VIFF 08 | DAY EIGHT

By Adam Thomas

Thursday October 2, 2008

ONLY PICK: Waltz With Bashir


While there is a crazy-good South Korean revision of the Hansel and Gretel story as well as Jim Finn’s The Juche Idea, a revolutionary experimental documentary on North Korean leader Kim Jung-Il, we just can’t wait for Waltz With Bashir, the Israeli-German animated semi-autobiographical documentary about life during the first Lebanon war. There’s a powerful legacy of animated films that have tackled the theme of war and its devastating effect on the human soul. From the Japanese classics like Barefoot Gen and Grave of the Fireflies to Marjane Satrapi’s Persepolis, these films manage to somehow isolate the pain and confusion of life in a warzone through their animation. Ari Folman’s artful movie is no exception. The film is built from stories “drawn” from the memories of nine different young soldiers, and is as powerful an indictment of the savagery of war as you are likely to see on the screen this year. AOT


_{ONLY suggests…}


10:30 am – GR2 – The English Surgeon
12:00 pm – GR5 – What the Heart Craves
03:00 pm _ GR5 – Faubourg Treme: The Untold Story of New Orleans or p.174
03:45 pm – VCT – The ‘Thank You’ Girls
04:00 pm – GR7 – Romance of Astrea and Celadon or p.156
06:30 pm – GR7 – Hansel and Gretel or p.57
07:30 pm – GR2 – O’Horten
09:00 pm – GR4 – Growing Op or p.102
09:15 pm – GR3 – Serbis
09:30 pm – PCT – The Juche Idea or p.189
09:30 pm – GR7 – Waltz with Bashir


_{Location Guide: GR1,2,3,4,5,6,7=Granville 7 | VCT=Vancity Theatre | PCT=Pacific Cinematheque | RID=Ridge}

FINE