Remaking a beloved film is like playing with fire; thereâs a good possibility that everyone and everything gets burned. In an interview with British GQ, music superstar Elton John threw some serious heat in Disneyâs general direction. John called the House of Mouseâs âlive-actionâ remake of the 1994 animation, The Lion King, a âhuge disappointmentâ and claimed that the creative team in particular âmessed the music up.â He then went on to say:
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âMusic was so much a part of the original and the music in the current film didnât have the same impact. The magic and joy were lost. The soundtrack hasnât had nearly the same impact in the charts that it had 25 years ago when it was the bestselling album of the year. The new soundtrack fell out of the charts so quickly, despite the massive box-office success. I wish Iâd been invited to the party more, but the creative vision for the film and its music was different this time around and I wasnât really welcomed or treated with the same level of respect.â
Elton John co-wrote the original animationâs music with lyricist Tim Rice. Their contribution to that film can be recognized in iconic songs like âCan You Feel the Love Tonight,â âI Just Canât Wait To Be King,â âCircle of Life,â and of course, âHakuna Matata.â The duoâs most notable involvement with the Jon Favreau remake was a song they wrote called âNever Too Late,â appearing in the filmâs final creditsâan afterthought.
Although it may have done well at the box office, 2019âs The Lion King was a critical failure. In retrospect, it shouldnât have been; the original film had proven to have a brilliant story and soundtrack. On top of this, a founding father of the MCU (Favreau) was directing and stars like BeyoncĂ©, Donald Glover, Seth Rogan, and Chiwetel Ejiofor were all at the helm; James Earl Jones was even reprising his role as Mufasa. It was primed for perfection. Throw in Pharrell Williams to oversee the music, a song by BeyoncĂ© called âSpiritâ for good measure and Disney is happy. What in the world could go wrong?
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Does the music work within the movie?
It all comes down to the idea of a remake. To remake something is to make it again albeit differently. A good remake builds upon everything the original did well while adding its own magic. Itâs impossible to best a masterpiece, and thatâs exactly what the original animation was, so celebrate it.
In order to create a faithful remake, Disney needed to leave the essence of The Lion King intact while adding contemporary flair. Instead, the âlive-actionâ remake stripped away one of the most important aspects of its counterpart and then attempted to rearrange the pieces. It tried to best it with ârealisticâ visuals, serving more like a love letter to CGI than to The Lion King. The result was a bland, computer-generated, and disconnecting experience that betrayed the hand-drawn artwork of its predecessor.
The original worked because it embraced the fact that it was an animated movie. All of the animals adapted human characteristics; a smile, wink, or choreographed dance was made all the more effective because the characters had palpable personalities. Mufasa strutted around as an admirable, wise, and emphatic king while Simba pranced in the shadow of his birthright. 2019âs The Lion King is an animated movie masquerading as a whimsical episode of Planet Earth (without enough whimsical). One of the reasons The Lion King works so well on stage is because those productions celebrate the life and excitement of the original.
âI Just Canât Wait to Be King,â for example, is still a good jam in the remake. However, without the belief-suspending performances from Simba and his backup dancers, itâs just not as much fun. Nothing in the new movie even remotely compares to the headbanging âHakuna Matataâ montage of Simba, Timon, and Pumbaa from the original. In 1994, children were given enough room to let their imaginations run wild, in 2019, not so much. The moments were bigger and better (larger than the circle of life if you will) in 1994; it was easy to picture (and revisit) your experience with the film when hearing its songs on the radio. The remake is littered with uninspired and hollow callbacks.
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So is Elton John right?
Heâs rightfully cranky about his apparent exclusion from the creative processâhe played an important part in The Lion Kingâs original success. Regardless of all that has been said here, no one can know what went wrong with the remake other than the people involved. What we do know is that a vast majority of people who saw the remake enjoyed the original more; this had nothing to do with the music being bad.
The remakeâs soundtrack takes very few creative liberties; it stays true to the originalâs African-inspired sound. Hans Zimmerâs score just seems louder. The biggest differences come in the form of a spoken version of âBe Prepared,â and the two new songs, âSpirit,â and âItâs Never Too Late.â So when Elton John says they messed up the music, they didnât. They didnât really do anything to the music. The music wasnât successful because it was simply a matter of âbeen there and done that.â It would seem that Johnâs frustration stems from a lack of musical innovationâthey couldâve done more with it (presumably with his help). The burn John is throwing Disneyâs piggy-backs every diss aimed not at the music, but the movie.
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The original The Lion King was a cultural phenomenon of the Disney renaissance. The remake is a one-off that tries to survive on and, ironically, best nostalgia. The energy just isnât there. People donât go to a movie or listen to music because they want to submerge themselves in reality, they do it to escape. The argument here is that the most recent filmâs music didnât do well because⊠the movie wasnât great. An unusual level of Disney dissonance (maybe not in the category of âlive-action remakeâ) serving as an afterthought in the shadow of its predecessorâeveryone and everything gets burned.
(Photo Credit: Getty Images)
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