Animated documentary about a Sabra and Shatila massacre attracting Cannes glory
An animated documentary about a massacre in the Middle East is the current frontrunner to win the coveted Palme d'Or prize at the Cannes Film Festival.
Waltz with Bashir is a daring and provocative attempt by director Ari Folman to bear witness to an atrocity committed during his stint in the Israeli army in 1982.
The invasion of Lebanon, codenamed Operation Peace for Galilee, was an attempt to occupy the country as far as the capital Beirut.
It ended in what many think of as the worst atrocity of the entire Arab-Israeli conflict, when at least 800 Palestinian civilians were massacred at the Sabra and Shatila refugee camps during Israel's invasion.
They were murdered by Lebanese Christian militiamen allied to Israel while the Israeli forces encircled the camps.
Folman was among them. His film is a personal journey with his own narration accompanied, unusually, by animated images.
The director says he had blanked the massacre from his memory until he started making the film.
"I think more than ever that I was used. We were all used - cynically used," he says.
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Waltz with Bashir is a daring and provocative attempt by director Ari Folman to bear witness to an atrocity committed during his stint in the Israeli army in 1982.
The invasion of Lebanon, codenamed Operation Peace for Galilee, was an attempt to occupy the country as far as the capital Beirut.
It ended in what many think of as the worst atrocity of the entire Arab-Israeli conflict, when at least 800 Palestinian civilians were massacred at the Sabra and Shatila refugee camps during Israel's invasion.
They were murdered by Lebanese Christian militiamen allied to Israel while the Israeli forces encircled the camps.
Folman was among them. His film is a personal journey with his own narration accompanied, unusually, by animated images.
The director says he had blanked the massacre from his memory until he started making the film.
"I think more than ever that I was used. We were all used - cynically used," he says.