Review of Waltz with Bashir (2008) by Tonypolito — 15 Aug 2010

The hypnotic & innovative animation plus the true-telling of first-hand soldiering accounts add up to interesting viewing of this, director Ari Folman's indictment of the Israeli Army for its massacre of Palestinian civilians - including women and children - during the 1982 invasion of Lebanon.

Twenty years later, a solider (Folman himself) has conveniently forgotten his own memories of the incident, then slowly recovers them through his inquiring of others what they recall. Implicit in that plotline is Folman's belief that many Israelis have also conveniently forgotten the incident, and that they ought be remembering it as well.

In latter dialogue, Folman draws overt parallels between this incident - in the Sabra and Shatila refugee camps - and Nazi evils in the Jewish camps, that especially shocking from a director who is Israeli.

The animation is reminiscent of darkly-themed comic books, filled with strong & unusual palettes that serve to hypnotize viewers. There's no Rotoscoping here; all art was sketched by hand off shoots, then each artwork was sliced into parts, moved about and photographed to create animation. The painstaking process creates a visually captivating experience - and one that intentionally misleads the viewer into a certain comfort, that what's seen is not entirely real.

When Folman finally removes that comfort and 'returns to reality,' the viewer's fully shocked into realization and acceptance, that what occurred was undeniably nothing less than a horrid atrocity.

The film's quite the antiwar antithesis to "Exodus" (1960); battles are seen from the disparaging infantryman's POV, battles that become evermore dysfunctional and pointless as the protagonist heads further up river toward the suppressed recollections that are his own Heart of Darkness.

RECOMMENDATION: Viewer interest may wane at points, especially at first where the pacing is slowest, but the film ultimately pays off. Worthy viewing.