Bambi’s Father Dies
By Denis Campbell • Apr 22nd, 2008 • Category: Living Abroad
Yes, in the movie his Mom is shot by the hunter, but the real life creator and the last of Disney’s Nine Old Men died last week. Ollie Johnston, passed away at the age of 95. His creations are legend, and his book The Illusion of Life is considered an animator’s bible. He is credited with Bambi’s furry rabbit friend Thumper’s nervously tapping foot to making Pinnochio’s nose grow, to Smee, joyously serving Captain Hook’s every wish. A genuinely nice man, we had the pleasure of meeting him in 1996 when a friend arranged a tour of Disney’s animation studios where my then seven year old daughter held one of the many Oscars this group won in her hand from that period.
In this day of computer generated features where the worry is how to get animal fur to move with the wind, these old boys did OK with simple pen and ink.
One of my personal Ollie favourites was the delightful waiter penguins dancing with Dick van Dyke in Mary Poppins. An excellent dancer, the task of overlaying such perfect detail as four penguins repeating his every step, much to the delight of Julie Andrews, is a scene I remember from my childhood on the giant movie screen of Boston’s Music Hall Theatre in the 1960s.
I hope my own children develop an appreciation for the pioneers of this work now gone.
I raise a toast to Ollie along with: Les Clark (Lady and the Tramp); Frank Thomas (Prince John in Robin Hood), Woolie Retherman (directed all films after Walt died), John Lousenbery (created the father in Peter Pan), Eric Larson (Brer Rabbit and Brer Fox), Ward Kimball (The Mad Hatter in Alice in Wonderland), Milt Kahl (The tiger Sher Kahn in Jungle Book) and Marc Davis (Cruella DeVille from 101 Dalmations).
Walt has his team together again, I wonder what comes next?
Denis Campbell is a journalist, author and businessman.
From a farmhouse in South Wales overlooking the Irish Sea, he and his wife run Target Point Ltd, an EU-wide strategy firm working with global businesses across a dozen industries on clarifying and executing strategy and changing their culture and focus. As a businessman living in the EU for 10-years, writing was a passionate hobby. He began blogging in 2006 with a number of pieces examining the corrupt climate of deception in the billion dollar spiritual self-help industry and re-published collected business, political and lifestyle features published across the EU since 2001. It has since grown into The Vadimus Post, from the Latin Quo Vadimus – where are we headed? (…and do we know why?), a daily e-magazine for those wanting to dig deeper, learn more together and dialogue on the key issues of the day.
Thanks for visiting and feel free to let me know your thoughts and opinions.
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