Vals Im Bashir) is a 2008 Israeli adult animated war documentary film written, produced, and directed by Ari Folman.
It depicts Folman's search for lost memories of his experience as a soldier during the 1982 Lebanon War and the Sabra and Shatila massacre.
Subsequently, it received wide acclaim from critics and audiences alike, with particular praise given to its themes, animation, direction, story, Max Richter's score, and Nili Feller's editing, although it drew controversies in some Arab countries.
Ari is surprised to find that, although he had also fought in the conflict during his stint as an infantry soldier in the Israel Defense Forces, he recalls nothing of his deployment.
The friend further explains that, given the nature of human memory, the vision might not be an exact record of what actually occurred, though it certainly relates to matters of great importance to Ari's inner world.
Eventually, Ari's memories start to come back into focus, and he remembers that he "was in the second or third ring" of soldiers in the city, as his unit fired flares into the sky at night in support of the Israeli-allied Lebanese Christian Phalange militia while they perpetrated the massacre in retaliation for the assassination of Bachir Gemayel.
While he did not know what the militia was up to until after they were finished, he concludes that the holes in his memory were a defense mechanism, as his younger self had felt as responsible for the massacre as those who actually carried it out.
The film takes its title from a scene in which Shmuel Frenkel, one of the interviewees and the commander of Folman's infantry unit at the time of the film's events, grabs a general purpose machine gun and "dances an insane waltz" (to the tune of Chopin's Waltz in C-sharp minor) amid heavy enemy fire on a Beirut street festooned with huge posters of Bashir Gemayel.
It is unusual, as it is a feature-length documentary that, excluding one short segment of archival news footage at the end, consists entirely of animation.
[12] The comics medium, in particular Joe Sacco,[13] the novels Catch-22, The Adventures of Wesley Jackson, and Slaughterhouse-Five,[14] and painter Otto Dix,[15] were mentioned by Folman and art director David Polonsky as influences on the film.
[4] On review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds a 97% "fresh" rating based on reviews from 152 critics, for an average rating of 8.4/10; the site's "critics consensus" states: "A wholly innovative, original, and vital history lesson, with pioneering animation, Waltz With Bashir delivers its message about the Middle East in a mesmerizing fashion.
[5] Several writers described the film as part of the Israeli "shooting and crying" tradition (where soldiers express remorse about their actions, but do not do anything concrete to remedy the situation), but Folman has disputed this.
It received nominations for Annie and BAFTA Awards for Best Animated Feature, but lost to Kung Fu Panda and WALL-E, respectively.