Is Mufasa a sequel to The Lion King?

In September 2019, just months after the theatrical release of Jon Favreau’s photorealistic version of The Lion King, Disney announced that director Barry Jenkins would direct a prequel centered around Mufasa. Needless to say, the CG remake earned $1.65 billion at the international box office.

Barry Jenkins’ surprise

After winning three statues at the 2017 Oscars for Moonlight, including Best Picture and allowing Regina King to win the Oscar for Best Supporting Actress in a Drama for If Beale Street Could Talk, Barry Jenkins made a surprise appearance by agreeing to direct the blockbuster. A large Gulf firm.

However, it was obvious to the 45-year-old director, who later stated in a press release The Hollywood Reporter :”When I was helping my sister raise two young boys in the 90s, I grew up with these characters. To have the opportunity to work with Disney to continue this magnificent story of friendship, love and heritage, while continuing to work on the lives and souls of the African diaspora is a dream come true.

I grew up with these characters.

Barry Jenkins Then added the microphone Diversity :”I read the script and about 40 pages in, I turned to Lulu and said, “This is great.” And as I continued to read, I pushed aside the voice in my head that said, “Oh, a director like you wouldn’t make a movie like this,” and allowed myself to sink into the idea that these characters, these. The story is incredible.

What convinced me was when James, my cinematographer, said, “You know what? There’s something really interesting about this cinematic approach that we haven’t explored yet.’ That’s when I went back to the powers that be and said, “I’d love to do that, but I have to be able to do what I want.”“

A prequel to The Lion King

In this film, Rafiq tells the legend of Mufasa to the young lioness Kiara – daughter of Simba and Nala. Timon and Pumbaa help him in this. Told in flashbacks, Mufasa’s story is that of an orphaned lion cub, alone and tired, who meets the friendly Taka, heir to a royal lineage. This chance meeting marks the starting point of an adventure-filled journey for a small group of “undesirables” who have bonded with them and who are now in search of their destiny. Their bonds of friendship are put to the test when they must band together to escape an enemy both dangerous and deadly…

In the 1994 animated film directed by Roger Allers and Rob Minkoff, Mufasa quickly became an iconic Disney figure. His tragic, almost Shakespearean fate made a whole generation of children shed many tears.

Mufasa takes place years before The Lion King and finally lets us know why Scar hates Mufasa so much. It was he who was destined to become king, as he was the only heir of royal blood, Mufasa was taken when he was just a lion cub.

Favorite topics for Barry Jenkins

During D23 2022, AlloCiné was able to speak with Barry Jenkins, who told us the following: “It’s different from The Lion King, but it will have the same energy. Mufasa tells us how Simba’s father became the king. We tell his story, from childhood to the birth of his son. In the film, Mufasa represents greatness. We admire his royalty, his leadership, we think he has it all , because he was born well.

But in this prequel, we explore how her friends and family made her who she is. We discover his journey. “Mufasa means a lot to me and I think it’s a movie that kids and their parents who grew up with the Disney classics will enjoy watching.”

The feature film deals with valuable topics Barry Jenkins and has already been discussed in his previous works, esp moonlight : Search for identity, transition to adulthood, transmission, importance of family relationships and commitment.

“Mufasa was not born with privileges”emphasized the director in the press conference. “He had a family, but he lost it. Then self-belief, fate and luck kicked in and gave him a new clan with which he could apprentice and build himself. He gave nothing away: he won everything with his courage and perseverance. “

A difficult but exhausting challenge

If the film director liked the themes of the feature film, the latter still trusted the magazine. Vulture That shooting for 147 days without a physical set with digital production was somewhat of an effort.

“At first I found the challenge stimulating. People today do a lot of things with just a computer. I told myself that anyone should be able to do it. There’s nothing physical that says I can’t do it too. But that’s not my thing.

I realize it’s not for me. I want to work again in a different way, that is, I want everything to be physically in place. I wonder what is the right recipe for creating chemistry on set. How can these people, this light, this environment come together to make the shot beautiful and moving. How do we create a text deep enough, dense enough, rich enough to speak to the audience…”

Mufasa: The Lion King Created with the same technology that is used the lion king by Jon Favreau. Specifically, a combination of photorealistic CGI and virtual reality to recreate immersive environments and realistic characters.

This approach was continued by Mufasa director Barry Jenkins, allowing the production team to shoot scenes in virtual space as if they were using a real camera. That’s why they didn’t shoot on real locations and this is one of the filmmaker’s regrets. However, the results have been amazing since the first viewers found the movie “Visually spectacular“.

Mufasa: The Lion King In our dark rooms can be found from 8 years.