10 Facts about Bambi

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Jan 19

“Let’s twitter and tweet like the birdies in May” – Let’s Sing a Gay Little Spring Song (Bambi)

Bambi is based on a novel by Felix Salten titled Bambi: A Life in the Woods.
Felix Salten sold the film rights for just $1,000.
Before Bambi II was developed in the 2000s, Disney considered a sequel based on Salten’s second book, Bambi’s Children. Although the film was never produced, the story was adapted into a comic book featuring Bambi’s fawns, Geno and Gurri.
The original film contains fewer than 1,000 words of spoken dialogue.
“Man in the forest” wasn’t just a line from the movie. It became a code phrase among animators to warn that Walt Disney was walking down the hall.
Bambi was the first Disney animated feature where characters don’t sing on screen. Walt felt songs would break the realism and instead used music to guide the emotional storytelling.
Upon its initial release, Bambi was not a box office success due to the impact of World War II, which limited its international distribution.
“Man” was ranked number 20 on the American Film Institute’s list of the 100 Greatest Movie Villains, despite never actually appearing on screen.
Walt Disney allowed the character of Bambi to be used in a public service campaign promoting wildfire prevention.
Thumper wasn’t in the original novel. In early drafts of the film script, his name was actually Bobo.