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Jules Engel - Color in 'Bambi'; animation as a non-naturalistic art form (20/95)

185 views · Published 20 July 2017 · 1:51 · Indexed 20 September 2026

Channel: Web of Stories - Life Stories of Remarkable People · 2017 · Film & Animation

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To listen to more of Jules Engel’s stories, go to the playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLVV0r6CmEsFxkaG0vffAILup4dNZ3FwO0

The late film-maker Jules Engel (1909-2003) was born in Hungary and later emigrated to America where he worked at the Walt Disney Studios on films that included ‘Bambi’ and ‘Fantasia’. After leaving Disney, Engel co-founded the United Productions of America Studios. [Listeners: Bill Moritz and Tamara Tracz; date recorded: 2003]

TRANSCRIPT: Primarily, primarily, my biggest involvement with 'Bambi' was colors. Because everything that I saw on 'Bambi' was painted like a natural, whatever. Natural, you know? And when I first brought in a pink or red or blue deers running, because they heard a shotgun go off. That was beautiful, it gave 'Bambi' another dimension, another presence. And I brought those colors in. Funny thing here is that no-one touched those colors because they always went to the natural. What the hell? When you're doing an animated film, you're already not natural, you're on other terrain. And a director, the person whose art is actually on Bambi, liked that. So when he saw my pink and red deers running for life, for their life, he thought that was good. It was good because there was a large sense of danger there. And the danger was heavy and big and you have the guns going off, you heard the guns going off. You should emphasize, you should push, you should be more inventive. So when the deers turned into these colors, that was a beautiful moment in the film. But again, it's, where are you going to stop? Or where are you going to above yesterday or above what was normal? There's nothing normal about animated film, you know? It's all invention but it's good invention. But that goes for all of the arts, to a degree.

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