Diving Bell and the Butterfly, The (2007) Rank 5 Reviews

Seattle Times (Moira MacDonald)

A film of rare imagination; a collage of unnerving images and great artistry. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Seattle Times (Moira MacDonald)

Reeling Reviews (Robin Clifford)

...kind of film that surprises you when the credits roll. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Reeling Reviews (Robin Clifford)

Entertainment Weekly (Lisa Schwarzbaum)

The Diving Bell and the Butterfly is the most beautiful movie ever made about a man who could only move one eyelid -- almost dangerously beautiful. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Entertainment Weekly (Lisa Schwarzbaum)

Houston Chronicle (Amy Biancolli)

A film that haunts and inspires. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Houston Chronicle (Amy Biancolli)

ViewLondon (Matthew Turner)

An astonishing, deeply moving film, Schnabel's third film is also his masterpiece, thanks to extraordinary direction, stunning camerawork, a terrific script and an Oscar-worthy central performance from Amalric. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at ViewLondon (Matthew Turner)

Denver Post (--)

He was the editor of French Elle, the father of two young children, a husband, a son. The list of roles that forged his elevated place in his world was lengthy. When he awoke in room 119 at the Naval hospital at Berck-sur-Mer near the French Channel, ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Denver Post (--)

Globe and Mail (--)

Stanley Kubrick said that books that were generally not considered cinematic often made the best films because they left the directors free to imagine. That's certainly the case with The Diving Bell and the Butterfly, painter-filmmaker Julian Schnabel's ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Globe and Mail (--)

Film Journal International (Wendy Weinstein)

The film, aided by Amalric's pitch-perfect performance, reveals the range of Jean-Do's emotional life, his anger, joy and wry humor. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Film Journal International (Wendy Weinstein)

San Jose Mercury News (Bruce Newman)

Director Julian Schnabel uses his skill as a painter to assemble a collage of fantastical images to reveal the exquisite physical wreck that Bauby has become. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at San Jose Mercury News (Bruce Newman)

Reeling Reviews (Laura Clifford)

Screenwriter Ronald Harwood has cracked a book largely thought unfilmable and director Julian Schnabel working with DP Janusz Kaminski has created a uniquely visual film about one of the most difficult movie subgenres, the biography of an author. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Reeling Reviews (Laura Clifford)

Minneapolis Star Tribune (Colin Covert)

The Diving Bell and the Butterfly tells one extraordinary man's story so well that it reflects vividly on our own. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Minneapolis Star Tribune (Colin Covert)

Newsday (Jan Stuart)

The visual lyricism and irascible humor of Julian Schnabel's screen adaptation make for a life-against-the-odds drama like none you've ever seen. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Newsday (Jan Stuart)

Christian Science Monitor (Peter Rainer)

The film is a visual and auditory feast. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Christian Science Monitor (Peter Rainer)

Chicago Sun-Times (Roger Ebert)

Here is the life force at its most insistent, lashing out against fate with stubborn resolve. And also with lust, hunger, humor and all of the other notes that this man once played so easily. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Chicago Sun-Times (Roger Ebert)

Metromix.com (Matt Pais)

Not a movie that you shake off easily -- maybe ever -- and one that makes you want to go out and gulp down every ounce of life you can squeeze into your glass. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Metromix.com (Matt Pais)

St. Paul Pioneer Press (Chris Hewitt (St. Paul))

The Diving Bell and the Butterfly may be the most unusual movie experience of the year. And it's unquestionably one of the best. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at St. Paul Pioneer Press (Chris Hewitt (St. Paul))

TV Guide's Movie Guide (Ken Fox)

Like Bauby's memoir, Schnabel and Academy Award-winning screenwriter Ronald Harwood's adaptation is far from a mushy exercise in never-say-die optimism -- it's suffused with Bauby's terror and bitterness. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at TV Guide's Movie Guide (Ken Fox)

New York Post (Lou Lumenick)

Yes, it's in French and it's arty (in good ways) - but I promise you won't have a more viscerally emotional experience at the movies this year. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at New York Post (Lou Lumenick)

Big Picture Big Sound (Joe Lozito)

