The Lion King Research Paper

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In the Pride Lands of Africa, a lion rules over the animal kingdom from Pride Rock. King Mufasa's newborn son, Simba, Simba is presented to the assembled animals by Rafiki, a mandrill who serves as a shaman and advisor. Mufasa shows the young Simba the Pride Lands and explains to him the responsibilities of kingship and the "circle of life" which connects all living things. Mufasa's younger brother, Scar, covets the throne and plots to kill Mufasa and Simba so he can become king. He tricks Simba and his best friend Nala into exploring a forbidden elephants' graveyard, where they are attacked by three spotted hyenas who are in league with Scar. Mufasa is notified to the danger by his majordomo, the hornbill Zazu, and rescues the cubs. Though …show more content…

Disney and Peter Schneider on a plane to Europe to promote Oliver & the Company. Throughout the conversation, the topic of a story set in Africa came up, and Katzenberg immediately jumped at the suggestion. The suggestion was then developed by Walt Disney Feature Animation's vice president for creative affairs, Charlie Fink. Katzenberg decided to add elements involving coming of age, death, and ideas from his personal life experiences, such as some of his trials in his bumpy road in politics, saying about the film, "It is a little bit about myself.” In November of that year Thomas Disch wrote a treatment entitled King of the Kalahari, Afterwards, Linda Woolverton spent a year writing drafts of the script, titling it King of the Beasts and then King of the Jungle. The original version of the film was very different from the final film. The plot was centered in a battle between lions and baboons with Scar being the leader of the baboons, Rafiki being a cheetah and Timon and Pumbaa being Simba's childhood friends. Also, Simba would not leave the kingdom, but become a "lazy, slovenly, horrible character" due to the manipulations of Scar, more easily overthrown after coming of age. By 1990, producer Thomas Schumacher, who had just completed The Rescuers Down Under, decided to himself to the project "because lions are cool.” Schumacher likened the script for King …show more content…

Matthew Broderick believed initially that he was, in fact, working on an American version of Kimba since he was familiar with the Japanese original. However, The Lion King director, Roger Allers, claimed that he was unfamiliar with the show: “The whole time I worked on The Lion King., the name of that show never came up. At least I never heard it. I had never seen the show and really only became aware of it as Lion King., and was being completed, and someone showed me images of it. I worked with George Scribner and Linda Woolverton to develop the story in the early days but then left to help out on Aladdin. If one of them were familiar with Kimba they didn’t say. Of course, it is possible... Many story ideas develop and changed along the way, in an effort to make the story stronger. I could certainly understand Kimba’s creators feeling angry if they felt we had stolen ideas from them. If I had been inspired by Kimba, I would certainly acknowledge my inspiration. All I can offer is my respect to those artists and say that their creation has its loyal admirers and its assured place in animation

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