The Lion of Judah

I ordered this movie to watch with my Sunday school kids (age 4-13) and obviously watched it before hand. I thought it had so much symbolism and did a great and entertaining job of explaining the passover story from the perspective of animals. The animations were awesome and it really was entertaining and adorable. We even had some adults walking by and stay to watch with us. One word of warning if you intend on watching with younger children: there are parts where the Roman’s are beating Jesus. It doesn’t show it, only the hand and the whip but you can hear it. It is very brief. We opted to fast forward over that part because the younger kids are very innocent and sensitive to content like that. But it was only a few second and you can easily watch and get what’s going on even skipping over that part. Otherwise, it is a wonderful movie and has some great teaching points to bring up after the movie with your kids.

Well done.

A fun creative way to see the animals point of view in the King’s time on earth

Poorly animated, poorly written. The characters are constantly clipping into things, they move awkwardly, and with no weight. The humans look like they’re walking in slow motion because the cloth of their clothes are waving super slowly (in hyper detail lol) and are almost always blurred out or facing away to hide their creepy faces. Also- white Jesus alert. 🙄 I know it was made in 2011 but honestly this trend needs to die.The main character, Judah, is so stupidly optimistic that I literally rolled my eyes a few times. 😅 Not a very likable main character. His face also looks creepily human. He comes out claiming to be a lion but we’re given know context as to why. Was he raised by lions? Did he grow up pretending to be one? Is it a joke of irony? We don’t know! And the supporting cast are all blundering about for the sake of “comedy” so they miss obvious plot points for the sake of not explaining how dire the situation actually is. The biggest problem is ALL of them are used for comedic relief so there’s no one to relate to. The voice acting is cringy and pretty emotionless (or overdramatic). When something bad happens each character gets a close up and they each do a mumbled reaction that just leaves you feeling awkward. Monty, the horse, speaks with an Indian (or Italian? Or something?) accent and while sometimes it adds to the humor I personally think it’s kind of random and offensive. Not to mention you can’t understand a word he’s saying. 👀 Characters also talk over each other sometimes. Unacceptable. We shouldn’t have to put on subtitles and reverse the film to understand it.A donkey named Jack (haha how original) they meet along the way seems to have the only real sense about him but ends up coming across as an angsty teen rather than a donkey who’s faced abusive owners that he’s fleeing. He seems more like a prejudice runaway rather than a fugitive on the run. That’s the biggest issue with this film- it doesn’t give us ANY context regarding why the characters do anything. They don’t take anything seriously and while it tries to overdramatize everything it ends up being really lame, like a flat soda. Kinda sweet but not satisfying. The characters have no backstory. We don’t know WHY Monty is a coward. And character development- it would’ve been much more satisfying to see Monty meet the king and discover his inner strength to be brave when he otherwise wouldn’t have been. And Judah desperately needed a lesson in humality considering he thought he was the savior of the animals. Then you have Sling- the old rat who serves as the team leader- is voiced by the same guy as Mermaid Man (who’s amazing nevertheless) so that’s literally I can hear. He always has an epiphany that is already SUPER obvious and overforeshadowed by characters statements but everyone reacts to it like it’s a profound plot twist.There’s a TON of religious commentary that is presented very shallowly and massively inaccurately. It goes through the entire life of Christ in the span of a few days within the story. (Mild Spoiler) — Judah the lamb mistakes his mother saying “you will save everyone” to mean that he will free the captured animals. But in actuality it was Jesus coming to set everyone free- and consequently ending animal sacrifice. Unfortunately it failed to make any kind of emotional impact and ended up being more like a summary than an actual story. One thing they said often that was immensely annoying was “if you look into the King’s eyes he’ll steal your heart! 👁👄👁” Out of context that’s already creepy. But Jesus was more about building a relationship with people- not hypnotizing them with a smile.Also- the story 100% disregards the disciples except for one Peter denies Christ (only twice) and if you don’t know the original context- then you’re like- why is this random guy having a mental break down after the rooster crows? Nice play on the story but poorly linked into the main plot. Literally the last 30-15 minutes all plot is disregarded as the cast is thrown from one scene of Jesus’s life to the next. Why have farm animals involved at all? Why not just animate Jesus’s life? Honestly, I wouldn’t want this studio to. The nails were in the palms of his hands for crying out loud.And that one star is for the Raven Gang. They actually made me laugh. The boss Crow told his subordinate to cry for him and it made me snicker.All in all- it falls into uncanny valley where most of these sort of animations fall into. Don’t buy it when you can watch it for free. It’s a garbage film and it tacks on the religious story to get away with being poorly animated. Expect better of studios because the original material deserves better. Your kids deserve intelligent story writing.

I LOVED how the writers had an idea in mind and how they used Real Scenes from The Bible to 100% make it work! So Cute and Creative!!! And the rooster...hilarious!

This was really good... I'm not sure if I've seen many animated Christian related movies, but I really enjoyed this one. I thought the characters were great, as well as the animation. The only complaint I have, is that it seemed to drag on the last 30 minutes or so... this would be where they were looking for Jesus "The King", and after they had found him. You just sort of had these 'dead moments' in this part of the movie, with not much going on. I mean, with exception of the Lord going through what he was in the background of the movie. I mean, they sat outside the gate, then ran around some, then they sat over here, ran around some more, and over there, and finally at the tomb. I think they could have played this part out a whole lot better and filled in the gaps. I don't want to take away from the movie, because I did really enjoy it.

I loved it - It's simple and funny - great way to tell children the Easter story without being too scary.

I did say "disappointing storyline", the film seems to have so many random distractions to the story that as a parent trying to watch it with the Kids I struggled to keep track of what was going on. Why were the rats "adopting" a horse into their club? Why do all the animals have crazy personalities? Why does the "lamb" there to save all the animals - it's kinda missing the point a little.Compared to something like "The Star", this movie just falls well short unfortunately.

For kids 8 and up

Many thanks 😊

My 3 yr old son loves this movie! Fast delivery and good condition.

Good for the children