The Lion King Reviews
Top CriticEveryone, young and old, will find something to appreciate in this Shakespearean tale of a young lion discovering his rightful place in the world.
Full Review
| Original Score: 4/5
The story line is a Joseph Campbell hero-quest so stripped down to its basics as to become dull.
Full Review
| Original Score: 2.5/4
A computer-animated scene featuring a stampede of wildebeest is positively breathtaking.
The Lion King, more than any of the recent wave of Disney animated features, has the resonance to stand not just as a terrific cartoon but as an emotionally pungent movie.
Full Review
| Original Score: A-
The result is a step toward multiculturalism and ecological correctness, though not without a certain amount of confusion.
More so than the exuberant movie miracles that came before it, this latest animated juggernaut has the feeling of a clever, predictable product.
Full Review
| Original Score: 3.5/5
Some of the richest imagery the studio's animators have produced and held together.
There clearly has been a conscious effort to please adults as much as children. Happily, for those of us who generally stay far away from 'cartoons,' they have succeeded.
Full Review
| Original Score: 3.5/4
It's all calculated to be wonderfully entertaining and almost every frame hits the mark.
An ingenious mixture of themes from narrative sources as ancient and varied as Hamlet, the Old Testament and The Odyssey.
An impressive, almost daunting achievement.
