waltz with bashir
waltz with bashir n. d. , waltz with bashir, available from urltoken accessed 18 july 2016 .
“waltz with bashir” isn’t the first israeli film to screen in an arab country .
waltz with bashir (2008) dvd recording, sony picture classics, new york. (also holds making of documentary “surreal soldiers: making ‘waltz with bashir’”) .
' war is like a really bad acid trip'... waltz with bashir
[ 4 ] while imbd labels both waltz with bashir and persepolis as biography, they both only identify waltz with bashir as a documentary and persepolis instead as a drama .
german - born composer max richter rounds off waltz with bashir' s tour de force with a nomination for best soundtrack .
waltz with bashir. dir: ari folman 2008. source: sharmill films. all rights reserved .
[ 6 ] steven aoun, “waltz with bashir” metro 163 (2009): 148 - 152 .
israeli soldiers in
waltz with bashir ,
an animated documentary by ari folman on the 1982 lebanon war .
looking for movie tickets? enter your location to see which movie theaters are playing waltz with bashir near you .
director ari folman tells joe strike all about the animation techniques and deeper meaning behind his acclaimed waltz with bashir .
the new animated documentary “waltz with bashir” raises some interesting points about interviewees and effectively portraying the truth in documentary films .
fox, stuart. “waltz with bashir. ” scientific american mind 20, no. 1 (2009): 69
sony pictures classics (2008) waltz with bashir presskit, available from: urltoken >. accessed 18 july 2016 .
we decided to attribute the grand prize to waltz with bashir because we believe it is a very... more
this entry was posted in jacqueline ristola - recreating reality: waltz with bashir, persepolis, and the documentary genre, volume 11 and tagged animated documentary, distribution, documentary, genre, persepolis, waltz with bashir. bookmark the permalink .
“waltz with bashir” meets that criteria by simple virtue of its israeli origin. lebanon and israel are still officially at war .
esther j. (2009) “waltz with bashir: an interview with ari folman, ” cinéaste, 34 (2): p. 67 .
ari folman' s animated waltz with bashir reconstructs the director' s suppressed memories of a 1982 battle — and a massacre .
mubi uk 2012, waltz with bashir – trailer, youtube video, september 13. available from urltoken accessed 18 july 2016 .
sony pictures classics (2008) waltz with bashir, youtube video, december 19. available from urltoken accessed 18 july 2016 .
mccurdy, kate. “waltz with bashir. ” dg magazine. 2008. http: / / urltoken, 23 oct 09. 1
when israeli filmmaker ari folman set out to make the animated documentary waltz with bashir, his father warned him not to do it .
“waltz with bashir” — the title conveys israel’s alliance with lebanon’s christian leader at the time, bashir gemayel — mixes documentary and animation to depict the trauma of an israeli invasion 26 years ago to expel palestinian guerrillas .
folman made
waltz with bashir
first as a 90 - minute video featuring interviews of his friends and soldiers also beset with nightmares and problems remembering that time .
“waltz with bashir” is a memoir, a history lesson, a combat picture, a piece of investigative journalism and an altogether amazing film .
js: they' re part of a licensing juggernaut. you' re submitting waltz with bashir for oscar consideration; any thoughts about competing with $ 9. 99 ?
local critics have also drawn parallels with israeli director ari folman' s 2008 animation
waltz with bashir ,
which won a golden globe and earned an oscar nomination .
“waltz with bashir” is rated r (under 17 requires accompanying parent or adult guardian). it has graphic violence, sex and brief nudity .
but he’s already decided against using the same tools that animated waltz with bashir. “we’re trying to invent something new now, ” he says .
stewart, garrett. “screen memory in waltz with bashir. ” film quarterly 63, no. 3 (2010): 58 - 62 .
[ 18 ] garrett stewart, “screen memory in waltz with bashir. ” film quarterly 63, no. 3 (2010): 58 .
from the opening scene, in which a pack of wild, vicious dogs rampage through a city street, it’s quite clear that waltz with bashir isn’t a typical animated feature. first shot as a documentary with three dvcams, and then painstakingly transformed into animation, waltz with bashir also defies easy categorization as an animated feature .
burgin, alice. “guilt, history and memory: another perspective on waltz with bashir. ” metro 164 (2010): 70 - 74 .
mccurdy, kate. “waltz with bashir. ” dg design network (dec. 2008), urltoken (accessed dec. 12, 2010) .
[ 10 ] alice burgin, “guilt, history and memory: another perspective on waltz with bashir. ” metro 164 (2010): 72 .
rottentomatoes. com. (n. d .). waltz with bashir. [ online ] available from: urltoken. accessed 21 october 2016 .
israeli film researcher raya morag said palestinian criticism that “waltz with bashir” was one - sided was natural, given that it represented folman’s point of view .
[ 4 ] kate mccurdy, “waltz with bashir. ” dg design network, dec. 2008, urltoken (accessed dec. 12, 2010) .
bradshaw, p. (2008) waltz with bashir. the guardian, 21 november. 2008, available from: urltoken. accessed 18 july 2016 .
imdb. (n. d .). waltz with bashir (2008). [ online ] available from: urltoken accessed 21 oct. 2016 .
