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A Palme d’Or challenger emerges
Until Tuesday, it looked like the Coen brothers’ “No Country for Old Men” was the leading contender for the Palme d’Or. But Julian Schnabel’s “The Diving Bell and the Butterfly” should prove to be strong competition.
The beautifully photographed movie focuses on Elle magazine editor Jean-Dominique Bauby, who suffered a massive stroke and became totally paralyzed. But Bauby, who is hooked up to machines to help him breathe, still has his intelligence, his imagination and the use of one eye. And as he lies in his hospital bed, he slowly begins to see a reason to live. He wants to write a book.
The first half of the movie is shot totally from Bauby’s perspective. We see only what he sees, and when someone steps out of his narrow line of vision, they disappear from the screen. Although he can’t speak to anyone, the audience can hear his thoughts. We are his confidant. And his ideas aren’t at all full of self-pity. In fact, they’re a humorous, running commentary on what he can see. His eye becomes his butterfly, his only opening to the world. His body, meanwhile, is his diving bell, a clunky contraption that suspends him in the ocean of time. Hence the title.
Schnabel, whose previous credits include “Basquiat” and “Before Night Falls,” seems a perfect match for the material. “Basquiat” was about fellow New York artist Jean Michel Basquiat, and “Before Night Falls” featured Javier Bardem as a Cuban homosexual. Both movies showed Schnabel’s uncanny ability to frame a scene, much like a painting.
And he shows similar brilliance in “The Diving Bell and the Butterfly.”
At one point, the non-functioning right eye of Bauby has to be sewn shut to prevent infection. And we see the process through Bauby.
To convey this, Schnabel places a material that looks like an eyelid over the camera lens and then sews it up, little by little. It’s as if we’re seeing our own eye being sealed.
The other, functioning eye becomes Bauby’s only way to communicate. One blink means yes. Two blinks means no.
To write a book under such circumstances, Bauby memorizes what he wants to say and then waits for his speech therapist to show up. She begins to pronounce the letters of the alphabet, and when she says the right letter, Bauby blinks once. Thus, he is able to slowly compose words and sentences.
Using this system, Bauby reflects on his life. “My life was a string of near-misses,” he blinks to the therapist. “The women I was unable to love, the chances of joy I let drift away … a race who’s result I knew beforehand but failed to bet on the winner.” But such introspection leads him to realize that he can still connect with his children and that his life doesn’t have to end as a near-miss.
Max Von Sydow gives a stirring performance as Bauby’s ailing, aged father. But French actor Mathieu Amalric is amazing as Bauby. We see his life before the tragedy, when he was at fashion shoots for Elle and when he was playing with his children. And we also feel the frustration, the dark humor and the eventual hopefulness as he communicates his thoughts orally and visually.
Amalric is virtually unknown in the United States, but this movie will change all of that. After more than a year of tedious blinking dictation, Bauby completed his book. It was published to great success in 1997, just before his death. “The Diving Bell and the Butterfly” will help him live on in our hearts.
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