{"id":76841,"date":"2022-12-26T00:01:39","date_gmt":"2022-12-26T08:01:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cartoonresearch.com\/?p=76841"},"modified":"2022-12-21T11:39:39","modified_gmt":"2022-12-21T19:39:39","slug":"so-deer-to-our-heart-the-80th-anniversary-of-bambi","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cartoonresearch.com\/index.php\/so-deer-to-our-heart-the-80th-anniversary-of-bambi\/","title":{"rendered":"So \u201cDeer\u201d to Our Heart:  The 80th Anniversary of \u201cBambi\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/cartoonresearch.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/Bambi-walt-disney-banner_600.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"600\" height=\"256\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-40255\" srcset=\"https:\/\/cartoonresearch.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/Bambi-walt-disney-banner_600.jpg 600w, https:\/\/cartoonresearch.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/Bambi-walt-disney-banner_600-300x128.jpg 300w, https:\/\/cartoonresearch.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/Bambi-walt-disney-banner_600-150x64.jpg 150w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 600px) 100vw, 600px\" \/>\n<p>\n<p>In June of 2003, the American Film Institute created a list of the top 100 Heroes and Villains in movie history.  On the ranking of bad guys, nestled near Darth Vader, Norman Bates, and Hannibal Lecter was\u2026Man\u2026 the villain from Disney\u2019s 1942 animated feature, <em>Bambi<\/em>.<\/p>\n<p>The film\u2019s unseen villain came in at number twenty!  There\u2019s a good reason that this unique of all Disney and film villains ranked so high.  &#8220;Man&#8221; in <em>Bambi<\/em> is responsible for one of the most shocking and gut-wrenching moments in film history and a scene in the film that ranks as a moviegoing rite of passage for generations.<\/p>\n<p>Spoiler Alert (it may seem ridiculous to write that, but just in case) &#8211; It\u2019s the sequence that results in Bambi\u2019s father letting the young deer know, \u201cYour mother can\u2019t be with you anymore.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>As difficult as it is to believe, this year marks the 80th anniversary of Bambi, which was released to theaters on August 13th, 1942.<\/p>\n<p><center><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/nLvX-erABqY\" title=\"YouTube video player\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/center><\/p>\n<p>\n<p>Jerry&#8217;s alternate blog, <em>Animation Scoop<\/em>, celebrated Bambi\u2019s 75th just five years ago, <a TARGET=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/www.animationscoop.com\/oh-deer-celebrating-the-75th-anniversary-of-disneys-bambi\/\">here<\/a>. To commemorate the 80th anniversary, what follows is a collection of quotes from some of the legends who brought us this Disney masterpiece and the many who have celebrated the legacy of Bambi:<\/p>\n<p>\u201cFrom the start, Bambi was a very different picture.  It had fantasy and reality all its own, separate from Walt Disney\u2019s other films.  This was no imaginary forest that one could enter and leave at will.  Whoever ventured in became part of an experience so strong that neither heart nor mind could ever forget its impact.\u201d <\/p>\n<p>\u2013 Animators Frank Thomas and Ollie Johnston, <em>Walt Disney\u2019s Bambi: The Story and the Film<\/em>.<\/p>\n<hr style=\"color: #D3D3D3; background-color: #D3D3D3; height: 2px; border: none;\" \/>\n<p>\u201cThis was the first time Walt saw what I could do as an artist. I did the young animals in the story, and apparently, he [Walt] was delighted with my drawings and said, \u2018I want to see this guy\u2019s drawings on the screen. Make an animator out of him.\u2019 So, I was trained by a few of the other animators like Milt Kahl and Frank Thomas, and I stayed on Bambi for six years.<\/p>\n<p>We moved out to the new studio, and we were up on the third floor, the 3D wing; and Walt had his apartment, and he would stay overnight. The man who was Story Director on Bambi was Perce Pierce; He had also been story director on Snow White. He would stand in the hallway when he knew Walt was coming, and he&#8217;d say, \u2018Man is in the forest! Man is in the forest!\u2019\u201d <\/p>\n<p>\u2013 Animator Marc Davis, 1998 interview with the author.<\/p>\n<hr style=\"color: #D3D3D3; background-color: #D3D3D3; height: 2px; border: none;\" \/>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/cartoonresearch.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/Bambi-1942-poster.jpg\" rel=\"prettyphoto[76841]\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/cartoonresearch.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/Bambi-1942-poster-200x300.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"200\" height=\"300\" class=\"alignright size-medium wp-image-24627\" srcset=\"https:\/\/cartoonresearch.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/Bambi-1942-poster-200x300.jpg 200w, https:\/\/cartoonresearch.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/Bambi-1942-poster-100x150.jpg 100w, https:\/\/cartoonresearch.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/Bambi-1942-poster.jpg 501w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 200px) 100vw, 200px\" \/><\/a>\u201cA sequence in Bambi had grown far too long. In desperation, Walt sat in the projection room with the directing animator to cut the sequence down. Walt would say, \u2018You can cut here\u2019 or \u2018Cut this scene out entirely.\u2019  The director complained, \u201cI think I would lose something if we cut that out.\u2019<\/p>\n<p>Walt was exasperated. He stopped short and said, \u2018Here I am, losing my shirt, and you&#8217;re telling me what you&#8217;d be losing.\u2019\u201d <\/p>\n<p>\u2013 Director Ben Sharpsteen featured in <em>Remembering Walt: Favorite Memories of Walt Disney<\/em> by Amy Boothe Green and Howard E. Green.