Used my two movie passes!

Saw The diving bell & the butterfly (Le Scaphandre et le papillon ) directed by Julian Schnabel and based on the book by Jean-Dominique Bauby. I found it both moving and confronting. Having read the book I was fascinated to see how it could possibly be made into a film, but I think Schnabel has done a remarkable job.
The story is about Bauby, age forty-three, editor-in-chief of the world-famous fashion magazine, Elle, who was living the "good life" to the extreme when he became the victim of a devastating cerebro-vascular accident that left him in a state of total paralysis, incapable of any verbal communication, in what is known in the medical community as "locked-in syndrome." His mental faculties totally intact as he laid motionless in his bed at the Marine Hospital of Berck-sur-Mer in northern France, Bauby learned to communicate with the outside world using his left eyelid, the only part of his body over which he still had any control. During the next fourteen months, using a communication code developed by his therapist and his publisher's assistant, who transcribed this code, Bauby was able to compose, letter by letter, a lyrical and heartbreaking memoir of his life struggle.

"....a movie about deprivation becomes a celebration of the richness of experience, and a remarkably rich experience in its own right. In his memoir Bauby performed a heroic feat of alchemy, turning horror into wisdom and Schnabel, following his example and paying tribute to his accomplishment, has turned pity into joy."
The New York Times (A.O. Scott) For more reviews


Also saw Juno recently. A comedy-drama with Ellen Page starring as a sharp-tongued teenager confronting an unplanned pregnancy. It's an uplifting film with lots of quick, sharp teenage dialogue, that's very amusing. Diablo Cody recently won an Oscar for Best Writing, Screenplay Written Directly for the Screen for this movie. Ellen Page is a remarkable young actor at just 21. Has anyone seen Hard Candy the independent psychological thriller she starred in, in 2005?