Bambi

Production

RKO Radio Pictures released Bambi for Walt Disney Productions in August 1942. The film adapts Felix Salten’s 1923 novel Bambi: A Life in the Woods. Production took roughly five years, with the studio bringing live deer and forest animals onto the lot for animator study.

Story

A young deer named Bambi is born in the forest and grows up with his mother, his rabbit friend Thumper, and the skunk Flower. He learns to walk, finds his mate Faline, and survives both a forest fire and an attack by the hunters whose presence in the woods is signaled by their dogs.

Reception

Bambi was the lowest-grossing of Disney’s first five animated features on its original 1942 release, partly because international markets were closed by the war. Subsequent re-releases made the film into a major commercial success and its imagery has influenced animation for decades.