He can call me flower if he wants to

Bambi (1942)

Less than two months after I started working at Suncoast, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs was released on DVD for the first time. I never got around to buying it. Several months later, my boss gave me a copy for free. I watched it with my husband later, and the main thing I remember was how surprising it was that a movie that old still looked quite well. I was reminded of this when he and I sat down to watch Bambi last week.

I cannot stress enough how amazing the animation of the first and last minute of the film is. It is about as close to CGI I've ever seen old school animation reach, and this was made nearly 70 years ago! The multi-camera technique was used to great effect. In fact, I am now of the opinion that this is one of the most beautiful films Disney ever produced.

Bambi is one of those few Disney movies parents think twice about before they show it to their children. I've never met an adult who didn't know why. I watched this film several times when I was a kid, and I remember well the first time I saw it. I couldn't have been more than 6 or 7, and I remember feeling surprised and a general sense of sadness that Bambi's mother was killed. Watching this movie as an adult, knowing what was coming, was a vastly different experience , so much so that I now wonder if adults have stronger feelings about the movie than children.

First off, I was halfway to tears by the time the doe was born. Seeing how cute he looked while knowing what was going to happen to him was gut-wrenching. I was almost hyper-aware of how the animation took a darker tone when the story became more serious, and danger lurked. But the worst part came after Bambi's mother was shot. Hearing Bambi shout "Mother!" is one of the most haunting sounds I've ever heard in a film. All in all, this movie was a lot harder for me to handle as an adult than it was as a child.

And then I made the mistake of checking to see how different the movie was from the book on which it was based. Oh. My. God. The film was all sunshine and rainbows compared to the book. At least Disney allowed for a mildly happy ending. The book's ending is positively miserable. That certainly put things into perspective.

This is the first time I watched this movie since I was about 18. My respect for it has skyrocketed.