“He’s kinda wobbly.”

“Thumper, what did your father say to you this morning?”

“If you can’t say something nice to say, then don’t say nothin’ at all.” 

Poor Thumper. He means well. He really does. 

Intertwined in all the innocence of young life and discovery is a sense of fear and apprehension that bother me. There are quite a few scenes where Bambi gets separated from his mom that gets me in my soft spot each and every time.  And of course there’s the sadness I know is coming toward the end of the movie when, after running frantically from hunters, Bambi calls for his mother and she does not answer.  That’s the part that makes  me to not want to see it at all. It’s the same kind of sadness I know I will experience if I watched Dumbo or Old Yeller, which is why I have never seen either of them.  I know this sounds ridiculous, but, sadly, I am not immune from being ridiculous.  If you ask my husband, he’d tell you I am ridiculous on a regular basis. 

So, I try to steer my daughter to the movies I can handle. Like the Little Mermaid, Cinderella, or Mary Poppins.  Am I the only one who reactst this way to Bambi?

After seeing the movie I wanted to know more about the events and the movie. J. Michael Straczynski of Babylon 5 wrote the screenplay after researching the story of Christine Collins and the Wineville Chicken Coop Murders for a year. Almost every character in the film existed in real life, except for one or two who were composites. Straczynski wanted the credits to say the film was a true story instead of based on a true story, so he had to provide documentation to Universal’s lawyers for every scene in the movie

The film focuses on Christine Collins whose 9 year old son Walter disappears while she’s at work. A nation wide man hunt takes place. Five months later, the LA Police tell Mrs. Collins that a boy who says he is Walter is found in Dakalb, Illinois; however, when she is reunited with him, she is stunned to see that it’s not her son. The police encourage her to take the boy home anyway as a try out but as time goes on, she continues to insist he is not her son. What happens to Mrs. Collins because she insists this boy isn’t her son is shocking.

If you haven’t seen the film, I would highly recommend it, but keep in mind that if you’ve got kids, especially a boy around the age of the boys who were killed in 1928, you may find some scenes disturbing. I know I did.