( waltz with bashir turns) the recollections and re - enactments of the war into visually stunning works of art (and) will leave you utterly devastated .
according to production notes, “waltz with bashir took four years from the moment research began until the final cut. ” research was conducted and testimonies were gathered .
first of all, the israeli leadership didn’t just “waltz with bashir. ” it first deliberately inflamed and then brought in the phalangist militia to carry out the killings .
beirut — lebanese auds have finally been able to “waltz with bashir” despite the fact that israeli helmer ari folman’s oscar - nommed pic is officially banned in the country .
it can be argued that this doesn’t matter. folman has told interviewers that waltz with bashir is an “antiwar” film. why must it deal with anything that isn’t necessary for it to make its point ?
unusual in that it takes the form of an animated documentary ,
waltz with bashir
is also the first feature - length israeli animated film produced in several decades .
from npr news, this is all things considered. i' m robert siegel. israeli filmmaker ari folman has made a remarkable documentary called
waltz with bashir .
gross: ari folman directed the new animated documentary
waltz with bashir .
you can download podcasts of our show on our web site, freshair. npr. org .
folman a. , polonsky, d. and goodman, y. (2008) surreal soldiers: making “waltz with bashir”. available from: urltoken accessed 22 october 2016 .
siegel: i heard the art director of
waltz with bashir ,
your colleague, say that animation - one advantage of animation was also to appeal to young audiences .
war is hell. movies from all quiet on the western front to platoon have told us this much, vividly and brutally. so to note that waltz with bashir concerns the impact of the first lebanon war on young men with the israeli defense forces (idf) might lead you to wonder if the film has anything new to say. but waltz with bashir is nothing if not innovative .
israeli director ari folman poses with his award for best foreign language film for
waltz with bashir
at the 14th annual critics' choice awards in santa monica, california january 8, 2009. reuters / danny moloshok
sadly, i haven’t seen enough of the winners to do justice though. i’m glad “waltz with bashir” didn’t win. i was not a fan. the best foreign language doco (if you can even call “bashir” that) was “up the yangtze” .
harsin, jayson. “the responsible dream: on ari folman’s waltz with bashir. ” bright lights film journal 63 (2009), urltoken (accessed june 20, 2011) .
siegel: ari folman' s animated documentary
waltz with bashir
opened in new york and los angeles yesterday. you' re listening to all things considered from npr news .
like folman' s
waltz with bashir
before it ,
lebanon
will not be screened in the tiny mediterranean country due to a national policy of boycotting israeli products .
few residents of sabra / shatila have seen
waltz with bashir
yet, but the movie has sparked curiosity due to its sympathetic portrayal of the palestinian victims of the massacre .
israeli filmmaker ari folman' s
waltz with bashir
has been nominated in four categories at the upcoming european film awards, the academy announced in seville, spain on sunday .
but
waltz with bashir
– the title refers to an israeli - allied lebanese christian militia leader – has struck a chord in a country that has never fully come to terms with its 16 - year civil war .
ari folman' s animated waltz with bashir reconstructs the director' s suppressed memories of a 1982 battle — and a massacre. ari folman / david polonsky / sony pictures classics hide caption
despite the official lebanese ban on israeli movies, residents of the country got a one - time opportunity to watch ari folman' s animated documentary
waltz with bashir
last week .
waltz with bashir, israeli film - maker ari folman' s oscar - nominated film about the horrors of the 1982 lebanon war, has been shown in beirut for the first time .
[ 25 ] jayson harsin, “the responsible dream: on ari folman’s waltz with bashir. ” bright lights film journal 63 (2009), urltoken (accessed june 20, 2011) .
glenn: i’m so with you on the counterfeiters. and while i’m not all that keen on waltz with bashir either, i still think it would’ve made a better winner than departures. (the class rules all, though. )
waltz with bashir is a production of bridgit folman film gang (israel), les film d & apos; ici (france) and razor film produktion (germany), in co - production with arte france and itvs international .
such a style is not necessarily a weakness. for instance, persepolis, a recent animated film with which waltz with bashir is often compared, also represents the first - person, expressionistically - told story of a young person trying to come to grips with overpowering historical events (in that case, the 1979 iranian revolution and its highjacking by the islamic regime). but while persepolis both illuminates the events it recounts and endows them with universality, waltz with bashir often tends to reduce them to personal trauma .
gross: my guest is ari folman, his new movie ,
waltz with bashir ,
is an animated documentary. we' ll talk more after a break. this is fresh air .
gross: my guest is ari folman. his new movie ,
waltz with bashir ,
is an animated documentary. we' ll talk more after a break. this is fresh air .
waltz with bashir
is an animated documentary that follows director ari folman' s memories from the 1982 lebanon war, and in particular the massacre in the sabra and shatila palestinian refugee camps .
1. wall - e 2. milk 3. the dark knight 4. waltz with bashir 5. gomorrah 6. wendy & lucy 7. trouble with watter 8. happy go lucky 9. man on wire 10. tropic thunder
yosef, raz. “war fantasies: memory, trauma and ethics in ari folman’s waltz with bashir. ” journal of modern jewish studies 9, no. 3 (2010): 311 - 26 .