<\/p>\n<hr style=\"color: #D3D3D3; background-color: #D3D3D3; height: 2px; border: none;\" \/>\n<p>\u201cThe situation: Bambi is learning to walk. He takes some steps and falls down. And Thumper says, \u2018He doesn&#8217;t walk very good, does he?\u2019 And his mother admonishes him [\u2018What did your father tell you?\u2019] So in this scene, he says, \u2018If you can&#8217;t say something nice, don&#8217;t say nothing at all.\u2019<\/p>\n<p>We try to squeeze every last drop out of each scene. The kid who supplied the voice was only four or five years old, and he had a little trouble remembering the lines&#8230; and it showed. So, we got the same hesitation into the animation. We even added time between \u2018nice\u2019 and \u2018don&#8217;t.\u2019 So he says, \u2018nice,\u2019 takes a breath and nothing comes out.\u201d <\/p>\n<p>\u2013 Animator Milt Kahl, 1960 Character Design and Development Lecture featured in <em>Walt Disney\u2019s Nine Old Men &#038; The Art of Animation<\/em> by John Canemaker.<\/p>\n<hr style=\"color: #D3D3D3; background-color: #D3D3D3; height: 2px; border: none;\" \/>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/cartoonresearch.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/08\/bambiposter-forest-fires.jpg\" rel=\"prettyphoto[76841]\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/cartoonresearch.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/08\/bambiposter-forest-fires-216x300.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"216\" height=\"300\" class=\"alignleft size-medium wp-image-59863\" srcset=\"https:\/\/cartoonresearch.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/08\/bambiposter-forest-fires-216x300.jpg 216w, https:\/\/cartoonresearch.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/08\/bambiposter-forest-fires-108x150.jpg 108w, https:\/\/cartoonresearch.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/08\/bambiposter-forest-fires.jpg 600w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 216px) 100vw, 216px\" \/><\/a>\u201c\u2026 the ultimate childhood trauma of losing a parent is dramatized with honesty and power. It is these moments, not the occasional kitsch that audiences actually take away with them. On their indisputable strength rests the sound defense against the charge of schmaltz.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Writer James Morrow discusses Bambi\u2019s mother\u2019s death in his article \u201cIn Defense of Disney\u201d in the April 1978 issue of <em>Media and Methods<\/em>.<\/p>\n<hr style=\"color: #D3D3D3; background-color: #D3D3D3; height: 2px; border: none;\" \/>\n<p>\u201cIt remains one of the studio\u2019s loveliest works, dealing in qualities of nature and life that will keep it young and fresh forever.\u201d<\/p>\n<p> \u2013 author and historian Leonard Maltin on Bambi in his book, <em>The Disney Films<\/em>.<\/p>\n<hr style=\"color: #D3D3D3; background-color: #D3D3D3; height: 2px; border: none;\" \/>\n<p>\u201cI heard they were doing <em>Bambi<\/em>, so, on my own free time, I did a lot of sketches of Bambi, with the forest background, and so forth, and took them into the studio. I think Phil Dike had something to do with that, and he looked at [Ty\u2019s sketches] and he said, \u2018What did you say you&#8217;re doing now?\u2019 \u2018I&#8217;m doing inbetweens.\u2019 \u2018I think you&#8217;re in the wrong department.\u2019 They talked it over, and they said, maybe we ought to put this guy working on Bambi, it seems to be perfect for his style and so forth.\u201d <\/p>\n<p>\u2013 Artist Tyrus Wong, whose artwork became the inspiration for the distinct look of <em>Bambi<\/em> (from an interview with Michael Barrier, available at <a TARGET=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/www.michaelbarrier.com\/Interviews\/Wong\/Wong.html\">MichaelBarrier.com<\/a>).<\/p>\n<p><center><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/rWFqkhv5QE8\" title=\"YouTube video player\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/center><\/p>\n<p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>As difficult as it is to believe, this year marked the 80th anniversary of Bambi, which was released to theaters in August of 1942.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":47,"featured_media":42972,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2477],"tags":[235,2437],"class_list":["post-76841","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-animation-cel-ebration","tag-bambi","tag-walt-disney-feature-animation"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cartoonresearch.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/76841","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cartoonresearch.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cartoonresearch.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cartoonresearch.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/47"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cartoonresearch.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=76841"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/cartoonresearch.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/76841\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":76852,"href":"https:\/\/cartoonresearch.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/76841\/revisions\/76852"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cartoonresearch.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/42972"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cartoonresearch.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=76841"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cartoonresearch.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=76841"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cartoonresearch.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=76841"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}