Bambi is a 1942 American animated coming-of-age drama film[4] produced by Walt Disney Productions and released by RKO Radio Pictures.

Loosely based on Felix Salten's 1923 novel Bambi, a Life in the Woods, the production was supervised by David D. Hand, and was directed by a team of sequence directors, including James Algar, Bill Roberts, Norman Wright, Sam Armstrong, Paul Satterfield, and Graham Heid.

Curious and inquisitive, Bambi frequently asks about the world around him and is cautioned about the dangers of life as a forest creature by his loving mother.

As the Great Prince wanders uphill, he discovers the human hunter, named "Man" by all the animals, is coming and rushes down to the meadow to get everyone to safety.

Bambi is briefly separated from his mother during that time but is escorted to her by the Great Prince as the three of them make it back in the forest just as Man fires his gun.

They are warned about becoming "twitterpated" by Friend Owl and that they will eventually fall in love, but the trio views the concept of romance with scorn.

Their courtship is quickly interrupted by a belligerent older stag named Ronno, who attempts to force Faline away from Bambi.

In 1933, Sidney Franklin purchased the rights to Felix Salten's novel Bambi, a Life in the Woods (1923) to produce a live-action film for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, but soon realized that it would be too difficult to achieve.

[15][23] Joseph M. Schenck of United Artists suggested he make an animated version in alliance with Walt Disney, who was contemplating the idea of his first full-length feature at the time, with Bambi as one of the possible choices.

[24] Later that year, Franklin approached him with the idea, but Disney eventually refused, feeling that his animation studio was unprepared for the technical difficulties that Bambi would have presented.

[26] Finally, on August 17, 1939, production on Bambi began in earnest, but progressed slowly owing to changes in the studio personnel, location, and methodology of handling animation at the time.

[28] Disney and his story team also developed the characters consisting of a squirrel and a chipmunk that were to be a comic duo reminiscent of Laurel and Hardy.

Marc Davis created the final design of Bambi by incorporating LeBrun's realistic study of deer anatomy but exaggerating the character's face by making his proportions baby-like (short snout, big eyes, etc.).

One of the earliest and best-known artists for the Disney studio, Maurice "Jake" Day, spent several weeks in the Vermont and Maine forests, sketching and photographing deer, fawns, and the surrounding wilderness areas.

Facing financial difficulty, Disney was forced to cut 12 minutes from the film before final animation to save production costs.

[37] Roy O. Disney sent a telegram to his brother Walt after the New York opening of the film that read: "Fell short of our holdover figure by $4,000.

This release included multiple bonus features not previously included in Bambi home releases: a documentary entitled Inside Walt's Story Meetings – Enhanced Edition, two deleted scenes, a deleted song, an image gallery, and a game entitled Disney's Big Book of Knowledge: Bambi Edition.

[48] This release also marked the first use of "Disney Second Screen",[49] a feature which is accessed via a computer or iPad app download that syncs with the Blu-ray disc,[50] allowing the viewer to follow along by interacting with animated flip-books, galleries and trivia while watching the movie.

[51] In honor of the film's 75th anniversary, Bambi was released as part of the Walt Disney Signature Collection on May 23, 2017 (digital) and June 6, 2017 (Blu-ray/DVD/digital combo pack).

[52] On the initiative of Stephen Greymoming, professor of Native American studies and anthropology at the University of Montana,[53] an Arapaho-language dubbing of the movie was produced in 1994, in collaboration with the Northern Plains Educational Foundation.

[58] The next such instance had to wait until 2016, when Pixar's Finding Nemo received a dubbing in Navajo,[59] and then Disney's Moana in Hawaiian two years later.

[64] The New York Times claimed that "In the search for perfection, Mr. Disney has come perilously close to tossing away his whole world of cartoon fantasy.

Farber added that "In an attempt to ape the trumped-up realism of flesh and blood movies, he has given up fantasy, which was pretty much the magic element.

The website consensus reads: "Elegantly animated and deeply touching, Bambi is an enduring, endearing, and moving Disney classic.

[68] Critics Mick Martin and Marsha Porter call the film "the crowning achievement of Walt Disney's animation studio".

[69] English film historian Leslie Halliwell wrote that Bambi was "one of Disney's most memorable and brilliant achievements with a great comic character in Thumper and a climactic forest fire sequence that is genuinely thrilling."

[83] Soon after the film's release, Walt Disney allowed his characters to appear in fire prevention public service campaigns.

[citation needed] Bambi had previously been the Forest Service's advertising icon beginning in 1942, but was only allowed by Disney to use the character for a year.

[citation needed] On January 28, 2020, it was announced that a photorealistic CGI feature-length remake is in development with a script co-written by Geneva Robertson-Dworet and Lindsey Beer.

Disney also argued that if the claimed 1923 publication date was accurate, then the copyright renewal filed in 1954 had been registered after the deadline and was thus invalid.