Waltz with Bashir Written, narrated and directed by Ari Folman

Waltz with Bashir What conventions of documentary are used in this film? How does the use of these conventions add meaning to the film? Narrator (participatory documentary) Interviews Re-enactments Archival footage

Waltz with Bashir What are the similarities in the narrative between Bowling for Columbine and Waltz with Bashir? Quest narrative – looking for answers Interviews work to build the story Narrator who is a character in the story Narrative built around a key event

Waltz with Bashir What disrupts Folman’s equilibrium and sets off the events which form the story of the film? How is this significant to developing the narrative? opening sequence

Let’s consider the opening scene... The surreal nature of the opening shot is punctuated by the pack of dogs racing through the street We are meant to find this scene disturbing because it somehow defies our expectations of reality It is only when the scene ends that we realize we have witnessed a dream

Dreams and Memory The first two scenes establish a link between dream and memory – Boaz shot 26 dogs in Lebanon and it is the same 26 dogs that haunt him in his dreams Recall that Ori, the therapist, explains to Ari that dreams are directly related to memory

Waltz with Bashir Parts of the film re-enact the dreams experienced by the young soldiers. - what are some of these dreams? - what do you think are the significance of these dreams for the film?

Recall the other dreams These scenes are visually similar to the opening These dreams relate to a traumatic memory Carmi’s experience on the boat, Ari’s experience at the massacre

Waltz with Bashir What are the key ideas that you got from watching this film? -History and memory (perception, truth??) -The impact of war on young soldiers To what extent are these ideas still relevant?

Mediated History Waltz With Bashir uses mediation in order to consider the slippery nature of memory and history As dreams bleed into memories, fiction bleeds into fact, and we are not sure where one ends and the other begins

Mediated History and Memory The dreams are not the only example repressed memory in the film Ari explains how he repressed the memory of the airport the moment when he first entered it, imagining a place full of opportunity and a chance to escape The truth is that he cannot escape his place in history Our minds modify our memory in order to construct narratives that we are comfortable with

Mediated History and Memory The “literal” waltz in the film is a memory that has become legend over time The film mythologizes the Waltz through the use of music and composition, putting into question what is real and what is fiction

Mediated History and Colour The film uses colour to represent the tenuous grip that Ari has on history The more he remembers, the more colour returns to his reminiscences

Mediated History and Scene The film also uses subtle visual cues to indicate the slippery nature of history Note the background in these two shots

Waltz with Bashir What is the denouement of this film? What meaning to do you take from the way this is shown? The denouement - the final scene

Waltz with Bashir To what extent do you think this film documents aspects of reality? Does the use of animation mean that the film is less “truthful”?

Interview with Folman

Waltz with Bashir, an animated documentary film charting the director’s quest to recover his lost memories of the 1982 massacres at the Palestinian refugee camps Sabra and Shatila in Beirut, Lebanon, has been released to international acclaim. The film presents itself, and has largely been received, as a soul- searching and honest account of a journey to face up to guilt and responsibility.

Waltz with Bashir But whose voices are not heard? The Palestinians

Waltz with Bashir An alternative reading That Israel launched a brutal offensive that led to the deaths of thousands of Lebanese and Palestinian civilians is apparently not relevant. With “politics” and the “background” rendered off-limits, we are left with something that is misleading and inane. Its principal message becomes “war sucks.” And why does war suck? Because it is traumatizing — principally for the soldiers.

Waltz with Bashir An alternative reading The question of who was doing whose dirty work is not so easily answered however Israel was nobody’s sidekick when it invaded Lebanon. The film does not show us the Israeli shelling of Beirut that led to 18,000 deaths and 30,000 wounded, the violations committed against civilians, the destruction of Palestinian and Lebanese resistance.

Waltz with Bashir An alternative reading As Folman and those he speaks with recount what happened when they were in Lebanon, there is a lot of “while they’re shooting at us from all directions,” “we are attacked, we retaliate.” There is no sense that Israel invaded Lebanon — the word “invasion” is barely used in the whole film. The soldiers are young men going off to war in fighting spirit, fantasizing about women, wondering at how to prove their masculinity, licking the wounds of being dumped by girlfriends.

Waltz with Bashir An alternative reading The young soldiers are singing songs with upbeat tunes and lyrics such as “Good morning Lebanon … you bleed to death in my arms,” “I bombed Sidon,” “I bombed Beirut, I bombed Beirut every day.” These lyrics are supposed to grate, but one nevertheless gets a sense of naive hapless kids who have no sense of the trauma that they are unwittingly walking into.

Waltz with Bashir An alternative reading One imagines that Folman would respond to the criticism that Israel’s role is not made clear in the film, that these hapless kids are also members of an invading army committing acts of aggression, by saying that this would be going into the realm of politics, and rather this is intended to be a human film.

A perspective on the massacre