The Lion King (Movie)

Subterms

    Latest story

    188 Shares179 Views

    James Earl Jones Movies: From Darth Vader in ‘Star Wars’ to Mufasa in ‘Lion King’

    by

    A look at standout movies featuring the actor, who died on Monday at the age of 93.James Earl Jones died on Monday at the age of 93. Like his contemporary Sidney Poitier, Jones helped change the perception of Black actors in Hollywood, creating indelible movie and TV characters who defied the prevailing stereotypes.Born in Mississippi and raised in Michigan, Jones spent much of his early career in New York, working in theater, TV and radio, where he trained his deep, booming voice. Because of his rich vocal tones and authoritative air, the actor was in high demand throughout his professional life, as both a narrator and as someone who could bring a sense of seriousness to supporting parts.The 12 movies below predominantly showcase Jones’s voice and his skills as a character actor. But the few leading roles show that if he had been given the same kind of opportunities as Poitier, Jones might have been just as big a star.‘Dr. Strangelove’ (1964)Rent on Apple TV or Amazon.Not many actors have the good fortune to make their big-screen debut in one of the greatest films of all time. Jones only appears in a handful of scenes in Stanley Kubrick’s grim nuclear war comedy “Dr. Strangelove,” but he does a lot with those few minutes, playing a bombardier whose consummate professionalism leads him to follow the orders of any crackpot commander or incompetent politician who barks in his ear.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    More stories

    • 100 Shares129 Views

      in Movies

      Barry Jenkins Takes On ‘Mufasa: The Lion King’

      by

      By his own rough count, the filmmaker Barry Jenkins has seen the 1994 animated movie “The Lion King” around 155 times, many of those viewings with two young nephews and a well-worn VHS tape.So when he was asked to direct the latest installment of the franchise, “Mufasa: The Lion King,” he was already pretty familiar with the story.Who isn’t? “When anybody takes their baby and holds it up like this” — he paused to raise his arms overhead, cupping his hands as though presenting a small but celebrated cub — “you know it’s ‘The Lion King,’” he said. “There are very few things that have that level of cultural penetration.”Familiarity aside, very few things in Jenkins’s career would seem to point to a big Disney animated feature. The director, 44, broke out in 2016 with “Moonlight,” a small-budget coming-of-age film set in Miami at the height of the crack epidemic. It went on to win three Oscars, including one for best picture that, notoriously, was announced only when a “La La Land” producer realized onstage that the wrong movie (his) had been called. Jenkins followed that up in 2018 with “If Beale Street Could Talk,” a romantic drama based on the 1974 James Baldwin novel about childhood sweethearts confronting a nightmare when the young man is unjustly accused of rape.And then Jenkins directed the 10-episode 2021 mini-series “The Underground Railroad,” an adaptation of Colson Whitehead’s Pulitzer Prize-winning novel, which imagines the abolitionist-era network of escape routes as a literal railway system. “In terms of emotional scope and just the practical logistics of filmmaking, that was by far the most massive thing I’d done,” he said.“Mufasa,” at least in terms of its fandom and the accompanying scrutiny, is likely to be even bigger. Disney is planning a December release for the film, which tells the story of how Mufasa grew up and came to power before siring Simba. It will serve as a prequel to three previous “Lion King” iterations: the original movie from 1994, the 2019 remake and the long-running Tony Award-winning musical. “I don’t know if pressure is the right word,” Jenkins said, “but you do go, OK, I have to live up to this standard that was set by these people who made these films before me.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 138 Shares129 Views

      in Movies

      Balmain’s New ‘Lion King’ Collection Marks 30th Anniversary of Disney Movie

      by

      A new Balmain collection pays homage to the Disney film on a milestone anniversary. Plus, a preppy designer makes a comeback.For Olivier Rousteing, the creative director of Balmain, the Parisian luxury house, South Africa is a long way from home. But the country is close to his heart.“My passport is French,” said Mr. Rousteing, 38, on a phone call from Paris. “But my blood is African,” added the designer, who learned relatively late in life that he is of Somalian and Ethiopian descent.The coastal Western Cape region of South Africa provided inspiration for Mr. Rousteing’s latest style collaboration: a Balmain collection developed in partnership with Disney to promote the 30th anniversary of the “The Lion King,” which was released in June 1994.The project was a kind of spiritual homecoming for the designer, as well as the realization of a childhood fantasy. Mr. Rousteing was 9 when he first saw the film. It taught him some valuable lessons. “Take nothing for granted,” he said. “Through your journey there will be obstacles and challenges, but trust in yourself, never give up.”His limited-edition collection, influenced by artisanal African textiles, patterns and silhouettes, was conceived to reflect the movie’s characters and pervading themes. Its ready-to-wear and couture pieces — which include zebra-stripe coats and jackets, a densely fringed raffia dress and a bustier gown patterned with familiar “Lion King” characters — are showcased in a short film shot near Cape Town and featuring models from across Africa.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 175 Shares99 Views

