Featured Blu-ray Review: Bambi: Anniversary Edition
June 3, 2017
Bambi: Anniversary Edition - Buy from Amazon: Blu-ray Combo Pack
I previously reviewed Bambi when it first came out on Blu-ray in 2011. The film is an animated classic and was absolutely worth picking up then. However, are there enough new extras on the Anniversary Edition to be worth the upgrade? Or is it strictly for those who missed out the first time?
Like I said above, I previously reviewed and it was a Pick of the Week contender then, so there’s no need go into the quality of the movie now. If you don’t own it, and you are even remotely interested in animation, then you should buy the movie.
There are a few new extras, starting with Studio Stories: Bambi, a five-minute featurette that has audio of Walt Disney talking about different elements of the movie production, while we get to look at images, animatics, and even home movies of the animation process. There are seven minutes of deleted scenes, with optional introduction by Floyd Norman, a story artist who has worked at Disney for decades. The deleted scenes were on the previous Blu-ray, but the introductions are new. Africa Before Dark is a vintage short starring Oswald the Lucky Rabbit. The Bambi Effect is a short look at how the animals were more realistically animated, some trailblazing female animators, and the effects animation department. Finally, there’s Fawn Facts, which has some trivia about the real life animals featured in the movie.
The Blu-ray also comes with a digital code for the movie and that code includes an extra on Tyrus Wong, who was the lead artist on Bambi and who passed away last year at the age of 106. Unfortunately, since I’m Canadian, I can’t use the code for the digital version, so I can’t watch the extra. The Blu-ray does include a postcard-sized painting by Tyrus Wong.
There are plenty of old extras ported over, including the Inside Walt’s Story Meetings: Extended Edition, the picture-in-picture feature from the original Blu-ray. Technically it’s pseudo-picture-in-picture, as not every make and model of Blu-ray player handled true picture-in-picture well enough, so studios stopped using those features. Still, I’m glad they faked it here, as I really liked these extras.
If you don’t own Bambi on Blu-ray yet, then the Anniversary Edition is a must have. If you do already own the previous Blu-ray, then I’m not sure there are enough new extras here to be worth the upgrade. It is the first time the movie is being released digitally and the half-a-dozen new extras add some value, so its worth the approximately $20 to buy. It’s not a Pick of the Week contender, because it is a double-dip, but it is worth the price.
The Movie
The Extras
The Verdict
Filed under: Video Review, Walt Disney