[ 9 ] raz yosef, “war fantasies: memory, trauma and ethics in ari folman’s waltz with bashir. ” journal of modern jewish studies 9, no. 3 (2010): 321 .
waltz with bashir, directed by ari folman, is an animated documentary that deals with the 1982 sabra and shatila massacre in war - torn lebanon. one night in september 1982, christian militia members invaded refugee camps in the heart of beirut and massacred more than three thousand palestinians while israeli soldiers surrounded the area. ari folman was one of these soldiers. waltz with bashir is folman & apos; s attempt to decipher the horror of that night .
gross: and the bashir is bashir gemayel, who was the head of the christian phalangist militia and as the person - as the soldier you' re describing as just, you know, circling and circling, shooting at whatever, that waltz that you described - there' s pictures of bashir gemayel all around him .
waltz with bashir is based on ari folman' s experiences as a young israeli defense force solider on duty in a beirut refugee camp during a massacre. all images © 2008, courtesy of sony pictures classics .
he always envisioned
waltz with bashir
as an animated film, especially because it focuses on dreams, fantasy and loss of memory .
animation gave me the freedom to do it ,
he says .
best director: reshef levi, “lost islands”; ronit and shlomi elkabetz, “the seven days”; ari folman, “waltz with bashir”; marco carmel, “like your father”; and eran riklis, “lemon tree. ”
besides dominating most critics' top ten lists for the past year, both
waltz with bashir
and
slumdog millionaire
have another ominous commonality. just as
slumdog
s popularity was eerily prescient of the global attention that shifted to mumbai in december, so does
waltz with bashir
place a militant israel in the minds of viewers who will undoubtedly walk out of the theaters only to be assaulted with a barrage of headlines documenting the current violence in gaza .
we decided to attribute the grand prize to waltz with bashir because we believe it is a very important film, a film which provokes a very strong impact on the audience while inventing a new cinematographic language. the jury was particularly impressed with the intelligence with which dreamlike visions interact with historical facts and the use of the music as part of the narration .
[ ii ] for a more detailed discussion on the animation process behind waltz with bashir, you may wish to read kate mccurdy’s article on the film in full at dg magazine’s website: urltoken, 23 oct 09 .
israel has made some incredible and thoughtful movies. and most of all ones that one wants to watch over and over. real, and interesting content. waltz with bashir is all of the above. only society like israel could make movies that are sure to strike a nerve like bashir with such style and depth. please keep them coming israel .
dancing with memory, massacre in' bashir' filmmaker ari folman was a 19 - year - old israeli soldier serving in beirut at the time of the 1982 massacre of palestinian refuges. though he has no memory of the time, he revisits the mission in his new film, waltz with bashir, a surreal, animated documentary of the terror .
the first thing to appear in waltz with bashir is an animated dog, but it looks nothing like bolt. this' toon is part of an angry pack of yelping, yellow - eyed predators — a nightmare vision .
during the four years it took to make the israeli - animated documentary
waltz with bashir ,
writer - director - producer ari folman never had time to consider whether his uniquely stylized film would play outside his country .
the oscar - nominated movie “waltz with bashir. ” depicts israel’s invasion of lebanon in 1982. the director was a conscript in the israeli army during that conflict. the israelis were fighting palestinian guerillas who were using lebanon as a base for attacks on israel. the movie’s title is a reference to the lebanese christian leader at the time, bashir gemayel – an israeli ally – and it ends with the massacre of hundreds of palestinians by bashir’s militia .
gross: my guest is ari folman. his new movie ,
waltz with bashir ,
is an animated documentary about trying to reconstruct his suppressed memories of being one of the israeli soldiers that invaded lebanon in 1982. your movie ,
waltz with bashir ,
has shown at film festivals. it' s already opened in israel. it' s about to open in the united states. have you been getting different reactions in different countries ?
' waltz with bashir': a delicate dance with memory ari folman' s animated memoir explores the legacy — for a soldier and for his comrades — of israel' s 1982 incursion into lebanon, which eventually led to the massacre of refugees at the sabra and shatila camps .
jerusalem (reuters) - you can’t see “waltz with bashir” legally in lebanon but you can buy copies of the oscar - nominated israeli anti - war film in beirut’s hamra district where director ari folman saw his life change 26 years ago .
gross: i' d like you to leave us with an image from your movie ,
waltz with bashir ,
and it' s the image that the title of the film is taken from. can you describe that image as it' s described to you in the film ?
the graphic - novel version of waltz with bashir will be released in the u. s. in january. in the meantime, folman and his bridgit folman film gang are at work on an adaptation of stanislav lem’s sci - fi novel the futurological congress. the film, says folman, will be “mostly animated, ” and he hopes to double his animation team and turn the movie around in three years, rather than the four years it took to make waltz with bashir .
waltz with bashir uses a unique animation style invented by yoni goodman at the bridgit folman film gang studio in israel. the technique takes real video, and maps it out so it can be converted into hand drawings and then into traditional animation .
the look of waltz with bashir is what is most arresting. it' s a deep, multi - plane style of animation that incorporates photo - real settings, realistic renderings of the people and under - animated movement, especially of faces .
waltz with bashir is a movie starring ari folman, ron ben - yishai, and ronny dayag. an israeli film director interviews fellow veterans of the 1982 invasion of lebanon to reconstruct his own memories of his term of service in that conflict .