In a perfect match of director and subject, artist Julian Schnabel adapts the memoir by late Elle editor Jean-Dominique Bauby into a compelling and intense look at one man's experience with locked-in syndrome. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Big Picture Big Sound (Joe Lozito)

Chicago Tribune (Michael Phillips)

It is wonderful: a rhapsodic adaptation of a memoir, a visual marvel that wraps its subject in screen romanticism without romanticizing his affliction. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Chicago Tribune (Michael Phillips)

Reel Film Reviews (David Nusair)

...a film that's as emotionally devastating as it is engrossing. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Reel Film Reviews (David Nusair)

Scene-Stealers.com (Eric Melin)

This genius collaboration between director of photography Janusz Kaminski and Schnabel immerses you in Bauby's situation so that it becomes your reality. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Scene-Stealers.com (Eric Melin)

Onion AV Club (Tasha Robinson)

The putative film adaptation reaches well beyond the contents of that book, expanding its philosophical resignation into a grim but beautiful visual poem. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Onion AV Club (Tasha Robinson)

Spirituality and Practice (Frederic and Mary Ann Brussat)

A classic in the literature of illness brought to the screen with all its creative juices intact, the film salutes the firepower of imagination as a life-giver and a life-sustainer. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Spirituality and Practice (Frederic and Mary Ann Brussat)

CinemaBlend.com (Joshua Tyler)

The film is so stuffed with visual poetry and moving turns of phrase that it practically takes flight. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at CinemaBlend.com (Joshua Tyler)

Variety (Justin Chang)

Most compelling in its attempts to re-create the experience of paralysis onscreen, gorgeously lensed pic morphs into a dreamlike collage of memories and fantasies, distancing the viewer somewhat from Bauby's consciousness. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Variety (Justin Chang)

Associated Press (Christy Lemire)

Astonishingly beautiful and self-consciously so. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Associated Press (Christy Lemire)

New York Magazine (David Edelstein)

In The Diving Bell and the Butterfly, Schnabel re-creates Jean-Do's constricted universe from the inside out, and the film becomes an act of sympathetic disjunction. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at New York Magazine (David Edelstein)

Big Picture Big Sound (Joe Lozito)

In a perfect match of director and subject, artist Julian Schnabel adapts the memoir by late Elle editor Jean-Dominique Bauby into a compelling and intense look at one man's experience with locked-in syndrome. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Big Picture Big Sound (Joe Lozito)

One Guy's Opinion (Frank Swietek)

A remarkably fluent and genuinely uplifting picture about a paralyzed man...no solemn, calculating tearjerker but a marvelously rich and fluid evocation. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at One Guy's Opinion (Frank Swietek)

Salon.com (Andrew O'Hehir)

Anyone who has read Jean-Dominique Bauby's slim, extraordinary 1997 memoir "The Diving Bell and the Butterfly" is likely to wonder how it could possibly be made into a movie. In 1995 Bauby, then 43 and the editor of French Elle, suffered a stroke that ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Salon.com (Andrew O'Hehir)

efilmcritic.com (Dan Lybarger)

By delivering Bauby's story in an appropriately straightforward tone, the filmmakers behind "The Diving Bell and the Butterfly" prove that engaging stories work best without artificial sweetening. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at efilmcritic.com (Dan Lybarger)

Compuserve (Harvey S. Karten)

The remarkable story of a man almost totally incapacitated who creates a best-seller by blinking his left eye is about the creation of art as much as it is the tale of human tragedy. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Compuserve (Harvey S. Karten)

eFilmCritic.com (Brian Orndorf)

While punishing to watch at times, it's something you can't quite keep your eyes off of. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at eFilmCritic.com (Brian Orndorf)

EmanuelLevy.com (Emanuel Levy)

Likely to divide critics due to its surreal style, biopic of Elle's paralyzed editor continues Schnabel's exploration of misfit artists that began in Basquiat and continued in Before Night Falls; in emotional impact it recalls My Left Foot and Sea Inside ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at EmanuelLevy.com (Emanuel Levy)

Seattle Post-Intelligencer (William Arnold)

The Diving Bell and the Butterfly would seem to be the last word in affliction movies. But it goes against that movie formula at every turn and proves to be a unique experience. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Seattle Post-Intelligencer (William Arnold)

