The Lion King (1994)

◄ The Lion King (1994)

Audio/visual unsynchronised

Before assuming the throne, Simba walks down Pride Rock. Zazu bows to Simba and although his mouth is moving no words are spoken. This is because Zazu was supposed to say "Your Majesty".
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Character error

When Simba and Mufasa view the sunrise, they refer to the "shadowy place" as being on their right. As they were facing the sunrise (east) that would mean that anything on the right side would be south. And yet, Scar refers to it later as the place "beyond the northern border."
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Continuity

When the young Simba and Nala are walking towards the "water hole" with Zazu flying above his shadow does not flap its wings as often as Zazu does.
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Simba clearly pounces on Zazu's back, but when they are on the ground, Simba's paws are on Zazu's front.
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The number of stripes on Timon's back alternate between shot from five to six.
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We see Simba scratch Shenzi's cheek, leaving visible cuts, but shortly after, Shenzi is healed.
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As Simba climbs a dead tree to escape the wildebeest stampede, he leaves scratches on the bark. In all later shots the tree is intact.
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When Simba finds Mufasa's dead body, his tears leave stains running down both cheeks. When Scar appears, Simba's face alternates between having tear stains on both cheeks in medium shots and only on his right cheek in close-ups. Once Scar tells Simba to run away, the stains disappear altogether.
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When Timon and Pumbaa find Simba in the desert, Timon is frightened and climbs on top of Pumbaa. On the next shot we only see Pumbaa's shadow cast in front of Simba, without Timon. When we next see Pumbaa, Timon is back on Pumbaa's back.
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When Simba approaches Mufasa's dead body, the camera shows Mufasa from the back and his paw is clearly past his nose. But when are then shown him face on, his paw has moved to the same level as his nose.
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Near the end of the film when Scar has Simba hanging on the edge of Pride Rock, the camera moves out and the lightning crashes, and we can see Simba is holding on to the rock up to his elbows, yet in the next scene we can see he is only holding on by his paws.
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In one of the final scenes where Simba walks up Pride Rock to roar, it is raining. When we see Timon and Pumbaa briefly, they are dry while the other characters all have signs of being wet.
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The number of Simba's whiskers on each side of his cheek changes from 4 to 5 and back again in some scenes.
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When Banzai the hyena says, "Man, that lousy Mufasa - I won't be able to sit for a week," he has visible cuts near his behind, but in the shot when he wrestles with Ed, they are gone.
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The pads on Scar's paws change from multiple pads to one large pad throughout the movie.
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The hyenas are seen throughout the entire film with three toes on all their paws. But when the hyenas are chasing Simba, Banzai claws at him after he squeezes through a rock, and his paw has four toes.
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Thorns that are all over Banzai's body disappear completely between shots with no time for him to remove them all.
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When Nala is crouched in the grass right before she pounces at Pumbaa, her eyes are green. When she's fighting with Simba, her eyes are blue.
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Grown-up Simba's eyes switch from white to yellow during the movie.
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When Rafiki smells the dust on the wind and realizes Simba is alive, he dips the tips of his fingers into the red paint in order to adapt his picture. In the next shot, his thumb is red too.
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When Simba and Nala are trying to escape the hyenas and fall through the rotten piece of wood, there is debris on the ground. In the next shot when Simba 'roars', the ground is clean.
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During the 'Be Prepared' sequence, Scar knocks a bone out of Ed's jaws, making him sit bolt upright, his tongue hanging out. In the very next shot, it's gone.
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In the 'I Just Can't Wait to Be King' sequence, as Zazu is telling the cubs off, Nala has her front paws in the water. In the next shot, both paws are on the bank, with no time to move.
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When Mufasa and Simba are talking at the top of Pride Rock, facing the sun, their shadows stream out behind them, which is correct. However, as Simba says "Everything the light touches", his shadow is in front of him, which is wrong. It should be cast on his right. Also, in the next shot, when Simba and Mufasa are facing south towards the 'shadowy place', their right sides are in shadow, with the light shining from the left. But it is sunrise, the sun, and therefore the light, should be on their right.
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In the scene where Pumbaa is grovelling before Simba, Timon walks up to him and places his hands on the center of Pumbaa's nose, between his nostrils. In the next shot, his hands are more towards the top.
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The number of whiskers each male lion has changes from scene to scene, and sometimes the whiskers disappear altogether. None of the lionesses in the film have whiskers, though obviously in reality females do have whiskers.
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In her first appearance, Nala's mother Sarafina's toes are the same color as the rest of her body. However, when Scar is informing the pride of the accident, her toes are lighter. A second later, during Nala's close-up, Sarafina's toes are once again the same as her body.
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When Scar first begins his speech after Mufasa's death, nine adult lionesses can be made out. However, when the hyenas begin to appear, there are suddenly only eight. The same thing happens when Simba returns to Pride Rock. At first there are six lionesses, then seven, then six again, then only five, then six.
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When Timon starts his Hula dance, when is back is to the camera, he is not wearing his lei (flower necklace). It suddenly appears a few frames later.
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When Nala is chasing Pumbaa and he is trapped under the root, he begins digging frantically as Timon runs up. However, by the time Timon has jumped onto his head, the ground is smooth again.
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When Simba is talking to Scar about the graveyard, Scar says "And he's absolutely right! Far too dangerous! Only the bravest lions go there!" Scar is sitting up and looks off to the right of the screen, but in the next shot he is sitting down with paws folded.
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When Simba comes back to Pride Rock, he looks out at it, and you can see dead trees on Pride Rock. When Nala comes and looks at it they are gone. When Timon and Pumbaa come and look at it, the trees are back, but when the storm movie in they are gone again. After that scene, the trees are there for the rest of the movie.
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Disappearing Tree/Rock - When the wildebeest herd starts to stampede through the valley, Simba is first on top of the rock that is under the tree, in the valley. The next scene then shows Simba standing out in the open floor of the valley as the wildebeests come running at him, and now there is no tree or rock anywhere to be seen. Then as Simba is shown running away from the wildebeests, we can see the tree and rock in the background again.
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When Timon files down one of Simba's claws you can clearly see that it is very short, but in another scene, shortly after where Simba eats a grub, you can see the same claw at the same size it was before being filed down, having had no time to regrow.
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When Mufasa pins the hyenas, he is facing the wall where Simba is. When the hyenas run away, they go straight ahead, yet are seen running away from Mufasa.
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Errors in geography

