#20 – Bambi (1942)
Best Character: Friend Owl
Worst Character: Flower
Bambi is a very charming film about the life of a deer prince and his adventures in the forest as he grows into an adult. It’s basically the closest thing Disney has come to a nature documentary. Filled with beautiful, lush animation, Bambi does a fantastic job with the environment and character design. The animation is actually my favorite part of the film, and probably the biggest reason I have it ranked in the top 20.
As the film doesn’t have much of a plot, more of the weight is placed on the characters than usual. Bambi, Thumper and Flower are the three biggest names, but we hardly see anything from Flower. He seriously receives like five minutes of screen time throughout the entire film. Flower is another character that has been ruined for me from how overrated he is in the Disney contests. Also he’s not cute. Bam! I said it. Thumper on the other hand is actually a lot better than I remember. Well, at least when he’s young. He’s actually pretty cute when he’s young! Unfortunately he completely loses his charm when he ages. His voice does not match him at all, and he gets kind of boring. Bambi is the only of the three that I like throughout the entire film. He’s adorable when he’s young, and he’s likable when he’s older. I’m not sure we see a ton of development from really any of the characters, but at least Bambi is likable. The real star of the show however is none other than Friend Owl. I had not seen Bambi in many, many years before making this list, and I had completely forgotten about Friend Owl. In short, he’s hilarious. My favorite Friend Owl scene has got to be when the birds around him start to sing their song and Friend Owl just completely loses his temper, ruining their song in the process. He can be cranky and stern, but he’s also very nice and can always be counted on to look after the young prince.
There were times during this film that I thought I had stepped into the Willy Wonka universe. Once the crew of Bambi, Thumper and Flower are all grown up, we see them going off to do manly things in the forest or something. Then, one by one, a female critter pops up and hypnotizes Flower (who I could have sworn was gay), and then Thumper, and finally Bambi. It was kind of funny how they each found love in a line like that. The love sequences for Thumper and Flower were short, not to mention unbelievable in Flower’s case, but Bambi’s had a little more substance to it. Faline is actually a lot of fun, especially when they’re younger. And Bambi was so shy! Their introduction was a really cute scene, and I’m glad it was included into the film to give us a little bit of development between them.