MovieChat Forums > Il y a longtemps que je t'aime (2009) Discussion > What was the illness? (Spoilers)

What was the illness? (Spoilers)

posted 16 years ago by rthomp-8
7 replies | jump to latest

What was the illness the son had? It was clearly genetic and degenerative. It seemed like muscular dystrophy, but surely others would have noticed and the Iraqi consultant wouldn't have needed a second opinion.

[–] cornelia123 16 years ago

No idea what the child suffered from. You would have thought that if the mother had been imprisoned for murder that they would have done a thorough investigation, including a thorough autopsy which would have uncovered the child's disease.

[–] c_bolavienon 16 years ago

Huge spoilers ahead !!!!!

No idea what the child suffered from.

When I got out from the theater, from the symptoms, I said adrenoleukodystrophy (ALD). And I'm not even a doctor.
I guess to watch ER, the movie Lorenzo's oil during all those years and to have Zinedine Zidane who helped a ALD association, here in France etc...helpt me because later I read somewhere in a french article that Philippe Claudel said it was ALD.

You would have thought that if the mother had been imprisoned for murder that they would have done a thorough investigation, including a thorough autopsy which would have uncovered the child's disease.

Nobody knew the results of the tests. Only her. The investigators didn't search in the right direction. They just wanted to know what she injected him and didn't go further since Juliette didn't say why she did it.

[–] rthomp-8 16 years ago

Thanks - that certainly seems to fit the bill - I'd never heard of it.

One other thing though. Juliette's sister said that she didn't want to give birth to her own children. There could be two reasons for this
1. she didn't want to get into the position of Juliette - killing her own child. (But then why adopt)
2. She knew that Juliette's son had an inherited disease.
Of these I think the second is much more likely and so Juliette must have said something.

[–] c_bolavienon 16 years ago

Huge spoilers ahead !!!!!

1.Well Lea didn't know what was going in on the mind of her sister when she did it. I heard women who did this sometimes just think "they're mine, I give birth to them so I can take them away when I want". So by adopting maybe she tries to avoid this kind of situation.
2. No, she didn't know it ;) she wouldn't have burt to tears and ask her about it if it was the case.

[–] amazing-grace-x 16 years ago

I thought that it was speculated that maybe Juliette had some sort of post-natal depression and never loved her son, so her sister didn't want to give birth in case the same thing happened.

[–] crogerson 16 years ago

From a quick glimpse of the handwritten lab results shown in the scene, it looked like his white cell levels were way low, so I guessed leukemia. But if Claudel said it was ALD, that's what is was supposed to be, I guess. Doesn't really matter too much to the film.

[–] poserpro 12 years ago

When a woman whose sister killed her son and she has no clue why her sis did it and it happened when she was very young, it creates kinda psychological block or fear to have her own kid(s), adopting is the alternative choice to her and her husband since both agreed.

Maybe after she knew the fact of the truth why her sis did it, some years later, she and her husband would like to have their own kid cause the psychological burden is gone, just like her sister who is open to new life.