History TearJerker / Bambi

** The build up is ''agonizing'' to sit through. First, the music. Then the voice actress for Bambi's mother delivers the perfect amount of dread and desperation: "Bambi... Quick! The thicket!!". Then they both run but Bambi's mother sounds especially frantic as she lags behind, like she knows she was too late to notice the danger. We hear the chilling shot and see Bambi make it to the den. He calls out relieved to his mother...only to realize she isn't there. The film drags on for almost a full minute of Bambi searching for her, with him audibly sobbing by the time the Great Prince finds him and breaks the news. A chilling moment of silence occurs as the realization hits Bambi, and a SingleTear is shed as the somber music rises again.

* Minutes before Bambi's mother is killed. Bambi and Thumper just finished playing out in the snow and ice skating on a frozen lake. Thumper suddenly gets extremely nervous telling the fawn that he better return home. While it's due to Thumper scared of upsetting his mother, it's that small moment that perfectly sets up the tone for one of animation's most heartbreaking moments.
--->'''Thumper:''' (meekly) I better go home now.

* [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vKBhiSXwLC4 A deleted scene]] based heavily on a part of the original novel had a spoken dialogue between two worn leaves ready to fall in Winter. Their conversation very much eludes to a loving elderly couple coming to the end of their lives, and after they say their goodbyes, they blow and fall off the tree, their forms completely silhouetted and lifeless. Only the shot of them coming loose, falling off, and landing together on the ground remained in the film.
** In the novel, only one leaf blows off, leaving the other alone, so Disney at least let them be TogetherInDeath.
* Meta: Frank Churchill, Walt's long-time composer responsible for the film's music, took his own life months before its release.

* What arguably makes it even worse is that Man, who is treated as one of the [[UltimateEvil biggest dangers the forest animals will ever face]], likely never spared a second thought to what kind of impact he makes. While hunters in cartoons are usually portrayed as [[EgomaniacHunter assholes]] [[HumansKillWantonly who just kill because they enjoy it]], the hunter(s) in this movie never appear onscreen, and probably fall under ObliviouslyEvil rather than EgomaniacHunter.

** The soundtrack version of the scene, known as ''Tragedy in the Meadow'' has a heartbreaking GutPunch of its own. From the start, it’s mostly just the musical score as you would expect, but as the hunter’s theme comes into play and you begin recalling the scene from memory, with dread rising from your very soul as you wonder with mounting horror if you are also going to be able to recognise the moment Bambi’s mother dies. Then something happens that makes you flinch and you understand that you never even had to try, for you have just heard a sound that made your heart stop cold. Disney left the fatal gunshot in the soundtrack.

*** When the Great Prince tells Bambi to come with him, we see Bambi looking back for a moment before following his father. That moment there symbolize the end of his childhood and innocence. Apparently this was exactly what Disney was going for with that scene.

* Meta: Frank Churchill, who composed the music for the movie, took his own life months before its release.

* [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vKBhiSXwLC4 A deleted scene]] based heavily on a part of the original novel had a spoken dialogue between two worn leaves ready to fall in Winter. Their conversation very much eludes to a loving elderly couple coming to the end of their lives, and after they say their goodbyes, they blow and fall off the tree, their forms completely silhouetted and lifeless.

** The build up is ''agonising'' to sit through. First, the music. Then the voice actress for Bambi's mother delivers the perfect amount of dread and desperation: "Bambi... Quick! The thicket!!". Then they both run but Bambi's mother sounds especially frantic as she lags behind, like she knows she was too late to notice the danger. We hear the chilling shot and see Bambi make it to the den. He calls out relieved to his mother...only to realise she isn't there. The film drags on for almost a full minute of Bambi searching for her, with him audibly sobbing by the time the Great Prince finds him and breaks the news. A chilling moment of silence occurs as the realisation hits Bambi, and a SingleTear is shed as the somber music rises again.

** Something that makes it more heartbreaking but is almost never talked about: in the DVD bonus features, it’s pointed out this is the only scene where the music stops. Considering how almost the entire movie has only a few seconds of silence, it speaks volumes about that scene that it’s the only one with more then a few seconds of silence.

* The death of Bambi's mother is one of the most iconic tear-jerker scenes in Western animation, along with Mufasa's death in ''Disney/TheLionKing''. It traumatized ''a '''lot''''' of children and jokes about the scene are often met with cries of "DudeNotFunny". Creator/StevenSpielberg even recalled in his childhood waking up in the middle of the night and going to his parents' room to check if they were both still alive.

** [[Disney/BambiII The midquel]] adds to the heartbreak in hindsight, by establishing that Bambi and even the Great Prince suffered heavy emotional scars from losing her for quite a while.

** Unless you take into account a deleted scene from ''Film/WhoFramedRogerRabbit'' revealing that Judge Doom is the hunter. Or the appearance of the mother's head on Gaston's wall in ''Disney/BeautyAndTheBeast''.

** The build up is ''agonising'' to sit through. We hear the chilling shot and see Bambi make it to the den. He calls out relieved to his mother...only to realise she isn't there. The film drags on for almost a full minute of Bambi searching for her, with him audibly sobbing by the time the Great Prince finds him and breaks the news. A chilling moment of silence occurs as the realisation hits Bambi, and a SingleTear is shed as the somber music rises again.