![]() The character animation on the Great Prince is admirable. His mouth says to look to the present but his eyes say it hurts too much to think about her. The Great Prince stops him almost the second he mentions his mother. Bambi just wants to play with them, which his mother told him was very important. It’s easier to look for danger from far away. He asks if they can go down to the other deer, but the Prince declines. The exasperated Prince leads Bambi to the majestic cliff of majesticness, and we actually get to see it straight on instead of from below!īambi gazes out over the herd of deer below them. He can’t quite make it up the icy hills, and the icy river gets the better of his poise, but he tries. From here, Bambi tries to reign in his enthusiasm, but he can’t help trying to imitate his father on their walk through the woods. Bambi’s ecstatic “WOO-HOOOO!!!!” leads to the funniest line in the film. After Bambi chokes down the sticks the Prince uncovered, the Prince tells Bambi they have to go check on the deer elsewhere in the forest. You’ve got to give him credit for trying, though. He’s really not cut out for this fatherhood thing. Bambi’s stomach growls, and the Prince callously suggests he eat something before remembering that it’s his job to find food. Far from comforting him, the Prince scolds him for oversleeping. At the very end, a shoot of new spring grass rises above the ice, symbolizing new beginnings.īambi wakes up alone and scared, then runs out of the den to his father’s side. Animals wake up and burst through the crust of snow and relish in the new sunlight. It’s a little more heavy-handed here, but it’s an important point to make, especially for this film’s younger target audience. Even in the depths of sorrow, life goes on and there’s always light to be found. Winter passes by in a lovely little montage that drives home the message from the previous film. Friend Owl points out that the does are all starving and the last thing they need is a fawn to raise, thereby convincing the Great Prince to be responsible until spring. Right now, business is finding a doe to raise Bambi because a male raising his own child would just be ridiculous. Unfortunately, one of the Prince’s main character traits is pushing his own feelings down in favor of business. Friend Owl flies down from the trees to offer condolences to the visibly heartbroken Great Prince. Not only does it care a lot for the original movie, but it shows respect for the original novel, too. ![]() The Great Prince leads Bambi into his den under a large log in a ditch. It’s handled with a great deal of gravitas and respect for the original material, and it’s just as touching here as it was the first time. They use archive footage to have the Great Prince deliver his wham line, “your mother can’t be with you anymore.” The poor little fawn’s eyes well up with tears and… well, you know this scene. That’s right, we’re jumping right into the feelings here, no messing around. The film opens for Bambi calling desperately for his mother in the blinding snow. Still, there’s a fair amount of effort here, and that puts it head and shoulders above the other sequels. Sixty-four years separate Bambi and Bambi II, and the animation, storytelling, and musical styles show it clearly. It also holds the world record for the longest time span between two installments of a franchise. But it was a story that should have been told in the original, so better late than never.īambi II was the final Disney animated film to be released on VHS. Was it the best way of doing it? Probably not. Well, this midquel is here to fill that gap. I griped and griped about how there was no time for Bambi or the audience to grieve the loss of Bambi’s mom before suddenly we were thrown into happy twittering birds. We’ll get to him later.įinally, Bambi II fills the gaping chasm left by that horrible transition in the original film. That’s about as much as you can ask for from a movie where only one member of the cast was even born at the time of the original. They even included some cels and archive audio from the original for authenticity. The characters were largely the same as in the last movie, if more fleshed out. It features scenes that were planned for the original Bambi but scrapped, and even adds parts of the novel. The other reason Bambi II isn’t quite as bad as most of the other sequels is that it respects its source material. I don’t know how they got you but I’m glad they did.
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