Waltz With Bashir

Released: 5th June 2008

Directed By: Ari Folman

Starring: Ari Folman

Certificate: 18

Reviewed By: Samuel Wilson

The film follows the history made by one man, Ari Folman.

It begins in a bar, where an old friend of the writer and director; Air Folman, tells him about his recurring dream. Every night the same dream creeps up on him, where he is being chased through the streets by 26 blood thirsty dogs. Ari’s friend then explains that every night it contains the same amount of dogs and reaches the same climax. After their discussion they can only put it down to one thing, their involvement in the 1983 invasion of Lebanon where both man served their time.

Ari then realises he can’t remember anything from that period of his life. Intrigued by this he sets out on his journey to meet old friends and acquaintances that served with him during the war to discover the truth.

As we follow Ari on his voyage of discovery, he slowly beings to remember what happened during that period. With surreal flash backs, recorded conversations and mind blowing animation, we are taken on a journey through the destroyed streets of Lebanon, thrown straight back into the gun fights, ambushes and trekking that Ari himself was involved in and more importantly into Ari’s mind.

This film really captures you as a member of the audience and takes you back to that manic period in Lebanon’s past, where people were being assaulted in the streets and left for dead. The people that were entrusted to protect the public make their mark in the history books for doing the exact opposite.

Waltz With Bashir is filmed using a very unique technique that involves manipulating digital paintings and then painstakingly, turning these into a flash animation. These paintings were all drawn by David Polonsky whom has previously worked on ‘The Edge Of Joy’ 2010 and is currently working on ‘The Congress’ 2013]. David, normally a right handed painter actually chose to re-do all his original paintings with his left hand because ‘the originals were too pretty’ these were then manipulated with Flash animation. The Production team behind the film did shoot live footage, but they used it as references for the films storyboards.

Question – Add all this together and what do you get?

Answer – An amazing eye catching film that you will not forget in a hurry!

After winning countless awards including Best Director, Best Film, Best Cinematography around the world and also Best Foreign Independent Film by the British Independent Film Awards, this film never stops to grow in popularity and I personally can’t see it stopping. It was made in such a way that even 20 years from now it will still have the same attraction as it did the day it was released.

I would like to add a section in this review to talk about where I thought this film lacked in some way or could of been improved, I would like to, but I can’t! I can’t recommend this film enough. (did I mention I like it?…yeah pretty sure thats covered!)