ReelTalk Movie Reviews (Jeffrey Chen)

Diving Bell , though uncompromising in its own way, comes across as aggressively watchable. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at ReelTalk Movie Reviews (Jeffrey Chen)

Lobo Howls (Judith Wolfe)

I don't usually fawn - but here I go. Director Julian Schnabel is a brilliant filmmaker. His previous films ( Before Night Falls and Basquiat) are pieces of art to be watched over and over again. His latest film is more challenging to a mass audience but ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Lobo Howls (Judith Wolfe)

ComingSoon.net (Edward Douglas)

As close to perfection as you'll get for a movie dealing with a subject matter that might seem impossible to handle in an entertaining way. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at ComingSoon.net (Edward Douglas)

ReelViews (James Berardinelli)

For many people, there is no hell more unimaginable than having a healthy, active mind trapped in a paralyzed husk of a body. Some of those in this situation seek a quick end to their misery (as was the case with Ramon Sampedro, whose tale was dramatized ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at ReelViews (James Berardinelli)

Slate (Dana Stevens)

With the help of brilliant French actor Mathieu Amalric, Spielberg's longtime cinematographer Janusz Kaminski, and screenwriter Ronald Harwood, Schnabel has made a marvelous film that uses images with as much grace and flair as Bauby used words. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Slate (Dana Stevens)

Cinematical (James Rocchi)

Imagine a Spike Jonze-Charlie Kauffman-Michel Gondry-style film but with a warm, beating heart instead of cool, detached hipster irony. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Cinematical (James Rocchi)

New Yorker (David Denby)

A gloriously unlocked experience, with some of the freest and most creative uses of the camera and some of the most daring, cruel, and heartbreaking emotional explorations that have appeared in recent movies. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at New Yorker (David Denby)

NewsBlaze (Prairie Miller)

Delves into the horrific destiny and triumphant creative, if not physical struggle of this French celebrity, whose stroke left him completely paralyzed save for interior silent monologues, and the furiously blinking eye of this ill-fated ravaged cyclops. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at NewsBlaze (Prairie Miller)

Plume Noire (--)

The Diving Bell and the Butterfly possesses all the weapons needed to seduce the public, the critics and the festival jury. A difficult subject based on a true story, a mise en scÃ¨ne rich in proposals, a clever mix of tones, alternating tears and cynical ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Plume Noire (--)

Screen International (--)

An astonishing assertion of the human spirit in the face of seemingly insurmountable odds, Jean-Dominique Bauby's The Diving Bell And The Butterfly was one of the publishing sensations of the 1990s, selling in excess of 1 million copies. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Screen International (--)

Ruthless Reviews (--)

Jean-Dominique Bauby (Mathieu Amalric), editor of Elle France -- handsome, successful, and full of life -- was suddenly and inexplicably stricken with a massive stroke of such force that, with the exception of a lone left eye, he was left paralyzed from ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Ruthless Reviews (--)

Hollywood Reporter (Ray Bennett)

Director Julian Schnabel and screenwriter Ronald Harwood have performed a small miracle in adapting for the screen Jean-Dominique Bauby's autobiography The Diving Bell and the Butterfly . ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Hollywood Reporter (Ray Bennett)

New York Press (Armond White)

Tells a real person's life story so inventively you might forget how rotten recent biopics have been. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at New York Press (Armond White)

Not Coming to a Theater Near You (Leo Goldsmith)

Even if Schnabel's films utilize a rolodex as burgeoning as their film's visual inventiveness, they still do so playfully and with a sense of the fun of moviemaking that so few films of similar lineage display. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Not Coming to a Theater Near You (Leo Goldsmith)

MTV (Kurt Loder)

Bauby's horrific situation, and the purposefully muted reactions of the people around him...speak for themselves with spare eloquence. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at MTV (Kurt Loder)

New York Observer (Andrew Sarris)

Astonishingly lyrical and profoundly moving. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at New York Observer (Andrew Sarris)

FirstShowing.net (Alex Billington)

It's hard to consider laughing at such a sad story, but pulling that off as well as it did shows Julian Schnabel's immense capability as a filmmaker. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at FirstShowing.net (Alex Billington)

