It's been called the best traditionally animated film of all time, and is certainly the most successful one—as well as the seventeenth-highest grossing film in history—with a box office gross of nearly $1 billion. Its songs and characters have become something of a pop-cultural touchstone. It represented, at the time of its release in 1994, the high point of the period known as the Disney Renaissance, which continued through 1999 but never again yielded such a success. I had never seen it before, despite the fact that I was born in 1996, only two years after its release. So, when I started to get more and more into animated musicals early in 2012, I was extremely curious about their supposed zenith. Was The Lion King really that good, I asked myself?

Early this year, I finally purchased a VHS copy from Half-Price Books and popped it in my player. I watched it. The whole thing. And the verdict: it's a good film. And there are many great moments. But overall, the whole cannot be called great.

A plot summary probably isn't necessary for most readers of this review, but I'll give one anyway. The Lion King is Disney's only original story of the entire Renaissance period (or their entire history, for that matter), but don't think that means it has a radical structure. Its writers, Irene Mecchi, Jonathan Roberts, and Linda Woolverton, freely admit that the film's story was largely cribbed from those two most famous of archetypal storytellers, Shakespeare and the Bible (specifically Hamlet and Macbeth and the stories of Joseph and Moses). That's not to say the film's story is inferior by any means, because it works. Oh boy, does it ever work (except for the length and placement of the beats—more on that later). In brief, the movie opens with the birth of Simba (Jonathan Taylor Thomas), the only heir to the Lion King Mufasa (James Earl Jones)—much to the chagrin of Mufasa's younger brother Scar (Jeremy Irons). Simba grows up rambunctious, adventurous, and with a rather large sense of entitlement due to his position, and Scar, already seclusive, draws further and further away from the lion pride. Finally, he decides enough is enough, and, along with the help of a trio of hyenas (Whoopi Goldberg, Cheech Marin, and Jim Cummings), engineers a wildebeest stampede that nearly kills Simba and, in the course of a rescue attempt by Mufasa, becomes a successful regicide. Simba, convinced by Scar that Mufasa's death was his fault, flees into the wilderness and takes up residence with the unlikely duo of meerkat Timon (Nathan Lane) and warthog Puumba (Ernie Sabella), who advocate a philosophy of apathy and fun. But destiny, as ever, cannot be thwarted, and an adult Simba (Matthew Broderick) finds himself compelled to return to his home and confront his traitorous uncle once and for all...

The positives first, starting with the cast. Jonathan Taylor Thomas and Matthew Broderick are hardly outstanding in the lead role of Simba, but they really can't be—the role is that of a fairly bland Hero's Journey protagonist, and the voice actors are quite serviceable for this task. It's the supporting cast that really shines in The Lion King, with the notable highlights of James Earl Jones as Mufasa and Jeremy Irons as Scar. Jones' booming, powerful voice lends itself wonderfully to Mufasa's dignity and power, but he also beautifully captures the warmth of the king's love for his son, which is a large part of what makes the character's death so incredibly traumatic and memorable for the film's children viewers. Irons is gleefully seductive and sardonic, relishing Scar's evil—it's been said that a Disney film is only as good as its villain, and Scar is one of the best ones to come out of the Renaissance (he's also the only one to actually get away with his nefarious plot—for a time, at least). The other supporting characters are also well-cast and acted.

The film's animation is gorgeous—apart from the criminally overlooked The Hunchback of Notre Dame, it's probably the best-looking hand-animated movie Disney has ever done. The incredibly tricky task of drawing anthropomorphic animals that still look realistically beastlike is pulled off masterfully—the physiology of the lions especially is astonishingly well done. The colors and shading are gorgeous, particularly in the little details (the shading in a scene early on in the film, in which Scar lazily toys with a mouse he is about to eat, blows my mind). Computers assist with some sequences, particularly the stampede scene, but the CGI is integrated so well that in most scenes it's almost impossible to tell what is computer-rendered and what is hand-drawn.

I'm of two minds on the film's music. Apart from the incredibly majestic “Circle of Life”, the songs (with music by Elton John and lyrics by Tim Rice) are nowhere near as good as those written by Alan Menken and Howard Ashman/Stephen Schwartz in most of the other Renaissance films—their poppy nature clashes violently with the movie's relatively somber, majestic tone, and, with the exception of Scar's “Be Prepared”, Rice's lyrics are too cliched, cheesy, on the nose, or all three. However, the score—dear heavens, the score—composed by Hans Zimmer and with choral arrangements by Lebo M, is breathtaking. It's Zimmer's only Academy Award-winning score, and for good reason. The sheer sweeping majesty and wistfulness of tracks like “This Land” and “Under the Stars” are awe-inspiring, and the alternating portent, desperation and heartbreak of the music during the stampede scene (“...To Die For”) will stir even the coldest listener. The official soundtrack for the film only contains four of Zimmer's compositions, which is unforgivable—fortunately, professional bootlegs of the entire score can be found with some digging.

Now for what is ultimately the film's greatest flaw, the thing that prevented it from being truly a great movie—the story structure.

Everything from the introductory “Circle of Life” to the conclusion of the wildebeest stampede is incredible. The stampede itself is perhaps the best scene in any Disney movie, period, and one of the greatest in cinema—the animation and Zimmer's score; the desperation of Mufasa's rescue attempt; Scar pacing back and forth across a ledge, watching intently; the death of such a beloved character; all gel together to create an almost overwhelmingly tense and moving five minutes. The preceding scenes perfectly balance comic relief with the prevailing somber, portentous tone of the film. It's not until Simba flees into the wilderness that things start to fall apart and the second act plows over the story like a steamroller.

Entirely too much time is spent with the sidekicks Timon and Pumbaa. Their irreverent attitude clashes horribly with the rest of the film's atmosphere, and the stuff of Shakespeare and the Bible turns into roughly twenty minutes of fart jokes and silly antics. Things pick up once adult Simba is called to action, but still don't feel quite right until, in another iconic scene, he receives a vision of his dead father that commands him to remember who he is. It's at this point that the movie remembers what it is, too—the sense of weight and seriousness returns, and the third act is in full swing. Unfortunately, it's too late. The second act has gone on for far too long, and as a consequence, the final battle for Simba's home feels incredibly rushed. It just happens—there's no sense of buildup or anticipation. Simba just wanders up to Pride Rock, the fight begins within two minutes, and Scar is defeated in under ten. The whole thing could have had so much more emotion and excitement if the screenwriters had chosen to cut out a sizable chunk of Timon and Pumbaa's unnecessary antics and keep the film's tone consistent. Instead, what we're left with is an incredible first act, a second act that feels as if it belongs in another film, and a third act that could have been great but has been sold short.

In summation: it's very easy to see why so many people love The Lion King. I really like most of it myself, and absolutely love many elements of it. But it cannot, in the end, be called a great film. Everything else was there—the acting, the aesthetic, the score. But in the end, the story is inconsistent and overloaded with jarringly immature comic relief. Had perhaps five minutes' worth of the second act been cut, and an additional five or ten added to the third act, this could have been an amazing movie. As it is, it is only a good one. Look elsewhere for Disney's true masterpiece (for me, it's Beauty and the Beast or The Hunchback of Notre Dame)—this one could have been that masterpiece, and that's what makes it so frustrating.