I don't think I've ever seen anything quite like Waltz With Bashir, the fascinating Israeli film which has just opened in New York. The movie was produced, written and directed by Ari Folman, the main character of the film. The film is an animated account of how Folman tries to reconstruct his memories of the 1982 invasion of Lebanon since he discovers he has suppressed just where he was and what he saw. He is spurred to investigate his role in the invasion when a friend reveals a nightmare he has from something he did during the invasion. Folman then visits a number of actual people who add their fractured memories to the story.
The movie is a strong comment on what comprises a memory and how hard it is to distinguish what is real and what is imagined. One of Folman's strongest memories may actually be an invention of his mind but it is a beautiful image of soldiers emerging from an ocean swim into the light of a city at war. The use of the animation technique aids this sense of uncertainty since it lends even possibly true memories an air of the surreal. The animation also allows each memory to be beautifully and artistically portrayed which makes the overall film a wondrous thing to behold.
As the barriers of the brain start to break and more accurate, horrific memories start to pile up, the film starts to turn towards a focus on what did happen and what role each person may have played in the horrible events. The film ends a bit abruptly with some actual news images which, for better or worse, certainly jerks the audience out of the cocoon of the animated world and back into the reality behind the film. Those images at the end are certainly something that can not be forgotten - after reading the next day about what is currently happening in the Gaza, there was nothing I could do to shake them from my mind.
To get a better sense of what this animated/memory/war film really is, check out the trailer:
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