The one positive that's gleamed from most people is "It looks amazing" and I disagree. The original looked far better.
Hear me out.
The effects were good, no doubt about it, but effects need to serve the story they are in. Photo Realism did not serve this story and made it less engaging to watch. Hyper realistic animals did not make this movie any better. In fact, i'd say it detracted from every scene. The characters had no ability to physically emote. They had to remove a lot of the more interesting visuals because they don't fit with hyper realism. Putting the wrong effects in a movie, even if they are really well done, detracts from the movie. The originals animation fit the story and served it. It played with color in interesting ways, the characters were all expressive and visually distinct, the animation style added to the emotional moments and the light hearted ones equally.

Sure, you could remake "Space Jam" with hyper realistic animals. Bugs could just be a rabbit, Porky could just be a pig, but the movie would worse off for it. Even if they looked super real, a hyper realistic rabbit and pig dunking basketball just doesn't work.
In the same vein, hyper realistic lions singing songs doesn't work. It feels weird and disconnected, like the animation was made for a different movie. The tech is great, they could do awesome things with it. But this was not a good fit. If they wanted to make a live action Moana, a hyper realistic chicken would work great for her pet because the pet is just a chicken. But making a story about talking animals hyper realistic just feels weird.

The performances were fine. I prefer the original but that doesn't mean these were bad. Well Beyonces was pretty bad. She can sing but she isn't a voice actor by any means.

For me this movie felt poorly paced compared to the original, a lot of the performances fell flat compared to the original, the animation didn't fit, and I enjoyed the songs less. In every regard I prefer the original. I wouldn't say it was an awful movie but I wouldn't say it was good by any means. I got strong armed into seeing this movie but I can say with no hesitation that I will never be viewing this again. As a different commenter has suggested, I should have bought a ticket for a different movie and then seen this one, because I regret financially supporting this movie.

4/10