Stunning animated film 'Waltz with Bashir' succeeds as a haunting memory of war

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    Animation might not immediately jump to mind as the ideal medium in which to tell a regretful and haunted war tome.  But thanks to dynamic new techniques and a story powerful enough to propel any live-action project, 'Waltz with Bashir' proves to be one of the most visually inventive and affecting war films since 'Saving Private Ryan'.  It paves new ground by addressing a chapter of Israeli history the people of that nation would like to forget, and it does so by following the quest of a veteran as he strives to remember.
    Writer/director Ari Filman also serves as the protagonist in this semi-documentary, tracking down old war buddies to piece back a section of his memory he has somehow lost.  A veteran of the First Lebanese War of the early 1980s, he is searching for the truth behind his role in and memory of the Sabra and Shatila massacre, where Israeli soldiers stood idly by as militants slaughtered thousands of Palestinian refugees.  He knows he was there, but he also knows that in order to fully learn from and come to grips with such a terrible incident, he must unlock the horrific memories in his mind.  His quest is also the quest of any people yearning to understand and atone for the tragic follies of the past.  Atonement comes first from remembrance and acknowledgment.  Ari has acknowledged the terribleness of what happened.  Now he needs to properly remember.
    The visuals on display are nothing short of dazzling, aided by refined animation techniques that make use of motion captured from real film.  Ari's friends from the war each tell their own tales, with each flashback adopting a dreamlike interpretation of events that is natural for memories too awful to explicitly recount.  The film's frequent forays into magical realism highlight the subjective and shifting nature of memory itself, leading the audience to observe accounts of a conflict through the same eyes of the people who lived it so many years ago; distanced by time, rattled by trauma, and molded by a human need to both romanticize and condemn the righteous sinfulness of war. 
    Folman gives each section of the film its own unique color palette and its own unique score, effectively building the awe and dread as we inexorably rumble toward the terrible day in question.  The music used is both beautifully affecting and subdued, reinforcing the power of visuals onscreen without overtaking them.   Of special note are a gorgeously rendered sequence involving a left behind soldier swimming into the ocean waves to make his way back to his unit, and a scene in which a lovely walk in an orchard is quickly turned into a bloody destruction of innocence.
    'Waltz with Bashir' has its faults.  This is likely a result of translation and and cultural divide, but the monotone nature of the narration does brag the drama a bit, at least to an American viewer.  The dull vocal tones do more to clash with the stunning filmmaking than reinforce the seriousness of the material.  Also, a deliberate decision to use actual footage of the massacre at the end is likely meant to snap the audience from the world of animation and remind them that this did indeed happen.  However the device just comes off as the only heavy-handed aspect of what is overall a remarkably restrained, contemplative, and non-political essay on war. 
    These issues aside, Folman's achievement is a significant one, both for the meager Israeli film industry and for war films in general.  Since the success and admitted greatness of 'Saving Private Ryan', war movies have chased the highest degree of realism possible, often without taking the time to properly examine what all those bullets and blood and expertly rendered sounds really meant to the minds and souls of the men who lived through them.  'Waltz with Bashir' makes these human effects of paramount importance, and uses the wonders of animation to affect rather than meticulously convey.  The world needs more films like this.