Okay so if you were a 90’s 00’s kid you’ve most likely watched The Lion King, and if you didn’t, what on earth did you watch?? Anyway as for most of us out there that have watched the original Lion King, you’ve probably been to the cinemas and watched the recently released remake or at least intend to, or maybe you don’t intend to watch it in fear of seeing that one emotional scene in HD, (don’t worry, we’ve all been there), but you’re at least curious to see how successfully they remade the original masterpiece? Well either way, I was one of those now young adults that sat in a theatre full of screaming young children and watched the newly remade Lion King and that’s what I’m here to talk about now.
The Lion King. So many things come to mind when we hear the title of this iconic Disney movie, but have you ever thought of its cultural appropriation? As an Australian, growing up in Australia and learning the English language I am able to follow the original and undubbed Lion King film quite easily and how the producers intended. This American produced film targets the general norms of American society and culture and preys on the stereotypical traits of the modern American family to advertise its film and attract its intended audience’s attention.
Although the films audience is targeted towards young children the movie holds a strong and quite mature message for its older audience, the “Circle of Life” relates to the mature theme of life and death, which is commonly known and accepted in Christian and Catholic religions, both believed to be two of the highest practiced religions within Australian culture. This song and message may be misunderstood or miss interoperated by other cultures which choose to practice religions such as Hinduism and Buddhism which most commonly believe in the immortal soul, otherwise known as reincarnation.
With the cultural knowledge I have, I believe that the intended overall audience was the typical white American household generally consisting of a heterosexual family with young children. I believe that this was the intended audience again in the remade version of The Lion King as they were solely trying to keep the authenticity of the original 1994 Lion King film, therefore complying to the norms of the originally produced era, in which gender roles are placed on specific characters such as female lioness’ Nala and Sarabi, which throughout the film were portrayed as the helpless victims which needed to be rescued by the masculine and heroic male characters Simba and Mufasa.
The gender roles presented throughout this film where enhanced by male dominated fight scenes and helpless minor credited female roles, which is quite specific and valuable to the film as they aid in hybridising the film between different cultures. Although the film highly connects with its intended American audience, it easily integrates with other cultures as it is often culturally appropriated for women to be victimised and reliant on the more dominant and masculine males of the society. The remake also lacks homogenisation by slightly stepping away from their original gender roles in the previous film, as portrayed in one of the final scenes in which Scar asks Sarabi to be his Queen, her response is more forcefully shown and suggest a stronger and more masculine female role, more suited to the norms of today’s society.
REFERENCES
Hang, M. (2016). Artifact Analysis: The Lion King. [online] Medium. Available at: View at Medium.com [Accessed 15 Aug. 2019].
van Wormer, K. and Juby, C. (2015). Cultural Representations in Walt Disney Films: Implications for Social Work Education. [online] Citeseerx.ist.psu.edu. Available at: http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.921.3326&rep=rep1&type=pdf [Accessed 15 Aug. 2019].
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