The Diving Bell and the Butterfly is a truly innovative film. Say what you want about the film, critique it if you must (not that it's a film worthy of much critiquing), but you cannot deny that director Julian Schnabel has created a true work of art here. Diving Bell tells the true story of Jean-Dominique Bauby, a Frenchman who suffers a stroke and is rendered paralyzed and unable to communicate - save for the blink of a single eye. Schnabel films much of the story from the point of view of that very eye, taking us into the world of Bauby (played brilliantly by Mathieu Almaric) and enabling us to see what he sees and hear his thoughts at work. Bauby wrote a book using blinks to signify the letters he wanted, an inspirational story not even Hollywood could dream of.
If the premise doesn't seem like it would be an easy movie to make, that's because it's not. But Schnabel and screenwriter Ronald Harwood do a more than admirable job of taking inside Bauby's head. It's easy to believe that most filmmakers would have never thought of the first-person view, filming the story traditionally through a series of flashbacks or filming more of the other characters and less of Bauby in his incapacitated state. (If Michael Bay had directed it, Bauby would have gone into a stroke thanks to a massive car explosion taking out 16 city blocks. But I digress...) Yet thanks to some visionary direction, the movie works. Diving Bell's main flaw is that, well, it's not exactly prime movie material. The story becomes repetitive as I suppose it has to, with the reciting of letters and Bauby's blinking taking up perhaps more time than we'd like. I also wish the flashback and fantasy scenes were more interesting - they're hit or miss, some wildly imaginative while others seemingly pointless. Yet ultimately, The Diving Bell and the Butterfly is quite a success against all odds. It's a work that Bauby himself would have been proud of.
Grade: B+
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