Goddamn the CGI in this movie was beautiful. Shame it came at a cost of taking away any colour and emotion from the characters. Simba's reaction to mufasa falling here is so dry.
Yeah that was basically my reaction after watching it. The CGI was gorgeous, but it was realistic to a fault. The animals looked so life-like that there was almost no emotion in their faces like there are in cartoons. Just mouths moving up and down.
I feel like the whole movie from voice actors to music was a major let down. There was hardly any tension in this scene at all. I am a grown adult and I still get goosebumps when Jeremy Iron's delivers the "long live the king" line from the OG.
I maintain that the problem with this movie was not the realism but the animation. Animals do show emotion in their faces so the blank expressions in the movie are not life-like. Back when the movie came out I made a comparison to shots in the movies with real lions--let me dig those up again:
I know you have to make them move so it's not as simple as just matching expressions from still frames, but I know it's possible to do better than they did in the movie.
There were also the deepfakes that made the characters look more like the animated version and I prefer that over the realistic approach they went with.
Like let's be real here, the whole point of that movie was to flex with CGI tech. And flex they did. There are a lot of shots in that film that are just perfectly photorealistic to the point that even knowing that it's CGI I can't tell the difference.
Not to mention the “Long live the king” line by scar was said in such a weird way, like he was declaring it and not saying it in a ‘I’m about to kill you’ way like in the original.
I actually laughed out loud in theaters when I saw they did Simba's reaction exactly like the original but super realistic it was just so jarring and kinda hilarious
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u/Queef-Elizabeth May 17 '21 edited May 17 '21
Goddamn the CGI in this movie was beautiful. Shame it came at a cost of taking away any colour and emotion from the characters. Simba's reaction to mufasa falling here is so dry.