Abc's World of Discovery Lion: Africa's King of the Beasts

 ((Thurs. (29), 9- 10 p.m., ABC))

By TONY SCOTT

Filmed at Ngorongoro Crater, Tanzania, Africa, by ABC/Kane Prods. Intl. Inc. , Wildlife Films Ltd. and BBC Television. Executive producers, Dennis B. Kane, Hugo Van Lawick; producers, Michael Rosenberg, Gil Domb; writer, Barbara Jampel.
 
Narrator: James Brolin.
 

For those thinking TV documentaries have served up lions every which way but fried, ABC's worthy "World of Discovery" returns for its fifth season with a nifty docu about a year in the life of a Tanzania lion pride -- and it's a dilly.

Tightly organized, filmed with cameras inside Land Rovers per local law, edited superbly by Alan Miller, program catches the regal, layabout king, his mate, their female offspring and the two male cubs of one of their daughters.

The cubs' mother handily steals the show, as she and the cubs head off alone to find food during the second dry season. Confronting another pride's hunters over a buffalo calf, she's defeated and returns to the family. Her welcome by her own mother is a moment to behold.

Cubs frolic and nurse, the king dines and copulates (before moving off to his other pride where he's apparently always welcome), his mate sleekly leads the other lionesses on hunting expeditions; they all doze, eat, roughhouse.

Bringing down zebra or other prey has become commonplace in lion footage. An extraordinary occasion is caught by these alert cameras as the starving felines face a buffalo herd arrayed with the force of an army battalion against them; the lions find themselves all but bested.

"Lion" investigates interrelationships, maternal patience (and impatience), the surprising feelings of the powerful king for the two cubs. The animals are captured up close thanks to expert camerawork with superior equipment, and the cats' acceptance of the vehicles.

Writer Barbara Jampel had the good sense not to lose the savage edge by going cute and naming the tawny beasts. James Brolin, hosting the docu, has a tame, full-grown, male lion at his side.

Cameras, Domb, Van Lawick, Alastair MacEwen, Sophie Darlington; editor, Alan Miller; sound, Marguerite Smits Van Oyen; music, Misha Segal; theme, Lee Holdridge.