About.com (Marcy Dermansky)

After I recovered from my initial horror, I was almost able to enjoy the experience of watching this discomfiting, entirely unique narrative. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at About.com (Marcy Dermansky)

Maxim (Pete Hammond)

Tough to watch? Sure. Worth it? Absolutely. Perhaps the most inspiring film in many years. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Maxim (Pete Hammond)

Los Angeles Times (Kenneth Turan)

The film, based on the memoir of Jean-Dominique Bauby, handles delicate subject matter with sensitivity and imagination. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Los Angeles Times (Kenneth Turan)

Jam! Movies (Bruce Kirkland)

It is a masterwork on both an artistic and emotional level. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Jam! Movies (Bruce Kirkland)

filmcritic.com (Chris Cabin)

Butterfly colors inside the lines but it does so with a dandy sense of personal rhythm. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at filmcritic.com (Chris Cabin)

Scott Mantz' Movie Reviews (Scott A. Mantz)

A couple of years ago, I had one of those "fluke" moments. I was joking around with my then-girlfriend, and when I went to give her a big hug, I felt a sharp pain shoot through the bottom right-hand side of my back. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Scott Mantz' Movie Reviews (Scott A. Mantz)

TheMovieChicks.com (Cherryl Dawson and Leigh Ann Palone)

There are some heartbreaking and gut-wrenching scenes, but they're balanced with beautiful moments and the fact that Jean-Do never loses his sense of humor. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at TheMovieChicks.com (Cherryl Dawson and Leigh Ann Palone)

New York Times (A.O. Scott)

With The Diving Bell and the Butterfly , Julian Schnabel demonstrates his own imaginative freedom in every frame and sequence. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at New York Times (A.O. Scott)

Los Angeles Times (Kenneth Turan)

The film, based on the memoir of Jean-Dominique Bauby, handles delicate subject matter with sensitivity and imagination. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Los Angeles Times (Kenneth Turan)

MovieFreak.com (Sara M. Fetters)

With each successive feature Schnabel's hand becomes more confident, much more self-assured, the auteur's painterly eye perfectly suited to bring this uniquely rousing biographical journey to distinct one-of-a-kind life. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at MovieFreak.com (Sara M. Fetters)

San Francisco Chronicle (Mick LaSalle)

By the end, The Diving Bell and the Butterfly achieves a victory over difficult material, but celebrating that fact doesn't preclude recognizing the story is not a natural for movies and remains an uneasy match. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at San Francisco Chronicle (Mick LaSalle)

Chicago Reader (Andrea Gronvall)

Julian Schnabel's skill as a painter informed his previous two films, Basquiat and Before Night Falls, and it's even more evident in this profoundly moving adaptation of Jean-Dominique Bauby's best-selling memoir. A celebrated editor for French Elle, ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Chicago Reader (Andrea Gronvall)

Village Voice (Scott Foundas)

At this year's Cannes Film Festival, the American painter turned filmmaker Julian Schnabel won the jury's Best Director award for The Diving Bell and the Butterfly, his French-language adaptation of the bestselling memoir by the late Elle magazine ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Village Voice (Scott Foundas)

Boston Globe (Wesley Morris)

If a movie about the human spirit doesn't do it for you, The Diving Bell thoroughly doubles as a movie about the cinematic spirit. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Boston Globe (Wesley Morris)

Groucho Reviews (Peter Canavese)

Qualifies as a masterpiece of sensual cinema and poetic subjectivity. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Groucho Reviews (Peter Canavese)

Ozus' World Movie Reviews (Dennis Schwartz)

Left me wondering if Schnabel's arty efforts were really worth the trouble when the real-life story itself was so moving and didn't need such artificial gloss. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Ozus' World Movie Reviews (Dennis Schwartz)

Mark Reviews Movies (Mark Dujsik)

Julian Schnabel's telling of the story is ingenious. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Mark Reviews Movies (Mark Dujsik)

Philadelphia Inquirer (Carrie Rickey)

In at least one way, Jean-Dominique Bauby resembles Christy Brown, the Irish poet and artist who transcended cerebral palsy by writing and painting with an appendage as dramatized in My Left Foot. After a massive stroke in 1995 left Bauby almost ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Philadelphia Inquirer (Carrie Rickey)

