Waltz with Bashir is a stunning exploration of war, memory, and the disturbingly subjective nature of truth. It’s one of the few films that can claim to be both a documentary and an animated feature, and it uses both forms to a superb end.
The film opens with an animated Ari Folman, the writer/director/star, having a drink with an old friend from the Israeli Defense Force during the war with Lebanon in the early ’80s. His friend tells him of a recurring dream in which exactly 26 vicious dogs rampage through the streets on their way to devour him. The pack seeks revenge because of an incident in which he had to kill 26 Palestinian watchdogs so as not to be detected during night patrols. This exchange leads Folman to realize that he has almost no memories from that time. In an effort to piece together what happened and how he was involved, he begins to talk to others who were there.
A conversation early in the film strays from foggy war stories and onto the topic of memory itself. A friend tells Folman about a study in which 8 out of 10 people, when showed an photograph of a fair that has been digitally altered to include themselves as a child, will claim to remember the event, even though the memory is entirely false. It’s a strange point to make at the beginning of a film which is ostensibly about reconstructing memories to arrive at a clearer picture of the truth. Ultimately, Folman’s inclusion of that bit of pop psychology is a key step in helping it rise above films with similar subject matter. While the film does communicate a requisite amount of history, it’s really about the effect of war on soldiers, civilians, and how the sketchy nature of memory plays a role.
Watching the film, I couldn’t help but think of it as a cross between Richard Linklater’s Waking Life and Steven Spielberg’s Schindler’s List. I do not mean to accuse of Folman of making a knock-off of either film, Waltz with Bashir is nothing if not unique. But there are striking parallels in the flowing, roto-scoped dreamscapes of Linklater’s film. Animation allows Folman to control the image to a breathtaking degree, while keeping everything one step away from reality. It might be truth, but we can’t forget that it’s an artist’s interpretation, a memory, a dream.
As the realities of a brutal massacre come to light, an interviewee points out that Folman’s memory of the event can’t help but be influenced by his knowledge of his own parents’ experiences in Auschwitz. The parallel to Schindler’s List is not simply a mingling of subject matter, but rather the way both films probe the murky question of how humanity reacts (or doesn’t react) in the face of inhuman cruelty. While Spielberg’s film approaches this subject in classic, high-drama Hollywood style, Folman’s animation allows him to illustrate, quite literally, that war is always an inhuman act.
The Carpetbagger has posted the nine semi-finalists for the Best Foreign Film Oscar Nomination. Comparing this list to the list of 67 films submitted for consideration by their countries of origin, the only real notable omission I can spot is Italy’s Gomorrah; I’ve sen some bloggy chatter already lamenting the exclusion of Let the Right One In, but that film was passed over for submission by its home country of Sweden in favor of Everlasting Moments (which did make the shortlist). The full list, with links to the films we’ve covered (as you’ll see, we have a lot of catching up to do), after the jump.
