“The Lion King 1 ½” is my favorite out of the three “Lion King” movies, mostly because of the sheer comedic genius of Nathan Lane, who voices Timon the meerkat. He’s hysterical, and he makes the movie.
In this film, we get to see what was happening even before Simba was born. Timon was an outcast in his meerkat town. He couldn’t do anything he was asked to do – he was flighty and irresponsible. He caused many a cave-in of the meerkat tunnels, and other disasters too numerous to mention. His mother feared he’d never make a decent meerkat, but giving him one last chance, she signs him up for sentry duty. All he has to do is yell if he sees hyenas coming. Put through an intensive training course by his Uncle Max (Jerry Stiller) wherein he learns to scurry, sniff, and flinch, he’s given the task of watching over the town. But he gets sidetracked by daydreaming about the life he’d like to have (in song) and some hyenas sneak up and wreak havoc on the other meerkats. Timon’s defense is perfectly reasonable – he broke into song and got distracted. But the other meerkats aren’t having any of it.
Feeling more rejected than ever, Timon decides to go out on his own, running into Rafiki the money along the way. Rafiki councels Timon to look beyond what he can see. Well, Timon sees a big, pointy rock (Pride Rock) and beyond that, a nice little patch of land where he can hang up a hammock and live happily ever after. He meets up with Puumba along the way, and they work their way through the crowd that, for some reason, has gathered around Pride Rock. They see the monkey holding up some baby lion or another, but they have a destination in mind and don’t stop.
From this point on in the movie, we see what Timon and Puumba were doing while Simba was having his own adventures, the two stories running parallel until they all meet up and teach Simba about Hakuna Matata. It’s funny how Disney chose to intertwine the stories – Timon is woken up one morning by Simba singing about how he just can’t wait to be king. Nathan Lane was the perfect choice to voice Timon, whose ascerbic comments on life are enjoyable and entertaining.
Yes, indeed – this is my favorite “Lion King” movie. We don’t own the other ones, and I don’t intend to buy them, but I have this one on our wish list for future purchases.
This film is rated G.
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