he has to kiss her)...last i heard a kiss is not a contract. but in the end once the devil is destroyed her father sees she is infatuated enough with this man she barely knows that he decides it's ok for her to leave her world behind..it really is a horrible message. but i'd rather my potential future kids watch a well made bad role model than watch the crap disney and the other animation companies put out today. i've only seen small portions of what's being put out today but it's been more than enough to see that the element that made disney so magical is totally lost in cgi and poor story telling.
so i guess my point is don't discount the entire disney repertoire previous to the lion king. there's depth there that very few people would even care to look for today.
The Lion King being on my list does no discrediting to any other Disney films, before or after.
ReplyDeleteAnd secondly- most importantly- this is a list of my favorite films. Having grown up with Lion King and it having an impact on my early life, it deserves a spot on this list.