Over the past decade Walt Disney Studios has been on a mission to remake its classics. From Disney princess to beloved animated favorites like the Jungle Book, Disney is fashioning a future for a young generation that is ready to consume the same content as if it were new. I believe the punch line is something along the lines of “…like you never seen before,” Another familiar favorite: “experience it in IMAX.” But maybe now of perhaps its Ultra 4K HD. But what is this connection between technological advancement in cinema and our consumption of film?
Let’s talk about CGI. In 2019 Disney released a completely CGI generated version of the 1994 animated classic The Lion King. Turning an animated movie into live action has the same appeal as reselling Peter Pan on Blu-Ray instead of DVD or re-releasing It’s a Wonderful Life in color instead of black and white. It’s something we as an audience have never experienced—but of course, we have. “But not like this!” as promos love to claim. This is the culture industry’s attempt to construct and reconstruct the aura of the 1994 Lion King. Generally, once something has been done it can never be new, but the culture industry’s job to make sure it is always new. CGI technology gives studios the opportunity to recycle the story of the Lion King and reinforce the importance of the product in society.
The advancement of technology in film is intended to create a more visceral cinematic experience. According to Walter Benjamin remaking these films diminishes the aura and authority of the original. Ironically, the point of creating a different film experience is to dethrone the aura of the original film by constructing a new aura, that paradoxically is still dependent on the earlier film. This is also an example of how the industry creates sense of pseudo individuality. Pseudo individuality is the process in which the industry makes the same product with slightly different variations that give the illusion of uniqueness (Adorno & Horkheimer,1944). Technologies present in the different iterations and copies of the film is what gives remakes some of its appeal and adds to a sense generational uniqueness.
In 2019, It is a fair assumption that children going to the movie theaters are accustomed to intense visual effects. Marvel movies, Star Wars, even Spielberg’s the BFG helped saturate the market with CGI technology. Therefore, the appeal of The Lion King to a younger generation is not technology but the story itself, and more importantly what place it has in pop culture. In contrast, because advanced technology broadens the scope of human imagination and the medium’s capability to represent. Therefore, the new Lion King can be seen as a way for treasured characters to be fully realized as they should be or would have been, had the technology been available. But by comparing the two films through their technological differences can suggests that something was lost in translation.
The live action version of the Lion King is not narratively different from the original. Rather most of the film’s differences lies in the presence of technology itself. For example, a key component of any cinematic portrayal is visual ques. Scar’s opening scene in the animated film is full of sarcasm and exaggerated facial expressions, that corresponds with his tone when he says “I wouldn’t dream of challenging you.”. However, in the later version when Scar says, “I wouldn’t dream of challenging you, [pause]again,” the audience is met with expressionless, unreadable body language of an indignant lion. This would be fine if the same did not apply for the characters in the film. Their faces remain neutral throughout the emotions present in the story. The same can be said for Simba and Nala in the musical number of “I Just Can’t Wait to be King.” Perhaps for the barest squinting of the eyes and the occasional opening of their jaws to remind us Simba and Nala indeed are in fact singing. The characters unfortunately overall lack personality, relying on the actor’s voice to convey meaning, tone, and mean. This may be due to the fact the hype surrounding the film is rooted in it being a realistic portrayal of the story.
The more realistic the form of creation the more it warrants seriousness. For the 2019 film this reigns true. Color in the first and second film are vastly different. The former is lively and bold using richer shades of color while the latter is dull and practical using tinted shades of for a more authentic look. Also, the 1994 film was able to personify the characters to make their actions, and words more meaningful. In the 2019 film it seemed like the filmmakers were really adamant about making talking animals seem less human. there seems to be a disconnect between body and mind and Timon losses some of his sass when asks Simba “How are you in as few words as possible?” while he scratches his ear.
Through technical reproduction, The Lion King loses its humanity. It is difficult to identify with the characters in the 2019 film as much as an audience would with the animation, despite groundbreaking visual effects technology. The Lion King will always be a beloved Disney classic no matter the format, that is evident in its box-office sales—it still brings people into the theaters but critics agree: the technical artist may have done their job a little too well (Scott, 2019). The remake is culture industry tactic to create a “unique existence” in time and space in order to circulate the same content (Benjamin, p.50). In this model technology makes films relevant beyond the impact of the story itself. But if new technology is the only thing that keeps bringing people to the movies, then what is the point of creating new stories? What are we watching movies for? If spectacle and visual stimulation is all it takes, then our agency as consumers is truly in the dead.
References
Adorno, T. and Horkheimer, M. (1944). Dialectic of Enlightenment. pp. 1-12
Benjamin, W. (1936). The work of art in the age of mechanical reproduction. The work of art in the age of mechanical reproduction. Visual Culture: Experiences in Visual Culture.
Scott, A. O. (2019, July 11). 'The lion king' review: The Art of Herding Digital Cats. The New York Times. Retrieved December 3, 2021, from https://www.nytimes.com/2019/07/11/movies/the-lion-king-review.html.
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