WALTZ WITH BASHIR
(feature, animated documentary)Writer, Director, Producer
2008
Writer, Director, Producer
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2006
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"SATURDAYS & HOLIDAYS"
Israeli Academy Award Winner"Best Dramatic Series 2003"
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COMFORTABLY NUMB
Israeli Academy Award Winner"Best Documentary"
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Writer, Co-Director
Bio
In the mid 1980s, after completing his military service, Ari Folman ventured out on his dream trip to circle the world with a backpack. Just two weeks and two countries into the trip, Ari realized traveling was not for him, so he settled into small guesthouses in Southeast Asia and wrote letters to his friends at home, letters in which he totally fabricated the perfect trip. One whole year of being in one place and writing down the fruits of his fantastical imagination convinced him to return home and study cinema.
His graduate film, "Comfortably Numb" (1991) documented Ari’s close friends taking cover on the verge of anxiety attacks during the first Gulf war while Iraqi missiles landed all over Tel Aviv. The result was comical and absurd and the film won the Israeli Academy award for Best Documentary.
Between 1991-1996 Ari directed documentary specials for TV, mainly in the occupied territories. In 1996 he wrote and directed "Saint Clara", a feature film based on a novel by Czech author Pavel Kohout. The film won seven Israeli Academy awards, including Best Director and Best Film. "Saint Clara" opened the Berlin Film Festival’s Panorama and won the People’s Choice Award. The film was screened throughout America and Europe to critical acclaim. Ari continued directing successful documentary series and took time off for his second feature in 2001. "Made in Israel" is a futuristic fantasy that centers upon the pursuit of the world’s only remaining Nazi.
Ari has written for several successful Israeli TV series, including the award-winning "In Therapy" ("Be Tipul"), which was the basis for the new HBO series "In Treatment."
Ari made his initial attempt at animation in his series "The Material that Love is Made Of" – each episode opens with five minutes of documentary animation which depicts scientists presenting their theories on the evolution of love. This successful attempt at documentary animation propelled Ari to develop the unique format of "Waltz with Bashir". Based on a true story, the film is a quest into the director’s memory for the missing pieces from the days of the Lebanon War in the mid 80s. As far as Ari was concerned, it was only natural to transform the quest into animation, full of imagination and fantasy.
Interview
Did you start this project as an animated documentary?
Yes indeed. "Waltz With Bashir" was always meant to be an animated documentary. For a few years, I had the basic idea for the film in my mind but I was not happy at all to do it in real life video. How would that have looked like? A middleaged man being interviewed against a black background, telling stories that happened 25 years ago, without any archival footage to support them. That would have been SO BORING! Then I figured out it could be done only in animation with fantastic drawings. War is so surreal, and memory is so tricky that I thought I’d better go all along the memory journey with the help of very fine illustrators.
What came first - the desire to make a documentary or the desire to make an animated film?
It was always my intention to make an animated documentary. Since I had already made many documentaries before it was a real excitement going for an animated one. I made an experiment in my documentary TV series "The Material That Love Is Made Of". Each episode opened with a three-minute animated scene introducing scientists talking about the "science of LOVE". It was basic Flash animation, but it worked so well that I knew a feature length animated documentary would eventually work.
What can you tell us about the animation process used in the film?
"Waltz With Bashir" was made first as a real video based on a 90-page script. It was shot in a sound studio and cut as a 90-minute length video film. It was made into a story board, and then drawn with 2300 illustrations that were turned into animation.
The animation format was invented in our studio "Bridgit Folman Film Gang" by the director of animation Yoni Goodman. It’s a combination of Flash animation, classic animation and 3D. It’s important for me to make clear that by all means this film was not made by rotoscope animation, meaning that we did not illustrate and paint over the real video. We drew it again from scratch with the great talent of art director David Polonsky and his three assistants.
Is the film based on your actual personal experiences?
The story is my very personal experience. It follows what I went through from the moment I realized that there were some major parts in my life completely missing from my memory. I went through a major psychologic upheaval during the four years I worked on "Waltz With Bashir". I discovered a lot of heavy stuff regarding my past and meanwhile, during those years, my wife and I brought three kids into this world. This makes you wonder, maybe I am doing all this for my sons. When they grow up and watch the film, it might help them make the right decisions, meaning not to take part in any war, whatsoever.
Was the making of “Waltz With Bashir” therapeutic for you?
A journey trying to figure out a traumatic memory from the past is a commitment to long term therapy. My therapy lasted as long as the production of "Waltz With Bashir": four years. There was a shift from dark depression as a result of things discovered to being in euphoria over the film finally being in production with complicated animation being done by the team at a pace better than expected. If I was the type of guy who believes in the cult of psychotherapy, I’d swear the film had done miracles to my personality. But due to previous experience, I’d say the filmmaking part was good, but the therapy aspect sucked.
Are all the interviewees the actual people portraying themselves?
Seven out of the nine interviewees in the film are the actual people. They were interviewed and filmed in a sound studio. For personal reasons, Boaz (my friend who had the dream about the dogs) and Carmi (my friend living in the Netherlands) did not want to appear on camera, so they were played by actors. But their testimonies are real.
Are there others like you who have had similar experiences?
Of course. I am not alone out there. I believe that there are thousands of Israeli ex-soldiers that kept their war memories deeply repressed. They might live the rest of their lives like that, without anything ever happening. But it could always burst out one day, causing who knows what to happen to them. That's what Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder is all about.
What are your feelings about the Sabra and Shatila massacre today?
The same as I’ve always felt: it’s the worst thing that humankind can do to each other. One thing for sure is that the Christian Phalangist militiamen were fully responsible for the massacre. The Israeli soldiers had nothing to do with it. As for the Israeli government, only they know the extent of their responsibility. Only they know if they were informed or not in advance about the oncoming violent revenge.
And your feelings about war?
Having made “Waltz With Bashir” from the point of view of a common soldier, I've come to one conclusion: war is so useless that it's unbelievable. It's nothing like you've seen in American movies. No glam, no glory. Just very young men going nowhere, shooting at no one they know, getting shot by no one they know, then going home and trying to forget. Sometimes they can. Most of the time they cannot.