Review No.140: African Cats

Anyone who reads my TV writings knows that my Achilles' Heel is the nature documentary as on the whole I find them rather tiresome though I do have a soft spot for Sir David Attenborough. As I've had to gear myself up to watch various films that I wouldn't otherwise bother with throughout this blog I thought it was a better time than ever to watch Disney's Kenya-set documentary African Cats. From the start of the film you get the idea that Disney are trying to emulate March of the Penguins from the close-up photography down to the choice of  a wise black actor to narrate the affair with Samuel L Jackson taking Morgan Freeman's chair in the announcing booth. As the title would suggest the film looks at African cats in particular a pack of lionesses on one side of the river and a cheetah who unusually has to look after five cubs. The two separate plot strands deal with how mothers care for their children in the wild with the lionesses looking after their young, in particular we see the relationship between mother and daughter Layla and Mara, as well as how they are watched over by the kindly but threatening Fang. However the pride from the North arrive chasing Fang away and extraditing his cub Mara, who had been living with her aunt since her mother's death, with the lionesses eventually accepting these new men into their pride. On the other side we see Sita the Cheetah teach her cubs how to survive on their own by both running away from predators and hunting for their own food. As time goes on we see the cheetah cubs grow up and attempt to fend for themselves while Mara tries to cope on her own away from the pride.

It's clear when watching African Cats that it's geared towards a family friendly audience though there are scenes in which I feel young children would get quite upset, like how I did when Simba's father died in The Lion King. I do think my ten year old self may have got more out of it but at the same time I felt that the film had a repetitive nature that kids may find quite dull. What I can't argue with is that directors Alastair Fothergill and Keith Scholey really had an eye for detail and the camera team did wonders with their sometimes almost too close for comfort shots, I'm thinking in particular of the scenes in which Fang tries to scare off some crocodiles. As I said before I feel that Disney really wanted this to be as successful as March of the Penguins however it's not turned out that way at all and I possibly wouldn't have heard about it unless I was watching all the films released this year. When it comes to vocal resonance I'm afraid that Samuel L Jackson isn't quite up there with Morgan Freeman however he does still add some authority to the film almost seeming like he wants to challenge the two lions for the King of the Jungle title. What I wasn't a fan of was the script which in away was almost disconnected from what was happening on screen it was almost as if the production team got together and realised they had some great footage but nothing realy to say about it so then went something that was overly poetic and at times utterly propesterous. At the end of the day African Cats does what it says on the tin, it's a documentary about lions and cheetahs in Kenya, and while it may appeal to children I didn't find much to sink my teeth into other than the wonderful wildlife photography.

Verdict: I think this is definitely one for the kids as I personally found African Cats rather dull at times although you still have to give it up for some wonderful footage of the African plains so for that reason it gets a 5.5/10