New Lion King a strange, surreal movie experience: Rob Minkoff

Rob Minkoff, head of this year's Tiantan Awards jury, speaks ahead of the Beijing International Film Festival on Thursday, April 11, 2019. [Photo: China Plus]

Rob Minkoff, known for directing the Academy Award–winning 1994 animated feature The Lion King, imagined it would be "a very strange experience" for him to watch the remake as an ordinary audience member.

The American filmmaker made the statement ahead of the upcoming Beijing International Film Festival where he will preside over the Tiantan Awards, the main award of the festival.

"Even though people are calling it a live-action, I'm not sure really it should be described as a live-action film because of the process and technique that's being used to make the film. But it looks, I suppose, like a live-action film. So it'll be a very strange experience, I think, very surreal," said the renowned filmmaker.

With stunning scenery of Africa and some talking wildlife, Disney recently dropped its first full-length trailer for the new movie.

Minkoff said he's surprised by "how similar it was to our original film" after watching the trailer.

"In a character-animation obviously you have the face, that's expressive. So in this film, it obviously doesn't have the same level of characters. But you won't see the characters that we all grew up with now going away in favor of some live action."

Rob Minkoff (center) met the press in Beijing along with six other judges for the Tiantan Awards on Thursday, April 11, 2019.[Photo: China Plus]

He says he doesn't see 'live action' versions of the story's characters replacing the iconic images he created in 1994, on merchandise like coffee cups.

The new movie, made with computer-generated imagery, follows the plot of the Oscar winning 1994 animation about lion cub Simba, who flees his kingdom after his evil uncle Scar connives to take his father Mufasa's place as king. It is reportedly due out in July.