The Nazi's banned the book "Bambi."
It was translated into
English by Whittaker Chambers (who 20 years later was a chief accuser in
Nixon's part of the McCarthy hearings.)
The book was ultimately brought to Walt Disney's attention by novelist
Thomas Mann.
Disney's movie took five years to make. It contained just 900 spoken
words, and the
American Rifleman Association objected to the way hunters were
depicted. By this time the book's author, Felix Salten, had already sold
his rights, and made almost nothing from
the film. (His book also has a sequel called "Bambi's Children", and
in addition he wrote the book that Disney's "The Shaggy Dog" was based on.
)
Meanwhile, the child star who provided the voice of Bambi never worked on
another movie. Donnie Duggan joined the marines, taking bullets in his head,
stomach,
lung, and
leg, much of it during the Tet offensive. The Disney studio didn't
hear from him for decades, and assumed that he
was dead.
It wasn't until
last year that he
turned up in Texas.
63 years after Bambi, he'd lost much of his
life
savings in the Enron debacle...
The name "Bambi" comes from the Italian word for baby. ("Bambino")
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