1. the wrestler 2. frost / nixon 3. man on wire 4. waltz with bashir 5. wall - e 6. the curious case of benjamin button 7. frozen river 8. milk 9. paranoid park 10. iron man
produced on a lean budget of $ 1. 5 million ,
waltz with bashir ,
which opened christmas day, was accomplished by just eight animators - - two were brought on near the end of the project - - and four illustrators, with david polonsky doing 80% of the designs .
if anyone still harbors doubts as to whether animation can be used to tell a serious - minded story and not simply to entertain children on a saturday morning, that questioning soul need look no further than waltz with bashir to witness just how effective the medium can be at dealing with mature issues with sincerity and reverence. even if a soldier manages... read more
satrapi’s austere style is similar to folman’s simplified naturalism, but its flattening effect creates a stronger distancing effect than waltz with bashir. as eitzen (1995) reminds us, “the form of the text can prompt viewers to ‘frame’ it in a particular way” (p. 91). the aesthetic forms of each film function differently, as waltz with bashir’ s simplified naturalism strives for a more realistic approach while persepolis ’s flattened aesthetics create a stronger distance between the art and audience, partially explaining the different receptions to the texts .
inspired by actual events, waltz with bashir chronicles one man' s descent into his own half - forgotten past. filmmaker ari folman, an israeli veteran of the first lebanon war, encounters an old friend suffering from nightmares of the conflict. ari begins to wonder why his own memories are full of gaps. in an effort to uncover the truth, he reconnects with old friends and dares to confront the horrors of war. hailed as
innovative
and
devastating ,
waltz with bashir fuses animation and documentary to create an experience unlike anything you' ve ever witnessed .
it is with a notable silence that yojiro takita’s “departures” – best known to many of you as that film that beat “waltz with bashir” to the best foreign language film oscar – slipped onto u. s. screens last week. of course, there are various reasons for the lack of hoop - la surrounding its release .
[ 7 ] stuart fox, “waltz with bashir, ” scientific american mind 20, no. 1 (2009): 69; david ansen, “waltz with bashir, ” newsweek 152, no. 23 (2008): 60; joan dupont, “ari folman’s journey into a heart of darkness, ” the new york times, may 19, 2008, urltoken (accessed june 24, 2011); ali jafaar, “a soldier’s tale, ” sight and sound 18, no. 12 (2008): 28 - 31 .
the animated film, waltz with bashir, “uses a unique animation style invented by yoni goodman at the bridgit folman film gang studio in israel. the technique takes real video, and maps it out so it can be converted into hand drawings and then into traditional animation .
if folman doesn' t consider lebanese or palestinian viewpoints on the war, he does progress from individual anguishes to general horror. the movie ends, boldly and disturbingly, with the sabra and shatila massacres, finally switching from animation to documentary footage. ultimately, waltz with bashir' s nightmares are everyone' s. (recommended )
so, this is the title of the film ,
waltz with bashir .
and the other meaning of the title, the symbolic meaning, and this is the relationship between the israelis and their allies, the christian militia, that was kind of a dance we did with them that ended up in a very tragic way .
waltz with bashir is a powerful and deeply human meditation, first on individual responsibility and ethics — especially when faced with the consequences of an individual acting within the constraints of an institution, in this case the israeli army. it is as old as sophocles’ antigone. at what point should one stop taking orders in the hierarchy or stop going along with the norms of the group — intervene? refuse ?
this focus on the experiences of idf veterans may bring grumbles from some of israel' s critics. isn' t waltz with bashir asking us, however artfully, to sympathise with the invaders of 1982, not the invaded - to somehow see the idf, rather than the lebanese and palestinians of beirut, as the victims of that war ?
a sullen looking animated soldier is israel’s best chance for the central prize, the palme d’or, at this year’s cannes international film festival. waltz with bashir will compete against 19 other films made by some of the world’s most accomplished directors, including hollywood heavyweights clint eastwood and steven soderbergh .
perhaps the most surprising frame of the entire movie is one of the very last: a fleeting acknowledgment of support from israel' s culture ministry and film board. folman says that when waltz with bashir has played at festivals in cities around the world, local israeli embassies have embraced it .
you can read israeli newspapers on the web, see israeli politicians interviewed on al arabiya, and buy [ former israeli prime minister ] ariel sharon' s autobiography in beirut bookshops. but you can' t show a film like' waltz with bashir,'
says mr. slim .
the film is structured like a conventional documentary, with folman visiting old army friends and piecing together what they saw and remember. the freedom of animation allows him to visualize what they tell him - - even their nightmares. the title refers to an israeli soldier losing it and firing all around himself on a street papered with posters of the just - assassinated lebanese president bashir gemayel - - thus, waltzing with bashir .
