I was about 7 months pregnant with Jeri when Disney re-released Bambi to local theatres again. It was showing in a little theatre in downtown Berkeley. Bambi and Dumbo were two of my very favorite movies when I was a kid and I had to go to see it. Problem was, Walt didn't want to go to a kiddie matinee.
So I stood in line chatting with the little kid in front of me so people might think I was there with her and not a very pregnant woman going to see a kiddie matinee alone. The theatre was full and I was the only person there without a child in tow. I decided it was Jeri's first movie, even though she couldn't see it yet (which may explain why, when she had her own room, she chose to cover the walls with deer wallpaper!).
I swear Bambi can make me cry at the credits, or could then (especially since I was always more weepy, if possible, when I was pregnant than when not pregnant). I loved seeing the movie again and left the theatre with red-rimmed eyes and hoping people wouldn't notice that my nose had taken on the appearance of an Irish alcoholic.
Those were the days before video recorders and definitely before the days that we had a video recorder. Even when VHS machines came out and we finally bought one, movies on tape were more expensive and you had to be very selective in what you paid full price for (unlike my trip to the Dollar Store the other day, where I found a DVD of three episodes of The Loretta Young show for only 50 cents!)
But as time passed, I started recording my favorite movies and occasionally splurging movies on tape as well.
I think Bambi was the first Disney movie I bought on tape. I bought it for me, though the kids may have watched it. I remembered that kiddie matinee and was happy to know that I could finally actually own the movie and watch it whenever I wanted, without having to pretend that I was with some other little kid in line (though, of course, by that time I had my own little kids to take to a movie house that might be showing a Disney film.)
Over time, I bought other Disney movies that were favorites of mine -- Dumbo, Pinocchio, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, and, when it was finally released, Fantasia, though I think I bought that more for Gilbert than for me.
Our kids grew up and beyond the age when they enjoyed Disney movies. And, in fact, I don't know that I remember them ever watching those videos, though they may have.
But at some point, as the kids got into their teens, I made a decision to plan ahead for our grandchildren. I would get a Disney library on tape so that when they all came to visit me there would be lots of movies I could share with them (because I would have lots of grandkids and they would all live close enough that they could pop around several times a week, or I could fill in as a babysitter when necessary).
Who could have predicted video games would become more popular than old fashioned Disney movies?
Who could have predicted that it would take so long to have one grandchild.
Who could have predicted DVDs?
At Christmas time I was looking over Laurel's Amazon wish list (which is mostly things that she'd like to have for Brianna), and I noted that, not surprisingly, Laurel's tastes in Disney paralleled my own (with newer Disney movies on the list as well). I realized that the chance of Brianna ever being in this house long enough to watch one movie, much less my library was slight.
I was also in the mood to clear stuff out of a cabinet, so I wrote to Tom and told him that I had this whole library of Disney movies and asked if he would like me to bring them down to them when we went down at Christmas time.
He told me they had just gotten rid of all of their VHS tapes and their VHS player and that they were an all-DVD house now.
So much for planning ahead.
I think while Walt is gone I'll fix a big bowl of popcorn and just gorge myself on all those unwatched Disney movies. Someone should watch them at least once!
(happy birthday, David...)
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