In the Blink of an Eye
by Rick BartonJean-Do never regains control over any part of his body save his left eye. Thus, he suffers from locked-in syndrome. His brain function is close to normal. He has the full range of thought processes and emotional responses. He still finds some things funny, but he can't laugh. Though his field of vision is restricted because he can't move his head, he can see and thus perceive the world around him. And he can hear. But he can't speak. He can answer direct questions by blinking once for yes and twice for no.
What finally liberates Jean-Do from the prison of incapacity that he compares to being locked inside a diving bell, is the amazing kindness and stubborn patience of Henriette Durand (Marie-Josée Croze), one of his speech therapists. Henriette facilitates Jean-Do's ability to communicate by reading him the alphabet until he blinks on letters to spell out words and sentences. The process is exhaustingly laborious, and the first thing Jean-Do spells out is that he wishes to die. I certainly found such a sentiment perfectly reasonable, but Henriette scolds him for it and insists that Jean-Do commit himself to communication. When he does so, he compares the experience with the emergence of a butterfly from the confinement of his cocoon. To take the blinking dictation of Jean-Do's manuscript, his publisher hires Claude Mendibil (Anne Cosigny) still another young woman of astonishing compassion.
Schnabel films much of The Diving Bell and the Butterly from Jean-Do's restricted and sometimes clouded point of view as people hover right in his face so that he might see them. The visual effect is uncomfortably claustrophobic, which, of course, is precisely what the director intends. Much of the 'action" in the film consists of Bauby's three beautiful women, Celine, Henriette and Claude, endlessly spelling out the alphabet so that he can gradually blink out the words of his communication. The narrative effect is almost numbing, which, again, is Schnabel's intent. In these two powerful ways the filmmaker makes us see and feel what Bauby's paralyzed life is like and therefore enables us to perceive and appreciate the remarkable achievement of a man in his situation exercising the force of will to write a book.
Bauby's memoir provides us glimpses of his grand life before the stroke and is honest about his frustrations afterward. Always a man intoxicated by beautiful women, Bauby continues to let his good eye roam to the legs and breasts of the women who attend to him. The film doesn't push this point unduly, but we understand that his inability to function has not dimmed his desire. Bauby also extols the sanctuary a man, even an incapacitated man, can find in memory and imagination. He recalls cherished moments, and he imagines future situations, often romantic, that will never occur. One can't help but admire such sentiments. But I wonder if others will nonetheless share my response that it was in death, not in so diminished a life that Jean-Dominique Bauby found the butterfly's release.