filmmaker ari folman was a 19 - year - old israeli soldier serving in beirut at the time of the 1982 massacre of palestinian refuges. though he has no memory of the time, he revisits the mission in his new film, waltz with bashir, a surreal, animated documentary of the terror .
best picture: “lost islands, ” directed by reshef levy; “the seven days, ” directed by ronit elkabetz and shlomi elkabetz; “waltz with bashir, ” directed by ari folman; “like your father, ” directed by marco carmel; and “out of the blue, ” directed by igal burtsyn .
waltz with bashir is an animated documentary (possibly made out of guilt) that artfully accounts the filmmaker' s forgotten, but haunting memory of the 1982 lebanon war, sabra and shatila massacre. ugly history presented with irresistible creativity and charm. a strong and powerful work that explores the psychological trauma by warfare. the god - awful screams at the end are haunting .
waltz with bashir’s opening is a remarkable one — twenty - six wild dogs bounding down the street, frothing at the mouth, trampling everything in their path, but also passing some humans by and fixing on a particular target to tree. it is disturbing, moving, and also a kind of symbolic foreshadowing .
from the beginning, folman saw waltz with bashir as an animated feature, drawing inspiration from graphic novels - - many coming out of post - war bosnia .
if you look at this film ,
he says ,
with [ its ] lost memory, dreams, war - - which is pretty surreal - - there is no other way to tell this story .
3d glasses were the amazingly effective gimmick of the year' s best concert film, u2 - 3d. in the documentary pray the devil back to hell, african women band together to stop abuse and torture in liberia. the israeli documentary waltz with bashir uses animation to explore israel' s 1982 invasion of lebanon .
4. “waltz with bashir” — israeli writer - director ari folman breaks all the rules with his animated documentary, which is exhilarating in its creativity. you’ve never seen anything like it: folman reconstructs the hazy memories of his time as a young soldier at war in 1980s lebanon by visiting friends and then animating their talks. the result looks like a graphic novel brought brilliantly to life .
waltz with bashir’s official selection at cannes is just the latest in a series of prestigious festival successes for the israeli film industry in the past half decade. these include last year’s first prize award by the film sweet mud at the sundance international film festival and a best foreign film oscar nomination for another lebanon - themed movie, beaufort .
folman' s own long - suppressed recollections of the lebanon war were triggered by sessions with an army psychiatrist, which are required of soldiers leaving the israeli reserves. so it' s understandable that waltz with bashir plays as a psychological exercise as much as a political one. the movie doesn' t pretend to answer all the war' s lingering questions. it' s only about the israeli veterans, what they did and saw and how they lived with the memories .
waltz with bashir
tells the story of a former israeli soldier struggling to recall his repressed memories of israel' s 1982 invasion of lebanon. it ends with the bloody massacre of palestinians in the sabra / shatila refugee camp by israeli - allied christian militiamen. no one knows exactly how many people died during the three - day killing spree – estimates vary between 400 and more than 2, 000 .
this idea of the translation of the real, however, does not sit easily with the fact that so many scenes involve shots that could only have been animated. the animator has considerable freedom because animation is “penetrative, ” insofar as it can show any events and states that are visually conceivable, which separates it from film, video and photography because the latter are concretely linked to a visual field that exists independently of the camera. [ 20 ] although waltz with bashir relies on the interview structure, the filmmaker has not simply linked a character voiceover to existing footage but rather created images to perform this role. this creative flexibility explains why animation was always the intended format, as yoni goodman the director of animation on waltz with bashir states :
beirut — lebanese auds have finally been able to “waltz with bashir” despite the fact that israeli helmer ari folman’s oscar - nommed pic is officially banned in the country. umam, an org that archives lebanon’s history and war memory through written and audiovisual materials, screened the film at its cultural center, a restored warehouse in a [ … ]
in israel, “waltz with bashir” is considered an anti - war movie. but in lebanon, the film is banned. pirated dvds of the movie are available, though. and one beirut resident, german - born monika borgmann, managed to acquire a copy from a german distributor. she recently organized a private screening in the city .
the aesthetic qualities of each film are partially what distances many from calling persepolis a documentary. drawn in simple, black and white imagery reminiscent of wood block prints, persepolis eschews the sense of simple naturalism waltz with bashir displays. evelyn hielkema describes the aesthetics exhibited in both the film and its graphic novel source material, noting that the film employs
filmmaker reflects on' waltz with bashir' reception although ari folman' s father warned him not to create the animated film about israeli involvement in a massacre during the 1982 lebanon war, the filmmaker did so anyway, in part to dissuade teenagers from going to war. to folman' s surprise, it was embraced by the israeli government .