Combustible Celluloid (Jeffrey M. Anderson)

Within ten minutes the film had effortlessly knocked the chip from my shoulder. This is a very, very good film. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Combustible Celluloid (Jeffrey M. Anderson)

Christianity Today (Brandon Fibbs)

Reveals that the human capacity for life, for love, and even for joy is not dependent on circumstances, but is embedded in something far deeper and far more spiritual. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Christianity Today (Brandon Fibbs)

Trades (Jim Pappas)

Sometimes filmmakers are inspired to make films because they are motivated by a desire to entertain people. Sometimes filmmakers use film as a medium to express themselves in a way they can't do otherwise. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Trades (Jim Pappas)

Sly Fox (Kam Williams)

The Sea Inside meets My Left Foot. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Sly Fox (Kam Williams)

Rolling Stone (Peter Travers)

[Director Schnabel's] best film yet, a high-wire act of visual daring and unquenchable spirit. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Rolling Stone (Peter Travers)

Film Experience (Nathaniel Rogers)

less cloying and superficial than other movies of its subgenre and directed with true showman's flair. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Film Experience (Nathaniel Rogers)

Film Blather (Eugene Novikov)

Schnabel's visuals are so confident, so moving, that I wished he had truly taken charge rather than being led around by a screenplay that can't cut the mustard. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Film Blather (Eugene Novikov)

Time Out (Dave Calhoun)

A claustrophobic and imaginative treat. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Time Out (Dave Calhoun)

Newsweek (David Ansen)

The Diving Bell and the Butterfly keeps opening up, its structure mimicking the awakening of its extraordinary protagonist's mind. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Newsweek (David Ansen)

New York Daily News (Elizabeth Weitzman)

In The Diving Bell and the Butterfly, director Julian Schnabel and his gifted lead, Mathieu Amalric, take us on an indelible tour through the highest and lowest points of the human experience. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at New York Daily News (Elizabeth Weitzman)

Los Angeles Daily News (Glenn Whipp)

Julian Schnabel deftly sidesteps all the traps inherent in the illness movie genre, creating a stirring movie about a man's emotional awakening that takes its immobile protagonist on a journey from boyhood to infinity. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Los Angeles Daily News (Glenn Whipp)

ColeSmithey.com (Cole Smithey)

With the help of cinematographer Janusz Kaminski, director Julian Schnabel goes so far toward cinematically capturing the claustrophobic condition of his paralyzed and mute protagonist Jean-Dominique Bauby (Mathieu Amalric) that the artifice of his point- ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at ColeSmithey.com (Cole Smithey)

Reel.com (--)

Jean-Dominique Bauby, Jean-Do to his loved ones, was an editor for the Parisian branch of Elle magazine before he suffered a stroke at 43 and became completely paralyzed save one eye. A playboy of sorts, he was also a great father, an irresponsible ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Reel.com (--)

House Next Door (Keith Uhlich)

The Sea Inside by way of Lady in the Lake . ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at House Next Door (Keith Uhlich)

Newark Star-Ledger (Stephen Whitty)

The best parts of the film are when the two men work together, Schnabel providing reams of unconscious images and Amalric commenting on them. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Newark Star-Ledger (Stephen Whitty)

Antagony & Ecstasy (Tim Brayton)

By turns terrifying and humane and even funny. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Antagony & Ecstasy (Tim Brayton)

New Yorker (David Denby)

Almost the first sound we hear in Joe Wright's "Atonement" is the tap of typewriter keys. Soon, the tapping becomes regular, like drumbeats, and it sets the tempo for the music that comes surging in. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at New Yorker (David Denby)

Washington Post (Ann Hornaday)

On Dec. 8, 1995, 43-year-old Jean-Dominique Bauby, the stylish, high-living editor of French Elle magazine, suffered a stroke and went into a coma, awaking 20 days later having lost his power of speech, able to move only his left eyelid. Having ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Washington Post (Ann Hornaday)

TIME Magazine (Richard Schickel)

