Title: The Lion King
Writer: Irene Mecchi, Jonathan Roberts, and Linda Woolverton
Director: Roger Allers and Rob Minkoff
Year: 1994
Actors: Matthew Broderick (as the voice of Simba), James Earl Jones (as the voice of Mufasa), Madge Sinclair (as the voice of Sarabi), Jeremy Irons (as the voice of Scar), Moira Kelly (as the voice of Nala), Nathan Lane (as the voice of Timon), Ernie Sabella (as the voice of Pumbaa)
The Lion King (1994) uses low-key lighting, high key lighting and three-point lighting throughout the entire movie to see the scene and the mood. “A high-key lighting design has a very bright light over everything, with few shadows and relatively low contrast between the lightest and darkest parts of the scene” (Goodykoontz & Jacobs, 2014); this was used for the most part during the movie. The movie was very friendly and the viewer was in a happy place when the high key lighting was used because that was typically the happy part of the movie.
Simba, Timon. And Pumbaa singing “Hakuna Matata” was very good use of high-key lighting.
Low-key lighting was very apparent when Scar or the hyenas would appear during the movie. To me, this was very apparent and it always felt very dark and dangerous because of what Scar’s real intentions were.
In my opinion, three-point lighting was shown during when Mufasa went to question Scar about him not showing up to Simba’s reveal. In the photo below: the bright light was mostly on Mufasa because of the position he had and the cave was a bit darker because Scar was in it.
The benefits of the style of lighting used were the fact that you could predict whether something good was going to happen or whether the viewer should hold onto their seats because Scar was about to get in some trouble. The Lion King did just that by making sure Scar was always used with low-key lighting and everyone else always seemed bright and happy.
This made the film very happy and also allowed the viewers to understand all the changes that happened when Mufasa was king and when Scar took over. This helped viewers understand that even in the darkest days, something good was going to happen and Simba was going to return to take his place as rightful King.
According to IMDb, The primary genre of The Lion King was Animation. Because Animation typically signifies light and fun, the lighting was used exactly how it needed to be. The movie was a very p movie and the final outcome was the result of it all; had the lighting been different, I don’t believe the movie would’ve made sense. For example, if Scar was always viewed with high-key lighting, this would easily confuse the viewers into thinking he was a good guy like everyone else.
References:
Goodykoontz, B., & Jacobs, C. (2014). Film: From watching to seeing (2nd ed). San Diego, Ca. Bridgepoint Education, Inc.
“The Lion King (1994) – IMDb.” The Internet Movie Database (IMDb). N.p., n.d. Web. Retrieved on 20 Aug. 2015 < http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0110357/>
Disney Movie Trailers (1994). The Lion King (1994). Retrieved from https://youtu.be/XkU23m6yX04
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