FEER THE DEER

BAMBI BITES BACK IN A NEW HORROR REIMAGINING

- ROBBIE DUNLOP

BAMBI: THE RECKONING, the fourth instalment in Jagged Edge's Twisted Childhood Universe, eschews the campy fun of Winnie-The-Pooh: Blood And Honey 2 and the gory excesses of Peter Pan's Neverland Nightmare. Instead, it favours a moodier tone that reflects its source material, author Felix Salten's 1923 novel Bambi, A Life In The Woods.

“At the time of publication it was considered a horror book, in a way,” explains director Dan Allen. “It’s steeped in atmosphere and it’s very dark. And, of course, it’s sad at the same time,” he adds, referring to Bambi’s loss of his mother.

Allen, also the editor of Winnie-The-Pooh: Blood And Honey 2, was drawn to the project because he enjoys “soppy, sentimental stories. I love horror films that have real emotional hearts – films that challenge your characters emotionally as well as physically. So I was excited to make sure that this was that as well.”

Ultimately, he wanted to make a film about the death of childhood, which he believes is “incredibly pertinent” for a Twisted Childhood Universe movie. “So often, these films have been called ‘childhood killers’; I think that is a bit extreme. But to actually engage with it on a narrative level and have a movie that is thematically about the loss of innocence and the death of childhood makes this really quite faithful to the heart of it.