was i the only one who was a bit taken back..... - Le scaphandre et le papillon (2008) Discussion

[–] bhfoe6 16 years ago

I didn't find that weird. I think it's a male bonding thing. Are you female?
If you are male, do you have a close relationship with your father or with a brother? Or maybe a male friend?

I don't think it's weird to talk about sex with a close male family or friend, actually... Did it when I was around that age.

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[–] ElliottJMead 16 years ago

no im male.
maybe im just conceited.

I can understand talking about sexual health and diseases. But i wouldent ask my son or any family member questions like that. I just think it's personal stuff. Not to talk to your father about.

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[–] Lippy_Love_Stick 16 years ago

i think it's a french thing, we have friends over there who are very open, questoins like that pop up like every 2 mins with them

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[–] cocainekongpow 16 years ago

And I was dating a french girl a while back, the 2nd time I met her we were already talking her pubes, or lack of.

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[–] il_projectionist 16 years ago

If my father asked me that, I think it might be part of a subtle insult :)

And to cocainekongpow, talking about pubes with a girl I've just met is no big deal if we're on the same wavelength (ie, dating).

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[–] nyntv 16 years ago

Europeans are very open about sex and discuss it easily with their children. I have noticed it during frequent visits to London, Italy and Paris.

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[–] Strazdamonas 12 years ago

Strangely im european and i never heard anyone ask anyone that.

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[–] 12 years ago

[deleted]

[–] jimgo4 16 years ago

Not something my dad would ever come up with...

He was a bit weird...

I was a little confused by his relationship with his wife too. She was obviously aware of his girlfriend, but I wasn't sure if his wife and him were still together before his stroke. It looked cruel of him to have his teary eyed wife translate his words to the girlfriend over the telephone, that he was anxious for her to visit him! The wife seemed to deserve better! She was at his side, while the girlfriend had put her own comfort ahead of his needs... How could he treat someone who was caring for him, so shabbily?
I didn't like that, and it didn't speak very well of him!
Maybe I missed something...

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[–] mb201040017 16 years ago

well it did say in the movie that she wasn't his wife. she's just the mother of his children. so his "mistress" is really just his current girlfriend. its really not that horrible of him to want to see his girlfriend.

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[–] MadnessEvolved 14 years ago

The movie wasn't exactly true about everything.

http://www.salon.com/entertainment/feature/2008/02/23/diving_bell

The major difference between book and film is that the mother of Bauby's children -- this is how he refers to her in the film as he points out that they were never married -- pays him saintly visits day after day, despite the fact he doesn't love her, and the girlfriend he is in love with never shows up at the hospital at all. In the most devastating scene of the movie, Bauby's girlfriend tells him on the phone that she can't come visit him because she cannot bear to see him like that. He painfully spells out his response to the mother of his children so that she can interpret it to his girlfriend. Bauby's touching reply is that each day he waits for her. At that point, his wounded former partner slams the phone down, and the audience withers with the pain of her rejection.

In real life, this scene never happened. His girlfriend, Florence, was at the hospital day after day spending time with him. (De la Rochefoucauld was at that point his ex.) In the book, de la Rochefoucauld is only mentioned in one bittersweet chapter in which she brings the children to the hospital to celebrate Father's Day for the first time, and they experience a wonderful day on the beach together.

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[–] dbeierl 16 years ago

One who cares, perhaps? It would be perhaps a point of pride for his son, or perhaps a source of present or future confusion or concern. Either way, his father was giving him an opening to speak about it if he wished; to rejoice in his growing up or to be reassured that this was a good and normal thing to happen.

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[–] ElliottJMead 16 years ago

in response to nyntv.
i'm english and iv;e never heard sex disscused like that from adult to child.

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[–] Yinky 16 years ago

I'm American, and my son & I talk like that all the time. I might not use the word "d*ck" but we're not all THAT clinical. For instance, he asked me how Edward Cullen (in the Twilight series) would be able to get a "boner" to impregnate his wife if he doesn't have a heart pumping blood throughout his body.

It really sucked that I couldn't answer that.

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[–] HankTuff 15 years ago

It seems that people from rural areas of the US are very conservative when it comes to language. For example they might get seriously offended if somebody used the word "damn".

If they heard a visitor from France asking his son that hair question they would run him out of the country.

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[–] tcw214 15 years ago

"what kind of weirdo asks his son that?!?! "
ley me think, a REAL father!!
my mom asked me that!
and had a very open talk to me about being a man, in and out of the bedroom!

i was about 13 then.. she said...

"men want women to be a chef in the kitchen and a whore in the bedroom"
i replied
" im flexable.. i take a whore in the kitchen"
i never saw her laugh so hard before or since.

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[–] Hal_Warren 15 years ago

I think the line shows character well. Prior to the stroke (even minutes prior, as it is here), he is so blunt and crude that he'd say that.

Sorry, Maury. I'm not a gymnast.

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[–] leetherobot 15 years ago

Thats just how some people communicate isn't it? I know my father wouldn't express himself that way to me, nor me to my (hypothetical) son. But for someone like him (editor in chief of a big fashion magazine), I would think he would have that kind of crass, straight to the point way of speaking wouldn't you?

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[–] Sea4Shoes 15 years ago

It's a French thing. I know the French, Italians, and Greeks seem to be much more open about that sort of thing than British or especially Americans.

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[–] Gwasgray 15 years ago

It's got to be because they're French. The French are notoriously uninhibited about sex and nudity, nothing really wrong with that, as long as it doesn't get too out-of-hand. I'm English and I would have hated it if my dad had asked me that, I would have squirmed and told him to shut up (I mean he probably did ask things like that a few times) I don't think it's perverse but I do find it slightly odd for a dad to ask that so casually. I remember once going to the doctor when I was entering puberty and when I lying on the bed he asked if I'd started growing body hair, I told I had a public hair and he lifted my underpants with a finger to check. Yes, that did make me a bit uncomfortable, he was one of those aging, old-fashioned GPs. But for God's sake don't think that I was worried about him molesting me or something, I think people tend to cry wolf about that sort of thing.

Europeans are very open about sex and discuss it easily with their children. I have noticed it during frequent visits to London, Italy and Paris.

Hang on there, Britain is not completely part of Europe, we don't consider ourselves Europeans and we're not the same as the Italians and the French. The British are famous for being a bit reserved and more inhibited than the French, Spanish and all the Mediterranean people (Italians, Greeks etc.) although we're more level-headed than some people in some parts of the United States (like the Bible Belt), who are just plain stupid about certain things.

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[–] cmgilliford 15 years ago

It is not just a European thing. Aussies talk like that too but watching the film I just saw that scene as showing a close bond between father and son that they could have that discussion. i didn't see it as weird at all.

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[–] mr_dark_eyed 15 years ago

take it easy. in French he didn't say D!ck, nor c0 ck... he said zizi.. which is a word kids use to refer to this little thing they have down there! Maybe you are still "taken back" by the questions itself, regardless of the term he used, but I thought this might make you calm down a bit about it.

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[–] kingcarcas 15 years ago

I think it's just about having a sense of humor, not where you're from. "Oh you Americans are stuck up of course you don't get it", what if some flipped it around and said "well that's because those French are perverts"...don't generalize.

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[–] Billy_Crash 15 years ago

Weird to you maybe, but it's just another question to someone else. He was half-joking with his son, most likely to make him feel manly and something apart from being a kid. Get a grip.

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