Introducing
Your new presentation assistant.
Refine, enhance, and tailor your content, source relevant images, and edit visuals quicker than ever before.
Trending searches
Although it is never explicitly stated, we know The Lion King is set somewhere in Africa.
The Setting, with its tall grass and wildlife, resembles the African savanna pretty closely.The popular song and phrase "Hakuna Matata" are in Swahili, which is a language spoken in a number of East African countries, including Kenya and Tanzania, and since the producers reserched the film in Kenya, we can probably conclude that Pride Rock and all of it's animals are somewhere in Kenya.
Mufasa: The father of Simba and the King of the Pride Lands. He represents god or the formless.
Simba: means lion in Swahili. He is the son of Muphasa and Sarabi. After his father’s death, he exiles himself from the kingdom believing that he killed his father. He represents guilt and pride.
Scar: means past wound. He represents the ego. He is Muphasa’s brother and wants to replace him as king. He uses Simba’s innocence to trick Muphasa and kill him. He convinces Simba that the latter is responsible for his father’s death.
Nala: means gift in Swahili. She is the daugther of Sarafina. She represents the gift of god to his son to make him remember who he is. Simba and Nala love each other. She is the reminder of love for Simba. She comes to remind him of who he is so that he leaves the jungle and go back to confront Scar.
Timon: He was raised in the fear of the hyenas by his tribe and went out looking for a safe place to live. He found the jungle with Pumbaa and follows the Hakuna Matata philosophy which means in Swahili “no worries”. He represents fear, that is why he is so attached to this philosophy. He shares it with Pumbaa and teaches it to Simba.
Pumbaa: means dull-witted, thoughtless in Swahili. He lives in the jungle with Timon and Simba. All other animals try to avoid him because of his smell. He lives alone before encountering Timon. Pumba represents shame.
External - Person vs. Person (Lion vs. Lion)
The problem being that Simba is the rightful heir to the throne, but Scar (his uncle) is jealous, selfish and wants the throne for himself.
Scar puts his plan into motion to kill Mufasa, who ends up dying in the stampede set up by Scar, although Simba survives. After Mufasa's murder Simba runs away and Scar claims the throne.
Our first conflict is when we watch Scar convince Simba that he is the cause of Mufasa's death. Scar tells him to "Run, run away and never return." Simba believes he is the reason his father has died and exiles himself.
Simba finds his way into the jungle and meets Timon and Pumbaa who teach him how to live a life with no worries. *Insert iconic song "Hakuna Matata"* Simba then grows into an adult under their care.
Simba is reunited with his old friend, Nala from the Pride Lands. She tells him of all the problems happening back at Pride Rock because of Scars rulling. Nala urges Simba to come back to Pride Rock and take his rightful place on the trone as King. Simba is hesitant, but decides that it's his destiny to go back and become King.
The climax of The Lion King is when Simba returns home and fights Scar for the Pride Lands. Simba wins making this the turning point of the story, where good concures evil and everything changes.
The fight ends with Scar falling off a cliff. The hyenas turn against him because they realized he was only lookinmg after himself. Scar blames the whole scheme and all his past decisions on the hyenas. The hyenas attack, kill and presumably eat Scar.
A big storm brews and cleans up the the mess across the Pride Lands from Scars rulling. The rain puts out the fire, gives water to the dying plants and completes the "circle of life." The storm clears out, the sun begins to shine, and Simba reclaims his land and is now "The Lion King."
Simba and Nala have a baby and present their child to the "people." This designates an heir to the throne.
Water is everywhere in The Lion King—everywhere that there's life, at least.
Water and water-specific imagery show up in places that are safe and nurturing. For instance, there's the watering hole and winding rivers in the Pride Lands and the giant lake in front of Timon and Pumbaa's jungle mountain.
As Simba is falling in love with Nala, the two of them romp around in a mini-waterfall. All of these places tend to be positively connoted with love, safety, and security.
Where there isn't water, however, there's bound to be evil or danger. Simba and Nala wander into the bone-dry elephant graveyard and nearly get eaten by a pack of hyenas. Scar plans all of his evil plots in the very same elephant graveyard, where green lava flows everywhere. Simba nearly dies in a waterless desert. The absence of water means our characters are in trouble.
A lot of the imagery surrounding Scar is intended to communicate his utter vileness. There's the scar on his face, for one. And then there's all the green smog and oozing lava that show up whenever he's partying in the elephant graveyard.
But there's one Scar scene that's downright iconic. When he's first rallying the hyenas to kill Mufasa and Simba, he sings a song called "Be Prepared." The hyenas get pretty jazzed by the song, and they form an army, marching past Scar while he sings from atop a giant outcropping of rock. Here's a little memory refresher.
That image isn't exactly unique. It's drawn to resemble the Nazi rallies of the late 1930s. The hyenas are goose-stepping Nazis. And Scar is supposed to be Hitler. Yep, you read that right. Here's a photo of the real Hitler for comparison.
It doesn't get much more evil than a Nazi rally, Disney. You got your message across
The Circle of Life is such a big symbolic deal in The Lion King that it actually gets its own song:
"It's the Circle of Life
And it moves us all
Through despair and hope
Through faith and love
Till we find our place
On the path unwinding
In the Circle
The Circle of Life."
The Circle of Life isn't a concrete thing you can point to or look at. Rather, it's a symbolic term for the series of events that unfolds on earth, bringing us from cradle to grave, through ups and downs, love and misfortune, and so on.
It also refers to how events tend to repeat themselves: Simba grows up, learns about manhood, and becomes the Lion King—and then he has a son who in turn will grow up, learn about manhood, and become the Lion King.
The Circle of Life is greater than all of us, and yet we're all connected to it. From the smallest ant to the largest antelope, we're all just living in this world and trying to make our own way. The opening sequence makes this super clear for even the most casual viewer of the film: we see animals of all shapes and sizes traveling to Simba's presentation. Although they're all extremely different, these animals exist together in a peaceful and beautiful harmony that mirrors the Circle of Life itself.