Having just seen the live action remake The Jungle Book by Jon Favreau, I've lost all hope in Walt Disney Pictures and its plan to recreate nearly all of its major animated classics in live-action. The latest in a slew of live action remakes, The Jungle Book is not only a sad retread of the original animated classic, but also an easy cash grab that depends on nostalgia in order to draw in audiences. It epitomizes a problematic predilection of Walt Disney Pictures: a reliance on remaking older classics that succeed financially but fail creatively.

There are many faults with The Jungle Book, but, above all, its fatal one is its inability to differentiate itself from the 1967 animated classic. Though the case is often made that a film should be judged on its own merits, it's impossible to judge a film that follows, beat by the beat, the plot of the original without adding anything of substance. The main praise the film will most likely receive is its visuals. The CGI is commendable but it's also the only way in which the film attempts to significantly distinguish itself from the original animated feature. The film follows the same plots points from the original, yet still manages to be inferior in its direction. The relationship between Baloo and Mowgli is rushed, Kaa is grossly underused and the realistic tone the visuals attempt to convey is offset by the inconsistencies within the relationships between different species in which animals can speak and others cannot. Moreover, the film's moral is overtly told to the audience, making the film come off as clichéd. Visually interesting yet structurally bland, The Jungle Book pales in comparison to the original animated film. This film is essentially a facelift, no different than a remastered release that merely enhances the resolution.

However, the film strategically chooses to minimize its dissimilarity from the original in order to appeal to audiences which loved the animated classic. The film makes certain it includes essential elements from the original in order to pander to the audience’s nostalgia. It depends on nostalgia in order to have audiences overlook shortcomings within the execution of the plot. This is most apparent in the friendship between Baloo and Mowgli. Although the execution is rushed, audiences will most likely overlook it since they've already seen the same friendship become well-established in the original. Furthermore, the little variations the film does make are largely inconsequential. Scarlett Johansson adds a seductive tone to the voice of Kaa, but this change is merely a stylistic choice that has no other purpose than making the film appear fresh and new. If anything, I much prefer the original voice of Kaa since it was the same voice of Winnie the Pooh which was not only incredibly eerie, but also significant to the plot by making Kaa a representation of childhood and his hypnosis of Mowgli a metaphor for the perils of adolescent stagnation. The minimal variations the film makes create an illusion of a new direction, but at its core it's merely another cash grab utterly dependent on nostalgia.

The Jungle Book’s dependence on nostalgia is a problem emblematic of Walt Disney Pictures’ current line-up of movies set to be released over the next few years. Currently, there are 14 live action remakes planned including Dumbo, Mulan and Winnie the Pooh. The number of titles is extremely unsettling since it illustrates the confidence Walt Disney Pictures has in remakes. While I understand that most of the animated classics are remakes of Grimm’s fairy tales, the direction those films took were genuinely original and clever. They actually differentiated themselves from the fairy tales, both in plot and in tone. With recent remakes like The Jungle Book, however, Walt Disney Pictures is presenting remakes of their own remakes without adding any of the Disney magic that made the original remakes classics. Substituting hand-drawn animation for CGI is not creativity: it's merely a cash grab. Unfortunately, nostalgia will still secure the money of the masses. When Beauty and the Beast arrives in theaters next year, I won't be in attendance. Neither will the magic.