“it only presents part of the truth, not the whole truth. it is as if the director is saying, ‘we (israelis) did not commit this crime, the phalangists did, ’” said ziad moussa, a retired teacher in the west bank city of ramallah where “waltz with bashir” was screened at the franco - german cultural centre .
twenty - five years later, folman, now an israeli film director, has made an animated movie about his lebanese experience called waltz with bashir. a moderate success in israel, it has done extraordinarily well abroad. it has won the british independent films award for best foreign film of 2008; the los angeles film critics award and the national society of film critics award for best animated film of 2008; the 2009 golden globes award for best foreign film; and the 2009 directors guild of america’s outstanding directional achievement award. and the best of the best may be yet to come, for as i write, waltz with bashir is also an oscar finalist in the best foreign film category .
my guess (readers of commentary will know if i am right by the time they read this) is that waltz with bashir will win its oscar. what doubts i had were dispelled the other day by watching international tv coverage of the fighting in gaza. images, images. and how balanced they were. here dead palestinian children in jabalya—and here a hole in the wall of a home in sderot. waltz with bashir will win because it is a perfect opportunity to be similarly balanced. what terrible things israel has done—and how wonderful it is to have souls sensitive enough to admit it. a country that knows its chopin can’t be all bad. my friend tells me it’s opus 64 .
waltz with bashir returns to the traumatic space of the first lebanon war to position the protagonist as victim and redeem him from his tribulations. the horrifying archival images of slaughtered palestinian men, women and children at the end of the film are then detached from their historical and political context and provide a kind of catharsis for the protagonist. [ 26 ]
the less charitable explanation, of course, is that the film isn’t terribly good. pleasant, certainly, and executed with commendable sincerity, but swaddled in the kind of safe, maudlin cinematic cotton - wool that never threatens any real danger, despite the potentially macabre directions the material could go in. it’s a cozy piece of work that doesn’t dare approach “waltz with bashir” for formal invention or “the class” for storytelling verve .
once folman completed editing the video version of
bashir ,
he, polonsky and director of animation yoni goodman broke it into storyboards .
waltz with bashir (hebrew: ואלס עם באשיר) is a 2008 israeli animated documentary film written and directed by ari folman. based on actual events, it depicts folman in search of his lost memories and experiences as a 19 - year old israeli defense forces infantryman during the 1982 lebanon war and the sabra and shatila massacres. (full description: urltoken )
for best film
waltz with bashir
will compete against
il divo
( paolo sorrentino, italy )
gomorrah
( matteo garrone, italy) ,
the orphanage
( juan antonio bayona, spain) and
the class
( laurent cantet, france) ,
happy - go - lucky
( mike leigh, britain) .
“waltz with bashir embodies itvs international’s mission to bring independently produced documentaries telling often unknown, and yet vitally important, stories to audiences around the world, ” said sally jo fifer, itvs president and ceo. “we are so proud that the academy has agreed that this film is worthy of one of the industry’s highest honors—both for the quality of the film and for the untold history it shares with the world in such a unique way. ”
in lebanon, “waltz” is banned under laws that forbid trade with israel. but there is huge interest, said monika borgmann, who acquired a copy from a german distributor and organised a private screening in beirut in january .
just as several other contemporary documentarians have done, folman set out on a quest for the truth, with himself on camera as the protagonist. however, unlike others, folman turned to animation, the most unreal form of filmmaking - - but one perfectly suited to fill in the missing pieces of an emotional jigsaw puzzle. the result is waltz with bashir, a citizen kane - style recounting of folman' s search and what he discovered. the animated feature is replete with phantasmagorical imagery and surreal dream sequences; the film opens with an unsettling depiction of his friend' s canine nightmare. the movie' s overall look and feel is dreamlike in its own right, thanks to a unique combination of conventional, flash and cg animation together with a carefully chosen color palette and bold character design. for the first time, two israeli animated features have qualified for oscar consideration in the same year: waltz with bashir and $ 9. 99. and thanks to strong critical buzz, folman' s film stands a good chance of getting nominated .
israeli troops then surrounded sabra and shatila as part of a “mop - up” operation on what israeli authorities described as “empty” camps. after bashir’s assassination, the phalangist militiamen howled for vengeance. in an earlier scene, when a patrol is pinned down by sniper fire from the beachfront towers, an israeli officer grabs a heavy machine gun and performs a long, wild waltz in the middle of the street, with his weapon as his partner, bullets hitting all around him and giant posters of bashir on the walls behind him. the phalangists are bloodthirsty dogs, bashir is their icon, and israel – and folman in particular – went insane and danced with them. that’s the memory that’s been more than this ex - soldier could stand .
the memories folman once blotted out do come back to him, until they can’t be stopped — until, in fact, they come into horrifying view, the actual images exactly as upsetting as they’re meant to be. by then, though, waltz with bashir has transcended the definitions? of ”cartoon” or ”war documentary” to be? classified as its own brilliant invention. a
this nomination is the latest in a long line of accolades, nominations and awards for the critically acclaimed film. earlier this month, waltz with bashir was named best foreign language film at the 66th annual golden globe awards. that prestigious award came just days after its win for the film as best foreign language film at 14th annual broadcast film critics association’s critics’ choice awards .
