Sadly not a lot of people will see this beautiful film. ‘Waltz with Bashir’ is on at Nouveau, it is a subtitled animated documentary that deals with war.

Director Ari Folman uses this animated feature film/documentary as a haunting confessional. He was a soldier during the First Lebanon War and was present during the massacres at the Sabra and Shatila refugee camps in West Beirut. He had no memory of it though and takes us along on his journey to try and remember where he was and how involved he was in what is today seen as genocide.

He interviews fellow soldiers, old friends, journalists and politicians. The actual interviews were not filmed though. Ari drew the subjects whilst interviewing and later animated them.

The film is a mixture of (all animated) interviews, dreams and stories as told by the different interviewees. From the opening dream sequence of 26 rabid dogs racing through the streets of Beirut to the final ‘real’ footage of the massacre, you are spellbound.

The brilliance of this film lies in the ‘lighting’, the way Ari uses shadows and rays of light to portray emotions. When an interviewee feels guilty he moves into the shadows. When Ari struggles to remember what happened whilst driving he moves in and out of the light of the streetlamps he passes. One of the most beautifully lit scenes is one ‘shot’ in an orchard when the soldiers are attacked by a child with an RPG missile launcher. To me the dappled light portrayed the fragility of life.

An utterly moving film.