Bambi Review: If you can’t say something nice, don’t say nothing at all

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Well, it’s November and it’s been a while since I have written any reviews.  November is known for many things worldwide. Remembrance Day in Canada, Thanksgiving in the United States, Guy Fawkes Day in the UK, and Black Friday. In the realm of Hollywood November typically means the release of a Disney animation film. 

Now Disney animation has been in the feature film game since the release of Snow White and the Seven Dwarves in 1937. Since that time they have released a total of 62 films and their most recent spectacle will be Moana 2 coming out on November 27th. Before the film comes out I will be reviewing one film from each of the Disney eras that can be found in a collection on Disney Plus. 

The final film will obviously be Moana but I will leave the rest up for surprise. Now as I make my way through each of the decades of Disney, I will try to make connections to elements of old Disney that I see in modern Disney films. So the first era in the Disney Prairie Grown Reviews movie marathon would be the 1930/40’s era. 

Obviously, this was the era that began Disney’s dominance as a film studio and it also ushered in the concept of animated feature-length films. Now I had many choices from this era that could have been used to encapsulate this era and what tendencies we saw from the studio at the time. 

The obvious choice would have been Snow White and the Seven Dwarves or Pinocchio however Snow White has a live-action film releasing next year so we can save that review for that time.  With Pinocchio, it just seemed like that movie has been talked about a lot recently with multiple remakes including one from Disney in the past few years.  So with all that preamble out of the way the film I landed upon was Bambi.

Bambi Review

Bambi was released in 1942 and since then it has become a beloved family film passed down from generation to generation. Now I had only seen Bambi once as a child and that was odd because other films from that era, I still watched often enough but Bambi was not one of them. 

Now, like everyone I know the famous scene from the film in which Bambi’s mother is killed. However, the rest of the film surrounding that was something I could not recall so I was looking forward to revisiting the film to see what the acclaim was for.

For me, the best way to describe the film is that it is most definitely not what I expected and also completely what I expected at the same time.  In that first era of Disney films, there are 10 films and of those 10 films only about three of them are actually story-based films.  The rest fall into the category of music-based like Fantasia or Melody Time or vibe films like Bambi.

So what do I mean by a vibe film? While the film starts with the birth of Bambi. We find out that all the animals consider him the prince of the forest. After that, we have about 30 minutes of Bambi just learning about stuff like how to walk, how to talk, and what animals live in the forest. 

So while there are things happening in the film I couldn’t necessarily say there was a plot developing.  As this was Disney’s fifth film you can tell there is still a consistent element of these early films where they just liked to show off their animation. There are quite a few scenes where the camera follows animals as they move around the forest. 

Now in these scenes, there is not a lot of actual plot that is being developed and it is more so just showing the quality and beauty of the animation. While I certainly respect the animators and overall believe animation does not get enough credit, I was waiting for the story to get going during these moments. 

The story kicks into high gear when Bambi’s mom is shot by a hunter. This is a pivotal scene in the film but in the wider context of Disney films. It is now almost a running joke for Disney characters to have dead parents but for the parents to die in the film was a new concept.   So the impact of a character who was a major part of the first half of the film to be killed midway through the game was a big deal.

Now to make my connection between old and modern Disney.  It was hard for me to figure out what I would talk about in this section but I landed on two distinct things that have persisted throughout the decades.  The first is the emphasis on nature.  Nature and the natural world are a huge aspect of many of the Disney animated films. The beauty of nature, the dangers within, and the attempt to preserve nature.   

The second one I wanted to mention and I already touched on it is the death of an important character.  The death of Bambi’s mom has a huge impact on the plot and changes the trajectory of the story. Many Disney films use death as a motivating factor for the characters and the lasting impact of loss.

Overall, this is not my favourite Disney film of this era. I feel that this era is known for being less story-based and more the beauty of its animation.  I just feel that I prefer both Snow White and the Seven Dwarves and Dumbo compared to Bambi. I certainly respect this film for both its animation and its impact on Disney animation as a studio.  At the end of the day, this might not be one that I love but it will forever be known as a classic!