' waltz with bashir
is a devastating animated film that tries to reconstruct how and why thousands of innocent civilians were massacred because those with the power to stop them took no action. why they did not act is hard to say. did they not see? not realize? not draw fateful conclusions? in any event, at the film' s end, the animation gives way to newsreel footage of the dead, whose death is inescapable .
sivan concludes by stating that “you were cast in the role of nazi against your will”. the characters provide a justification for a lack of agency and responsibility because of the over - determining history of the holocaust. such explanations for inaction can be connected with the way in which the animation in waltz with bashir severs intention from movement, creating a logic of determinism that is both part of the documentary’s seductive power, and part of its problematic politics .
ari folman, the director, served with the israeli army in lebanon in 1982 and it was his unit that fired the flares that illuminated sabra / shatila .
waltz with bashir
depicts mr. folman' s personal struggle to come to terms with his experiences from 26 years ago in lebanon. the movie won the palme d' or at the cannes film festival, then received a golden globe award, and was the favorite for the foreign film academy award. it lost out to the japanese film
departures .
the film was honored with a golden globe this sunday for best foreign film .
the film’s title is as important as it is enigmatic at first. early on, folman’s youthful self is told “bashir' s been killed. you’ll be in lebanon in a few hours” – and he is. during much of the film the viewer is as lost as folman. who the hell is bashir, and what did his death have to do with folman ?
in the end, everything is a matter of context. the trouble with waltz with bashir is that it has none. it is all images and no commentary. or rather, the little commentary it provides, like that of the tv news, is entirely image - driven. folman’s film is a child of our times, which likes its visual bites, like its sound bites, to be compact. we do not have the patience for history .
instead of being banned or otherwise attacked, waltz with bashir has been embraced by much (although not all) of zionist society and the government itself, currently run by sharon’s appointed successor. although surprised, folman understands why. the facts as they are presented in his film are “not controversial in israel, ” he said in a uk interview (november 20, 2008, audio file at filmdetail. com). like the knesset commission, the film admits that israel waltzed with bashir but tends to put the worst blame on “goyim, ” covering up the full story, and, most of all, why it happened. its israeli critics are concerned with the film’s effect abroad .
both persepolis and waltz with bashir have their creators consciously crafting their own images and identities, reenacting various traumas through the medium of animation to process the memories for the filmmaker and the audience. as animators become actors through the creation of the character performances (wells 1998, p. 107), so too do the artists behind animated documentaries, with the films (including setting, characters, and voice acting) serving as a performance of the real world .
following the film, we will welcome from jerusalem ram rahat - goodman, longtime activist with the israeli refusenik organization yesh gvul (there is a limit). attendance is free and first come, first serve. seats are limited! if you don’t want to take your chances and would like to reserve a place, contact amnesty international concordia at info @ urltoken. (facebook event page: urltoken “free film screening: waltz with bashir, a lebanon war story” )
it might smack a little of filmmaking as therapy, but folman relates the stories of those he interviews back to his own journey with respect and care. and it’s important to emphasise such respect: when you’re dealing with sensitive truths, with stories of men being ordered to fire into darkness with no idea of why they’re doing it; of the ‘waltz’ of the title, danced by one idf soldier while firing down a beirut street, then animation hardly seems the most ‘respectful’ medium .
in fact, israeli writer - director ari folman' s powerful, innovative film is composed largely of nightmares, all but the final one rendered in graphic - novel style. a series of flashbacks from israel' s 1982 invasion of lebanon, waltz with bashir has been called an
animated documentary .
yet it' s not about what happened, but what' s remembered .
could waltz with bashir move israeli hearts and minds so intensely that it prevents a future war? none involved thinks so .
cinema doesn' t change the world ,
they say. but for those who where there, they have performed a service .
none of us spoke about this war ,
says folman .
i' ve tried to open things up .
while the film uses some documentary conventions, it is the distribution, particularly the american distribution, that firmly frames the film as an animated documentary, which has a traceable history. while the main website (http: / / waltzwithbashir. com) for the film never once uses the term “animated documentary, ” trailers help frame the veracity of waltz with bashir. the u. s. (sony pictures classics 2008) and uk (mubi uk 2012) trailers both emphasize the factuality of the events depicted, with “based on actual events” and “based on a true story” appearing at the beginnings of each trailer, respectively. the american press release kit (sony pictures classics 2008) positions the film as an animated documentary, quoting folman as saying that “waltz with bashir was always meant to be an animated documentary” (p. 4, emphasis in original). press kits developed and distributed by sony picture classics frame waltz with bashir as an animated documentary, a position that circulates through reportage to shape audience genre expectations. these expectations are necessary to “ (1) both standardize and differentiate products, and (2) market movies to many individuals” (staiger 1997, p. 10). film critics, in creating reportage around the film, channel distributor’s descriptions and labels, further situating waltz with bashir as an animated documentary among audiences. as a. o. scott’s coverage illustrates, film critics at the time found the term animated documentary to be “a phrase that sounds at first like a cinematic oxymoron” (2008, p. 1), but dutifully replicated the framework presented by the distributors of animated documentary in their reviews .
but the lebanese daily a - safir, which is sympathetic towards hezbollah guerrillas with whom israel fought a war in 2006, said “waltz” was simply an attempt by folman to “purge his personal memory” of its ugly recollections of the 1982 offensive .