      in Movies

      ‘The Lion King’ at 30: Jason Weaver Sang for Simba but Few Knew It

      by

      The actor was playing a young Michael Jackson when Elton John spotted him. Three decades later, the new attention to his legacy is “gratifying.”When Jason Weaver arrived at his middle school in Chicago wearing a sweatshirt emblazoned with “The Lion King” logo in 1993, his classmates sneered. The apparel had been a gift from Disney when Weaver recorded the singing voice of young Simba, but the blockbuster animated film had yet to be released.“They were like, ‘What the hell is ‘The Lion King’?” Weaver, 44, recalled in a recent video interview. “They didn’t believe in any way shape or form I would be involved with a Disney film — not a kid from the South Side.”Until then, Weaver had mostly done print and commercial work in Chicago. He’d landed a small role in the civil rights drama “The Long Walk Home” and played a young Michael Jackson in the ABC mini-series “The Jacksons: An American Dream.” But for kids, a Disney theatrical movie was on another level.During an hour-and-a-half “Lion King” recording session in 1992, Weaver, who was turning 13, had sung the lead vocals for “I Just Can’t Wait to Be King,” the braggadocious anthem belted by the lion cub Simba as he fantasizes about inheriting the pridelands from his father, Mufasa.Opening in June 1994, “The Lion King” would go on to become the highest grossing traditionally animated film of all time. Its soundtrack eventually sold more than 7 million copies, and “I Just Can’t Wait to Be King” was certified double platinum.According to Weaver, his mother, Marilyn “Kitty” Haywood — a former jingle singer and recording artist who worked with Aretha Franklin and Curtis Mayfield — turned down Disney’s initial offer and negotiated a fee of $100,000 plus lucrative royalties for her son.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 138 Shares199 Views

      in Movies

      Blue Ivy Carter to Join Beyoncé in ‘Mufasa: The Lion King’

      by

      Beyoncé’s 12-year-old daughter will make her feature film debut as Kiara, Nala and Simba’s daughter, in a prequel to the 2019 hit.Blue Ivy Carter will be joining her mother, Beyoncé Knowles-Carter, in the movie musical “Mufasa: The Lion King,” which is expected in theaters in December.The movie — a prequel to “The Lion King,” the 2019 hyperrealistic remake of the Disney classic starring Beyoncé as the voice of Nala — will be directed by Barry Jenkins, who won a best adapted screenplay Oscar for “Moonlight.”Blue Ivy, 12, will make her feature film debut by voicing Kiara, the daughter of Nala and Simba, who will again be voiced by Donald Glover. (Billy Eichner, Seth Rogen, Mads Mikkelsen and Thandiwe Newton will also lend their talents.)“A buddy of mine, Matthew Cherry, made the short film called ‘Hair Love’ that Blue Ivy did the audiobook of,” Jenkins told Entertainment Weekly in an article published on Monday. “Starting this project and just having that in the ether, I was like, ‘Is it worth a shot? Would Blue Ivy want to do it? Would Beyoncé want to act opposite her daughter? Is it too close to home?’” he said. “But once we put the question to them, they both responded with enthusiasm.”Representatives for Beyoncé did not immediately respond to a request for comment.Last year, Blue Ivy joined Beyoncé onstage during the Renaissance tour, which wrapped up in October; she already has a Grammy, for best music video for “Brown Skin Girl,” a single by her mother. Beyoncé holds the record for most Grammys in history, with 32 wins.“The Lion King,” which was directed by Jon Favreau, was a box-office smash, earning $192 million at theaters in the United States and Canada in its first weekend. It ultimately made more than $1.5 billion in ticket sales globally. More

    • 113 Shares129 Views

      in Movies

      Disney Is a Language. Do We Still Speak It?

      by

      President Dwight D. Eisenhower once praised Walt Disney for his “genius as a creator of folklore.” When Disney died in 1966, the line made it into his obituary, evidence of its accuracy. Folklore, defined broadly, is an oral tradition that stretches across generations. It tells people who they are, how they got here and how they should live in the future. The company Disney created appointed itself keeper of these traditions for Americans, spinning up fresh tales and (more often) deftly repackaging old ones to appeal to a new century.It started with Mickey Mouse, but as his company turns 100, Disney’s legacy — advanced in hundreds of films and shorts and shows, mass-produced tie-in merchandise, marvelous technical advancements, gargantuan theme parks around the world — was the production of a modern shared language, a set of reference points instantly recognizable to almost everyone, and an encouragement to dream out loud about a utopian future. Walt Disney was a man who gazed backward and forward: speaking at the opening of Disneyland in 1955, he proclaimed: “Here age relives fond memories of the past, and here youth may savor the challenge and promise of the future.” But what happens when that promise is broken and the reference points are siloed? When his company struggles at the box office like a regular studio and faces cultural headwinds like any artist?Walt Disney at the opening of Disneyland, extolling the hope of a brighter tomorrow.USC Libraries/Corbis, via Getty ImagesDisney told stories of folk heroes (Davy Crockett, Paul Bunyan), princes and princesses, and even, occasionally, a mouse, all while leading the pack on ever-shifting technologies. (He was, among other things, the first major movie producer to make a TV show.) A sense of optimism ruled Disney’s ethos, built on homemade mythologies. The lessons of his stories were simple, uplifting and distinctly American: believe in yourself, believe in your dreams, don’t let anyone make you feel bad for being you, be your own hero and, most of all, don’t be afraid to wish upon a star. Fairy tales and legends are often disquieting, but once cast in a Disney light they became soft and sweet, their darker and less comforting lessons re-engineered to fit the Disney ideal. It was a distinctly postwar vision of the world.And we ate it up, and we exported it, and we wanted to be part of it, too. “One of the most astounding exhibitions of popular devotion came in the wake of Mr. Disney’s films about Davy Crockett,” Disney’s obituary explained, referring to a live-action 1950s shows about the frontiersman. “In a matter of months, youngsters all over the country who would balk at wearing a hat in winter were adorned in coonskin caps in midsummer.”The coonskin caps were a harbinger of things to come. Halloween would be dominated by princesses and mermaids. Bedsheets and pajamas would be printed with lions and mopey donkeys. Adults would plan weddings at a magical kingdom in Florida. Audiences around the world would join in the legends. Once-closed countries like China would eventually open their doors, leading the company — aware that success in this new market meant fast-tracking children’s introduction to Mickey, Ariel and Buzz Lightyear — to open English-language schools using their characters and stories as the teaching tools. History would show that Eisenhower was onto something when he referred to Disney as a creator, not just a reteller, of folklore.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber?  More