--- title: Bambi: Read a 1942 Review of Classic Disney Animated Movie description: "Bambi is the star, but a puckish, toothy, yellow-nosed rabbit named Thumper almost hops off with the picture," the reviewer noted canonical: https://time.com/4882887/disney-bambi-movie-1942-review/ author: Lily Rothman article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2017-08-08T13:00:38.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-02-23T16:49:24.416Z article:section: History og:title: Read TIME's Original Review of 'Grade-A' 'Bambi' From 1942 og:description: The movie came out 75 years ago og:url: https://time.com/4882887/disney-bambi-movie-1942-review/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt848842b0f53144a9/6988d8b0e76ad2df4b62e9f6/bambi-1942.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: bambi-1942 og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Read TIME's Original Review of 'Grade-A' 'Bambi' From 1942 twitter:description: The movie came out 75 years ago twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt848842b0f53144a9/6988d8b0e76ad2df4b62e9f6/bambi-1942.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Read TIME's Original Review of 'Grade-A' _Bambi_ From 1942  by [Lily Rothman](https://time.com/author/lily-rothman/)  ## Lily Rothman Rothman is managing editor at TIME. Aug 8, 2017 1:00 PM UTC  A scene from 'Bambi' A scene from 'Bambi'Walt Disney Productions  by [Lily Rothman](https://time.com/author/lily-rothman/)  ## Lily Rothman Rothman is managing editor at TIME. Aug 8, 2017 1:00 PM UTC Coming from a man who had already changed the entire field of animation, it was high praise — but[ Walt Disney](http://time.com/4326360/walt-disney-world-war-ii-excerpt/) was feeling confident about _Bambi_. It was, TIME quoted him saying, “the best picture I have ever made, and the best ever to come out of Hollywood.” The film — which turns 75 on Tuesday, having premiered in the U.K. on Aug. 8, 1942, before opening in the U.S. later that month — was based on a [book](http://time.com/vault/issue/1928-07-23/page/32/) by the Austrian writer Felix Salten. Though the music from the movie hasn’t exactly entered the popular consciousness in the same way other Disney tunes have, the animation set a new standard, particularly as the first time the backdrops in an animated Disney feature had been done with oil paints rather than watercolor. The choice of a new medium gave _Bambi_ a palette of rich forest colors that made the flora almost as much a character as the fawn. But what really made the movie stand out was its characters, as TIME [noted](http://time.com/vault/issue/1942-08-24/page/76/) in its 1942 review of the movie: --- > “” --- The magazine didn’t quite agree with Disney that _Bambi_ was his best picture ever — it was good, the reviewer conceded, but his earlier work, which included _Fantasia_ and _Dumbo_, was better. But the critic singled out Peter Behn, who had voiced Thumper, as deserving all the praise he could get — and the studio too, for managing to have the boy actor record his lines before his voice changed. That was not an easy feat for a movie that took five years to make, thanks in part to the studio’s devoting[ three-quarters ](http://time.com/vault/issue/1942-06-08/page/60/)of its resources to making wartime shorts for the U.S. government. But perhaps the strongest proof of the movie’s impact could be found in the people who hated it. “Disney’s indictment of men who kill animals for sport is so effective that U.S. sportsmen who have seen the picture are gunning for him,” the original review noted. “They feel that Disney is undoing their lifework of conserving wild animals for future open seasons.” ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4882887/disney-bambi-movie-1942-review/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4882887/disney-bambi-movie-1942-review/"},"headline":"Read TIME's Original Review of 'Grade-A' Bambi From 1942","datePublished":"2017-08-08T13:00:38.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-23T16:49:24.416Z","description":"The movie came out 75 years ago","url":"https://time.com/4882887/disney-bambi-movie-1942-review/","keywords":["movies"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt848842b0f53144a9/6988d8b0e76ad2df4b62e9f6/bambi-1942.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Lily Rothman","jobTitle":"Rothman is managing editor at TIME.","url":"https://time.com/author/lily-rothman/"}],"articleSection":"History","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt848842b0f53144a9/6988d8b0e76ad2df4b62e9f6/bambi-1942.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"bambi-1942","caption":"A scene from 'Bambi'","creditText":"Walt Disney Productions","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/history/","name":"History"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/movies/","name":"movies"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4882887/disney-bambi-movie-1942-review/","name":"Read TIME's Original Review of 'Grade-A' Bambi From 1942"}}]}] ```