it’s important to show israeli films because this demonization is not useful at all. in the end, everybody has at one point to live together in this region. and i believe that at least understanding the so - called “other” could be a step against this demonization .
adds borgmann, on why she thinks people in lebanon should see the israeli movie, “waltz with bashir. ”
the final two slots go to ari folman’s critically - feted animated doc “waltz with bashir, ” which recounts israel’s ill - fated invasion of lebanon in 1982; and ronit elkabetz and shlomi elkabetz’s “the seven days, ” about a moroccan family mourning the loss of a family member during the first gulf war. the latter pic won the wolgin award at the jerusalem film festival on july 19 .
writer / director ari folman' s waltz with bashir is something audiences may not seen before: an animated documentary. in the film, folman tries to piece together the gaps in his memory from serving in the israeli defense force during the lebanon war in 1982. and though the images are animated, their power and meaning remain intact, and the conflict' s full destruction is on display .
since it was shown in cannes last year, “waltz with bashir” has attracted a lot of attention and a measure of controversy, some of it surrounding the very last moments of the film, in which the animation stops and the audience is confronted with graphic, horrifying images of real dead bodies. this ending shows just how far mr. folman is prepared to go, not in the service of shock for its own sake, but rather in his pursuit of clarity and truth .
the message of the futility of war has rarely been painted with such bold strokes .
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a vivid film fails to grapple with the torturous complexities of the 1982 lebanon war .
while waltz with bashir does push some boundaries of the documentary genre through its use of animation and voice - over work, such efforts are largely undone by its final scene as the film drifts further into expositional documentary tropes. after folman finally understands the hallucinatory dream that haunts him as a revenant of his experiences and complicity in the sabra and shatila massacre, we are then confronted with live action archival recording of the massacre’s aftermath, acting as the bearer of the historical reality. by showing folman’s realization through live action footage, the film ultimately reasserts the status quo that live action footage is the realm of documentary, and that animation does not have such a claim to the real. waltz with bashir ’s animated portions present us with subjective truths of folman’s friends, and the results are captivating. this embracing of subjectivity is, however, swept away with the reinstallation of live action footage, presented as objective truth as seen in “the expository mode of documentary [ that ] emphasizes the impression of objectivity” (nichols 2010, p. 169). the final shot of the film lingers on the face of a dead child pinned between rubble, confirming the image as described by an animated talking head earlier in the film. by the film’s end, waltz with bashir reifies traditional, expositional documentary tropes, not only through the live action indexical footage being the bearer of truth and reality, but also through dependence of expositional documentary tropes to assure the audience of its veracity.
waltz with bashir ( hebrew : ואלס עם באשיר , translit . vals im bashir ) is a 2008 israeli animated war documentary film written and directed by ari folman . it depicts folman in search of his lost memories of his experience as a soldier in the 1982 lebanon war . this film and $ 9.99 , also released in 2008 , are the first israeli animated feature-length films released theatrically since alina and yoram gross 's ba'al hahalomot ( 1962 ) . waltz with bashir premiered at the 2008 cannes film festival where it entered the competition for the palme d'or , and since then has won and been nominated for many additional important awards while receiving wide acclaim from critics . it won a golden globe award for best foreign language film , an nsfc award for best film , a césar award for best foreign film and an ida award for feature documentary , and was nominated for an academy award for best foreign language film , a bafta award for best film not in the english language and an annie award for best animated feature . the film is officially banned in lebanon . 
waltz with bashir (hebrew: ואלס עם באשיר, translit. vals im bashir) is a 2008 israeli animated war documentary film written and directed by ari folman. it depicts folman in search of his lost memories of his experience as a soldier in the 1982 lebanon war. this film and $ 9.99, also released in 2008, are the first israeli animated feature-length films released theatrically since alina and yoram gross's ba'al hahalomot (1962). waltz with bashir premiered at the 2008 cannes film festival where it entered the competition for the palme d'or, and since then has won and been nominated for many additional important awards while receiving wide acclaim from critics. it won a golden globe award for best foreign language film, an nsfc award for best film, a césar award for best foreign film and an ida award for feature documentary, and was nominated for an academy award for best foreign language film, a bafta award for best film not in the english language and an annie award for best animated feature. the film is officially banned in lebanon.
waltz with bashir (hebrew: ואלס עם באשיר, translit. vals im bashir) is a 2008 israeli animated war documentary film written and directed by ari folman. it depicts folman in search of his lost memories of his experience as a soldier in the 1982 lebanon war. this film and $ 9.99, also released in 2008, are the first israeli animated feature-length films released theatrically since alina and yoram gross's ba'al hahalomot (1962). waltz with bashir premiered at the 2008 cannes film festival where it entered the competition for the palme d'or, and since then has won and been nominated for many additional important awards while receiving wide acclaim from critics. it won a golden globe award for best foreign language film, an nsfc award for best film, a césar award for best foreign film and an ida award for feature documentary, and was nominated for an academy award for best foreign language film, a bafta award for best film not in the english language and an annie award for best animated feature. the film is officially banned in lebanon.