Death may be, as the cliche has it, the ghost haunting the attic of everyone's mind, but the movies don't usually play it that way. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at TIME Magazine (Richard Schickel)

Moviepie.com (--)

From the opening moments of The Diving Bell and the Butterfly, you know you are in for something different. The camera is blurry and disoriented. It has a hard time focusing, lights seem too bright, then images disappear into groggy darkness. Voices come ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Moviepie.com (--)

KPBS.org (Beth Accomando)

Jean-Dominique Bauby was 43-years-old when he suffered a stroke and was diagnosed with a rare condition known as "locked-in syndrome."In Bauby's case, this meant that he was left entirely paralyzed except for his left eye. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at KPBS.org (Beth Accomando)

Arizona Republic (--)

Schnabel, who had a brief moment as a painter atop the 1980s art-market bubble, has expanded into film and is more likely now to be remembered as director than painter. His new movie, The Diving Bell and the Butterfly, may well be the best movie of the ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Arizona Republic (--)

Detroit News (Tom Long)

You wake up and the world is blurry. People are talking, you understand what they're saying, but they can't seem to hear you. Faces come into focus; it's a hospital. And then you notice you don't seem to be able to move. Except for one eye. And all ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Detroit News (Tom Long)

The Deadbolt (Brian Tallerico)

The landscape of cinema is littered with dramas centered around how the strengths of the inner human can overcome the weaknesses of their external frames. Most fail to convey the pain and emotion of the experience without sinking into melodrama and ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at The Deadbolt (Brian Tallerico)

FilmStew.com (Richard Horgan)

The theatrical release schedule occasionally has a way of perversely lining up a pair of films that, on paper, would seem to have absolutely no chance of sharing anything in common. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at FilmStew.com (Richard Horgan)

Film-Forward.com (Kent Turner)

A small-scale film on a grand-sized canvas: director Julian Schnabel and his cinematographer, Janusz Kaminski, meet the challenge of adapting ... Bauby's 1997 memoir. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Film-Forward.com (Kent Turner)

Wall Street Journal (Joe Morgenstern)

"The Diving Bell and the Butterfly" is unsparing and inspiring in equal measure. The camera immediately puts us in the position of its hero, a man regaining consciousness after a catastrophic stroke that has left him lucid but almost completely paralyzed. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Wall Street Journal (Joe Morgenstern)

Boxoffice Magazine (Richard Mowe)

In this way, the viewer is given the chance to experience the same confusion and disorientation as Dauby as he awakens in his hospital bed and begins to realize he can neither move nor speak. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Boxoffice Magazine (Richard Mowe)

Wolf Entertainment Guide (William Wolf)

One of the most highly praised films at the 2007 Toronto International Film Festival and the New York Film Festival was Julian Schnabel's "The Diving Bell and the Butterfly. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Wolf Entertainment Guide (William Wolf)

Hollywood Report Card (Ross Anthony)

Engaging, moving, and even has a good message, but it's also a film that slips in the follow through. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Hollywood Report Card (Ross Anthony)

european-films.net (Boyd van Hoeij)

An arresting true story and a ravishing visual creation, but the two remain separate entities that do not support one another but get in each other's way instead. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at european-films.net (Boyd van Hoeij)

Slant Magazine (Nick Schager)

A textbook example of a director prizing himself over his material. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Slant Magazine (Nick Schager)

San Diego Union-Tribune (David Elliott)

It would be inhuman not to empathize with the actual man's plight, but the movie is a sophisticated prod, pushing us inside its own Bauby. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at San Diego Union-Tribune (David Elliott)

Video Reviews With Joan Ellis (Joan Ellis)

"The Diving Bell and the Butterfly" is harrowing. Director Julian Schnabel brings us so skillfully into this sad true story that we are left in silent despair when it is over. The film is an absorbing ordeal of a grim reality. ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at Video Reviews With Joan Ellis (Joan Ellis)

USA Today (Claudia Puig)

Whereas the book was lyrical and moving, the movie is surrealistic and inventive. The film version of the best-selling memoir The Diving Bell and the Butterfly is visually arresting and a tribute to the power of imagination, but it is not as emotionally ...read the complete Diving Bell and the Butterfly movie review at USA Today (Claudia Puig)

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