At this point in 2020, it’s hard to think of a clever, catchy opening for an article about another Disney remake. We know they’re going to happen. We know they’ll make about a billion dollars each. We know they’ll kick off another round of hand-wringing as to whether this film should be classified as live-action or animation. And finally, we know that they will fade from the public spotlight with little fanfare. “Jungle Book” made $966 million in 2016 and it doesn’t even get to be part of the “Watch at Home” carousel on the Disney website.
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So it’s hardly surprising that Disney has its eyes on “Bambi” next. According to Variety, Disney has tapped its 1942 animated classic as the latest feature in the vault to receive the live-action-ish treatment. Whether you call it motion capture or animation, this new movie will be scripted by “Captain Marvel” screenwriter Geneva Robertson-Dworet and Lindsey Beer (who is attached to everything from a “Short Circuit” reboot to a “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles” reboot). No director as of yet, but that should come next.
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The upside of this, of course, is an upswing in interest in the original “Bambi,” as well as in the early days of Disney as a studio. Whether you love these new films or hate them, they open the door to opportunities to discuss these eras in Disney’s history, and those are conversations worth having. As for the remake itself? It’s tough to imagine we’ll look back on these films in a decade or two and view them as anything other than an attempt to monetize a trend. But if any Disney film would be the one to demonstrate the artistic value of these remakes – well, wouldn’t it be fitting if it were “Bambi”? That would certainly have a nice sense of symmetry.