Leaf-cutter ants, a gopher and some giant anteaters, all native to the Americas, are shown living happily in Africa. (The gopher should have been a naked mole rat: see trivia.)
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Part of the lyrics song in "The Circle of Life" are "there's a lion and a tiger", yet no tigers live in Africa.
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During the "sunrise" scene the river is seen on the "south" side of Pride Rock. Later during Simba's "circle of life" lesson the river is on the "north" side of Pride Rock.
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When Mufasa shows Simba the kingdom, they are staring at the sunrise in the east, and Mufasa says Simba must never go to the dark area to their right, which is to the south. In the next scene, Scar asks is Simba knows about that same area, along "the northern border."
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Factual errors

The elephant skeletons would have to come from freakishly large elephants. Hyenas could not pass through the trunk socket of an elephant's skull.
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Rafiki the monkey appears to be some sort of bizarre mandrill-baboon hybrid. He has the colorful face of a mandrill, but the long, kinked tail of a baboon (mandrills have very short tails).
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Scar is younger than Mufasa, yet Scar has a darker mane. As a lion's mane darkens as it ages, Mufasa's mane would have to be darker than Scar's.
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Incorrectly regarded as goofs

When Banzai says, "Here, kitty, kitty, kitty," it may appear as though no one is actually speaking. This is because the shot cutting from the cubs to the hyenas is very quick. However, pay close attention only to Banzai's location on the screen: you see his mouth moves when he says "here," and he's audibly saying "kitty, kitty, kitty" through gritted teeth, with his lips shown curled back. If you grit your teeth, curl your lips back, and say this line, you can do so without moving your mouth and it will still sound perfect because you only need to use your tongue to make the sounds.
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Revealing mistakes

At the end of the elephant graveyard scene, Scar's shadow on the wall does not match his pose.
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When Rafiki parts the grass to show Simba the Dream Pool, he pulls aside the grass on Simba's right (and holds it there). However when Simba passes through the gap, the grass on his left is also pushed aside as if by some invisible hand. It springs back once he's through.
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During the "Mufasa, Mufasa, Mufasa," scene, Shenzi's hair changes when she rolls over to laugh.
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If you look close, when Simba is sitting on the rock during the "Hakuna-Matata" song, the pads on his right paw are bigger then the paw itself.
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Scar Steps on Smoke - When Scar begins to sing "Be Prepared", he can be seen walking towards the camera while green smoke is billowing up around him. If you notice on the right side of the screen there is a cloud of green smoke that comes up and you'll notice that Scar's right rear foot (screen right) walks over and on top of part of the smoke.
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Spoilers

The goof below may give away important plot points.

Factual errors

Rafiki's Swahili message "Asante sana, squash banana, We we nugu mi mi apana" Does not mean "You are a baboon, and I'm not." It actually means "Thank you very much, Squash Banana; you are a dog, and I'm not!"
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