The Diving Bell and the Butterfly

Director: Julian Schnabel Julian Schnabel

Overview

The astonishing true-life story of Jean-Dominic Bauby -- a man who held the world in his palm, lost everything to sudden paralysis at 43 years old, and somehow found the strength to rebound -- first touched the world in Bauby's best-selling autobiography The Diving Bell and the Butterfly (aka La Scaphandre et la Papillon), then in Jean-Jacques Beineix's half-hour 1997 documentary of Bauby at work, released under the same title, and, ten years after that, in this Cannes-selected docudrama, helmed by Julian Schnabel (Basquiat) and adapted from the memoir by Ronald Harwood (Cromwell). The Schnabel/Harwood picture follows Bauby's story to the letter -- his instantaneous descent from a wealthy and congenial playboy and the editor of French Elle, to a bed-bound, hospitalized stroke victim with an inactive brain stem that made it impossible for him to speak or move a muscle of his body. This prison, as it were, became a kind of "diving bell" for Bauby -- one with no means of escape. With the editor's mind unaffected, his only solace lay in the "butterfly" of his seemingly depthless fantasies and memories. Because of Bauby's physical restriction, he only possessed one channel for communication with the outside world: ocular activity. By moving his eyes and blinking, he not only began to interact again with the world around him, but -- astonishingly -- authored the said memoir via a code used to signify specific letters of the alphabet. In Schnabel's picture, Mathieu Amalric tackles the difficult role of Bauby; the film co-stars Emmanuelle Seigner, Marie-Jos?e Croze, Anne Consigny, and Patrick Chesnais.

Product Details

Release Date:	07/21/2015
UPC:	0031398221760
Original Release:	2007
Rating:	PG-13
Source:	LIONSGATE - 600000-AEC LGE
Region Code:	1
Presentation:	[Wide Screen]
Sound:	[Dolby Digital Stereo, Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround]
Language:	English
Time:	1:52:00
Sales rank:	47,464

Cast & Crew

Performance Credits

Mathieu Amalric	Jean-Dominique 'Jean Do' Bauby
Emmanuelle Seigner	Céline Desmoulin
Anne Consigny	Claude
Max von Sydow	Young Papinou,Actor
Patrick Chesnais	Doctor Lepage
Niels Arestrup	Roussin
Olatz Lopez Garmendia	Marie Lopez
Jean-Pierre Cassel	Father Lucien
Marina Hands	Joséphine
Isaach De Bankole	Laurent
Gerard Watkins	Doctor Cocheton,Actor
Théo Sampaio	Théophile
Fiorella Campanella	Céleste
Talina Boyaci	Hortense
Emma de Caunes	Empresse Eugénie
Jean-Philippe Écoffey	Noirtier de Villefort
Nicolas Le Riche	Actor
Anne Alvaro	Betty
Francoise Lebrun	Madame Bauby
Zinedine Soualem	Joubert
Georges Roche	Fourneau
Agathe De La Fontaine	Inès
Franck Victor	Paul
Laure de Clermont	Diane
Philippe Roux	Auxiliary Nurse
Elvis Polanski	Jean-Do as a Child
Sara Séguéla	Paraplegic at Lourdes
Marie Meyer	Model
Lenny Kravitz	Lenny Kravitz
Azzedine Alaia	Azzedine Alaia
Michael Wincott	Michael Wincott
Jean-Baptiste Mondino	Jean-Baptiste Mondino
Farida Khelfa	Farida Khelfa
Marie-Josée Croze	Henriette Roi,Actor
Nicholas Le Riche	Nijinski
Yves-Marie Coppin	Fisherman
François Delaive	Nurse
Daniel Lapostolle	Auxiliary Nurse 1
Francis Filloux	Night Nurse
Vasile Negru	Violinist
Ilze Bajare	Model
Anna Chyzh	Model
Antoine Breant	Jean-Baptiste Mondino's Assistant
Jean-Pierre Cassell	Actor
Lopez Garmendia	Actor
Paul Cantelon	Composer

Technical Credits

Ronald Harwood

Ronald Hardwood

Julian Schnabel	Director
Ronald Harwood	Screenwriter
Georges Demetreau	Special Effects
Jon Kilik	Producer
Kathleen Kennedy	Producer
Pascal Guegan	Stunts
Dominique Gaborieau	Sound/Sound Designer
Francis Wargnier	Sound Editor,Sound/Sound Designer
Jérôme Seydoux	Producer
Ronald Hardwood	Screenwriter
Pierre Grunstein	Producer,Executive Producer
Jim Lemley	Executive Producer
Pierre Frunstein	Executive Producer
Gérard Moulévrier	Casting
Jean-Paul Mugel	Sound/Sound Designer

Editorial Reviews

Julian Schnabel danced up to the edge of greatness in Basquiat and Before Night Falls. With The Diving Bell and the Butterfly, he plunges in headfirst. To call this a sophisticated achievement is a massive understatement, failing to appreciate how much nuance, warmth, and uniqueness of perspective is poured into Schnabel's third film. The fact that it's shot in French, a foreign tongue for the director, only adds to the feat. "Language," in the abstract sense, interests a visual artist like Schnabel greatly, and language is at the forefront of the true story of Jean-Dominique ("Jean-Do") Bauby, a paralyzed stroke victim who dictates his memoirs through eyelid blinks. Every affliction imaginable has been dramatized on film, but maybe we've never imagined something quite like locked-in syndrome. Bauby's fully functioning mind has only a single eyeball as an outlet for expression, and must spell out words by selecting them one letter at a time, blinking when the appropriate letter is recited to him. This could be the sole concentration of a really interesting film. But screenwriter Ronald Harwood has adapted Bauby's memoirs as a full-blooded character study, with a crucial assist from lead actor Mathieu Amalric, who excels at both ends of Bauby's spectrum: the carefree magazine editor, seen in flashbacks waltzing through glamorous photo shoots, and the gnarled human shell whose single eye darts about wildly, in an apparent state of permanent panic. Schnabel employs a variety of camera angles and techniques to mimic Jean-Do's perspective, as well as a recurring visual metaphor for his condition: a deep-sea diver plunged down to the depths, totally incommunicado. So effectively does Schnabel put us in his shoes, Jean-Do becomes our John Doe -- an ordinary man grappling (or sometimes failing to grapple) with extraordinary circumstances. The Diving Bell and the Butterfly explodes our preconceived notions about disease movies, emerging as one of the most striking films ever made about communication. The moving supporting performances -- including the quartet of women at his side, and Max von Sydow as his elderly father -- complete this rich and emotionally fulfilling package.