Nants ingonyama bagithi baba! It's been nearly two decades since that glorious savanna sunrise, and once again
The Lion King is
at the top of the box office. It's a good chance to revisit what made the original the capstone of the
Disney Renaissance, starting with the music. Not the gaudy show tunes or the Elton John ballads, but the soaring, elegiac score by Hans Zimmer which, despite winning an Oscar, never saw a full release outside of
an unofficial bootleg.
Luckily, it's unabridged and high-quality, allowing one to lay Zimmer's
haunting,
pulse-pounding,
joyful tracks
alongside the original video (
part 2,
3,
4), revealing the subtle leitmotifs and careful matching of music and action.
In addition, South African collaborator
Lebo M wove traditional Zulu chorals into the score, providing
veiled commentary on
scenes like this; his work was later
expanded into
a full album,
the Broadway stage show, and
projects closer to his heart. Speaking of expanded works, there were inevitable sequels -- all of which you can experience with
The Lion King: Full Circle (
download guide), a fan-made, three-hour supercut of the original film and its two follow-ups.
Want more? Look...
harder... [more inside]
posted by Rhaomi
on Oct 1, 2011 -
22 comments
Are You Not DEVO? You Are Mutato! LA Weekly goes behind the scenes of
Mutato Muzika, the commercial music studio owned by Mark Mothersbaugh. Mark is a
visual artist, composer, oh, and front man for a little band called
DEVO who is "spending December at Mutato trying to create an album’s worth of new material and contemplating a method of dispersal in the post-record-company world."
posted by SansPoint
on Dec 6, 2007 -
17 comments
More than you wanted to know about the "Tomb Raider" movie. What's weird about it all is that the timing sucks. The game has gone through five successive versions and they've used the same basic engine for all of them. These days it's looking significantly dated, and the last couple of games have gotten really poor reviews. Of course, it probably still sells well to frustrated teenage boys, but I think the last couple of games haven't sold anything like the previous ones did because it's the same old same old.
By the time the movie finally comes out, the game may already be history.
Has there
ever been a movie made from a computer game which was either a commercial or critical success?
"Mortal Combat" and
"Super Mario Brothers" spring to mind as counter-examples.
posted by Steven Den Beste
on Oct 29, 2000 -
39 comments
