How to Define Waltz with Bashir: Animated Documentary or Animated Fiction, or Both?

This chapter looks at the form of Ari Folman's Waltz with Bashir and confirms whether it is an animated work of fiction or an animated documentary, or even both. It discusses how Waltz with Bashir was never originally promoted as a documentary and analyses the original Hebrew movie poster that simply gives the film's title, while the English language version says in small print 'based on a true story'. It also discloses how Waltz with Bashir has been praised for accurately portraying the more unreliable psychological state of the traumatised soldier through animated dreams and flashbacks. The chapter examines the distinction between how Waltz with Bashir was originally promoted and how it became to be defined as crucial. It points out how the viewer's expectations would have been different if Waltz with Bashir had been initially advertised as a documentary concerning Israel's role during the Sabra and Shatila massacres.