Python Hyena The Diving Bell and the Butterfly (2007): Dir: Julian Schnabel / Cast: Mathieu Amalric, Emmanuelle Seigner, Max Von Sydow, Marie-Josee Croze, Anne Consigny: Depressing yet provocative film about freedom of mind and body. It is the true story of Elle editor Jean-Dominique Bauby whose life halts when he awakens from a coma. He can hear and understand but unable to communicate. Director Julian Schnabel does a fantastic job at emphasizing immobility. The feeling isn't pleasant even for the viewer but that is precisely why the film works. Mathieu Amalric brilliantly plays off the paralysis. He uses his eyes to indicate communication but his fate is more a relief to the audience when they would likely prefer the same thing. Emmanuelle Seigner plays the mother of his three children who sticks by him thick and thin. Max Von Sydow plays his father whose own memory is fading. He can sympathize with his son but within his own disability he is at similar loss. Marie-Josee Croze displays the patience of a social worker. Her highlight is the techniques she teaches him in his process of effective communication. The role is fairly straight forward but Croze nails it creating a scene stealing performance. Anne Consigny also makes an appearance. Film gives strong sense of being paralyzed, which makes it more effective than pleasant. Score: 8 / 10

gavin6942 The true story of Elle editor Jean-Dominique Bauby (Mathieu Amalric) who suffers a stroke and has to live with an almost totally paralyzed body; only his left eye is not paralyzed.Director Julian Schnabel is a pretty amazing guy. Not only is he a great artist and painter, who also happens to work on films, but he went the extra mile of learning French in order to make this movie. Did it have to be in French? No, but Schnabel demanded it.Some of this film takes place from the point of view of Bauby, which is pretty amazing given that he is paralyzed in all but his left eye. That makes the use of the camera very limited, but also rather powerful if done right. Here, it is done right.

justincward The POV story of a man who becomes paralysed by a stroke, and the book he eventually manages to write by blinking at his assistant. In spite of not being faithful to the book and being completely bourgeois, TDBATB powerfully puts across the terrible experience of Jean-Do. The main thrust of the story is of how his wife and mistress react to his condition, and how it's the mistress he really loves in the end. What's very good is Jean-Do's inexpressible anger and cynicism at the patronising and stupid reactions of most of the people he interacts with - in his head. What's not so good is how it's the sentimental story of a privileged narcissist, but the French always do that well.If this ever happens to me, however, I would like my speech therapist to use the system from Breaking Bad - you have a 5x5 matrix board of the alphabet and pick row, then column, to choose your letter. Jean-Do could have saved a good six months of people reciting the alphabet to him. French medical care, eh?

KineticSeoul This is a realistic and depressing flick and yet it's also vivid, visually touching and inspiring to a certain degree. The story is about a guy, a good guy and for the most part a good family man becoming a vegetable after having a stroke and becomes paralyzed from top to bottom. And basically the only thing he can move is his eyelids which is the only way he can communicate with other people, by blinking. And the man is a journalist by the name of Jean-Dominique Bauby and the story he writes. And he writes a book while paralyzed by blinking to other people in order to communicate. The movie really makes you feel like your the protagonist himself, in fact this whole movie is from his perspective and even have first person view thing going on a lot of times. But it all works together almost perfectly. And as the movie progresses I couldn't help but feel sympathetic and a bit attached to the guy. The movie gets kinda tedious at times but that just makes you feel more like what the character has to go through during his daily basis. While paralyzed his imaginations and thoughts are still intact and it really does show his imaginations and past thoughts and experiences in a vivid manner. The movie has depression and sorrow but it also pulls at the heartstrings and makes you feel for the protagonist. Since the movie makes you feel like your part of him, well it does it's best to try to go in that direction and it works for the most part. Mathieu Amalric was the right chose as Jean-Dominique Bauby, he made the character so realistic even if most of the talking happens inside the characters head. And Marie-Josée Croze who plays a speech therapist in this reminded me of brunette version of Naomi Watts.7.9/10