A pack of snarling stray dogs bounds down city streets, saliva dripping from their bared fangs. At first there are only a few of them. Then more join, until there must be twenty or thirty. Cars swerve to avoid them. Mothers shrink back and shield their children from the sight of the beasts. What do they represent? Are they the dogs of war, sweeping through the streets, heralding coming battles and death? The pack arrives at an apartment building,. A lone man stands at a window, looks down at the dogs.
Cut to a bar in Israel. Filmmaker Ari Folman sits with a friend, who is describing a recurring dream. The dogs are a part of this dream. Each of the twenty-six dogs (for he knows that there are twenty-six) represents a dog that he shot during the 1982 Lebanon War, to stop it from alerting its masters. After listening to his friend's dream, Folman is hit by a strange realisation: he has no recollection of his own involvement in the war. He knows that he fought, that he was a part of the Israel Defense Forces; but he has no actual memories of the conflict.
So Folman sets out to recover them. He begins with a single image: it is night, he is wading in the sea, the cityscape is eerily let by flares. He tracks down the only other person he recognises from this image; and, from there, visits all his old friends, in an effort to reconstruct not only his own experience of the invasion, but a collective experience.
So Waltz with Bashir is a documentary. But it is no normal documentary. Instead of the usual talking heads and archive footage, it is entirely animated. (There are one or two talking head segments, but these, too, are animated.) Folman's style is stark, with ample use of noirish chiaroscuro that gives the film an almost expressionist feel. The relative realism of Folman's visits with his friends contrasts with the often surreal style and imagery of their accounts of the war. Waltz with Bashir owes more to Apocalypse Now than Saving Private Ryan.
The use of animation might seem odd to some, even pretentious. But given the harrowing subject matter, especially in the Sabra and Shatila massacre, it really drives home the horrors of war. It is reminiscent of Isao Takahata's Grave of the Fireflies (1988): both films use animation to portray the deeply disturbing effects of war. What is usually a medium for cutesy kids' stuff is used to show to the audience graphic images of violence and death. It is this incongruity that makes Waltz with Bashir all the more horrible.
It is also a deeply personal journey. Folman is Jewish, and in coming to terms with his involvement in what was essentially genocide, he is reminded of the Holocaust, an act of genocide through which he and his parents lived. Though he was not directly involved with the massacre in Lebanon, Folman is concerned that he may, in the words of one his friends, have "played the part of the Nazi".
The massacre was actually carried out by Christian Phalangists, while the Israel forces (Folman among them) watched on and lit flares, so that the Phalangists could see who to shoot. Neither the Israel forces nor the Phalangists are demonised, and it could be argued that Folman isn't critical enough. Indeed, several scenes go as far as almost implying that the IDF's brutality was merely the result of youthful folly a squad of soldiers fires round after round into a family car more out of fear than anything else. But the graphic and deeply saddened nature of the final scenes shows that Folman is on the side of neither the Israelis, nor the Phalangists, nor the Palestinians. He is one the side of humanity; and he, like us, prays that we can put an end to events like this.
Cut to a bar in Israel. Filmmaker Ari Folman sits with a friend, who is describing a recurring dream. The dogs are a part of this dream. Each of the twenty-six dogs (for he knows that there are twenty-six) represents a dog that he shot during the 1982 Lebanon War, to stop it from alerting its masters. After listening to his friend's dream, Folman is hit by a strange realisation: he has no recollection of his own involvement in the war. He knows that he fought, that he was a part of the Israel Defense Forces; but he has no actual memories of the conflict.
So Folman sets out to recover them. He begins with a single image: it is night, he is wading in the sea, the cityscape is eerily let by flares. He tracks down the only other person he recognises from this image; and, from there, visits all his old friends, in an effort to reconstruct not only his own experience of the invasion, but a collective experience.
So Waltz with Bashir is a documentary. But it is no normal documentary. Instead of the usual talking heads and archive footage, it is entirely animated. (There are one or two talking head segments, but these, too, are animated.) Folman's style is stark, with ample use of noirish chiaroscuro that gives the film an almost expressionist feel. The relative realism of Folman's visits with his friends contrasts with the often surreal style and imagery of their accounts of the war. Waltz with Bashir owes more to Apocalypse Now than Saving Private Ryan.
The use of animation might seem odd to some, even pretentious. But given the harrowing subject matter, especially in the Sabra and Shatila massacre, it really drives home the horrors of war. It is reminiscent of Isao Takahata's Grave of the Fireflies (1988): both films use animation to portray the deeply disturbing effects of war. What is usually a medium for cutesy kids' stuff is used to show to the audience graphic images of violence and death. It is this incongruity that makes Waltz with Bashir all the more horrible.
It is also a deeply personal journey. Folman is Jewish, and in coming to terms with his involvement in what was essentially genocide, he is reminded of the Holocaust, an act of genocide through which he and his parents lived. Though he was not directly involved with the massacre in Lebanon, Folman is concerned that he may, in the words of one his friends, have "played the part of the Nazi".
The massacre was actually carried out by Christian Phalangists, while the Israel forces (Folman among them) watched on and lit flares, so that the Phalangists could see who to shoot. Neither the Israel forces nor the Phalangists are demonised, and it could be argued that Folman isn't critical enough. Indeed, several scenes go as far as almost implying that the IDF's brutality was merely the result of youthful folly a squad of soldiers fires round after round into a family car more out of fear than anything else. But the graphic and deeply saddened nature of the final scenes shows that Folman is on the side of neither the Israelis, nor the Phalangists, nor the Palestinians. He is one the side of humanity; and he, like us, prays that we can put an end to events like this.