IN THE MOVIE:
- Movie is set in the 80s’.
- Belle is in a big part of the movie, the majority.
- She is the nice and very sweet girl… at the beginning. (She was compared to Quinn -Glee-)
- The basketball scene was shot. In the book this scene is about Belle playing basket ball.
She wears a big shirt and people can see her red bra. Girls are impressed by the way she plays
basket ball and boys are checking her out.
- “At the end of the day, she’s walking home and two guys in a car come to her and offer her to take her home.
At first she doesn’t want to but she ends up jumping in the car. Boys are surprised, they weren’t expecting her
to agree to that. Unfortunately, the boys don’t take her home and go to the lake. They start hitting on her one of
them try to put his hand on her shoulder. She takes the tennis racket (it was in the car) and hit him hard on the
nose with it! Then she goes on the driver seat and drives herself home, letting the boys in the road. She let the car a
few streets away from her house.” This was also shot.
- The barbecue scene was shot. In the book, the Blake family receive their neighbors. Fred is in his
office so Belle goes to look for him. They hug and Fred tells Belle how much he loves her.
- Exterior scenes were shot. We can see Belle with some friends. This was not in the book.
- A cafeteria scene was shot. This is not in the book, but from extras, a boy is kinda of bullying
Belle in the scene.
- It seems like Dianna and Michelle shot a few scenes together, alone, and there’s no such scene
in the book.
- The end of the book was shot as well : Belle wants to kill herself but renounces when she sees
hitmen. In the movie she goes kicking their ass (while in the book she just leaves)
- She uses guns to kill people (it was not in the book)
- “She manipulates a cute teacher, but not happily ever after.” This wasn’t in the book either.
(Note : it is said in the book that she’s a virgin).
- She is the one with the crush on her professor and has a little thing with him but it was describes
as “rushed” and “short” by the viewers.
- On her first day of school she’s introduced to her class in English class. The professor says she
comes from America and all the students turn around to look at her. Then the professor doesn’t
remember her name and when she says her name is “Belle” (‘Beautiful’ in French) all the students
seem shocked and are looking at her with a ‘what the ****’ look since it’s awkward for them to hear
that someone’s real name is ‘Beautiful’.
- Some schoolyard scenes and bus scenes for the first day of school were shot with lots of extras.
- Belle and her father (played by De Niro share a one on one scene that is described as “very sweet”)

From what it has been said, Belle seems more badass and violent in the movie than she is in the book.
She also seems to appears more in the movie and her role seems more important to the general intrigue.
Besson seems to have developed her temperament.

IN THE BOOK:
- The first day of school, Belle stays with her little brother for a while then meets a group of girls from her
class. At lunch she says to her brother about her first day : “Girls are cool, boys I don’t know”.
- She has to play basketball for sport class but didn’t take appropriate clothes because she didn’t know.
Her professor offers her to wear huge boy blue shorts and a huge sleeveless tee-shirt. Any girl trying to
wears the huge shorts would have failed but Belle wears them perfectly. The t-shirt let people see her red bra.
At first she feels embarrassed but her professor tells her that only girls are here so she goes.
- She never learned how to play basket-ball but as soon as she gets the ball in her hands she moves
perfectly and everybody is impressed. Red bra flying is the air and everything (yes, it is written).
- While she’s playing basketball, four guys (they were playing tennis) stop their practice to watch her
play and to check her out, noticing the red bra.
- At the end of the day, she’s walking home and two guys in a car come to her and offer her to take her
home. At first she doesn’t want to but she ends up jumping in the car. Boys are surprised, they weren’t
expecting her to agree to that. Unfortunately, the boys don’t take her home and go to some streets.
They start hitting on her one of them try to put his hand on her shoulder. She takes the tennis racket
(it was in the car) and hit him hard on the nose with it! Then she hit the other guy. She watch them
bleeding outside of the car, laughs and says “it’s not like that that you’re gonna get girls”. Then she
goes on the driver seat and drives herself home, letting the boys in the road.
She let the car a few streets away from her house.
- She’s so good at school that all of her professors ask her to do stuff for the school like school theater
spectacle or singing spectacle. But she always refuses (not very nicely). Not because she doesn’t want to,
because she does but because she can’t because of her father and the family secrets and she’s sick of that.
- Says the word “porn”
- She goes to call her dad so he comes downstairs and her dad gives her a thigh hug.
- She’s in front of her mirror naked and measure every part of her body. She knows by heart her bust
measurement, her waist measurement but she’s curious to know the distance between for example neck
to belly, wrist measurement…
And she has the perfect, ideal size everywhere.
- Her family being under Witness Protection Program, the FBI keep a watch on the phone calls and
they reveal to Belle’s mom that a certain Cyril has been calling Belle every day for one week now.
- When she started her new life in Cholong (Normandie, France) she became quickly popular without
even trying. She knows she’s beautiful.
- When she learned that her cousin killed birds with a rifle, she starts crying and her father, angry says
“You made my little girl cry you bastard?”
- I won’t spoiler the story with her father but towards the end, when her father screw up everything, she’s
in her room, crying. The FBI don’t want the family to get out of the house anymore and Belle doesn’t accept
that. If she has to stay home forever she’ll never make it to Hollywood, she’ll never be famous, all of her dreams
are falling down. She says she cruses her father and her mother for giving birth to her. She wants to kill herself.
She thinks about jumping out of the window but realizes that she has more chances to end up paralyzed. Plus,
she wants a memorable death, she wants people to talk about her dramatic death, she wants fame, even if it’s
when she dies. So she decided to get out of the house (without the security noticing her) and she wants to jump
out of the ferris wheel.
- In the hallway of the house she meets her brother (who’s also living the house). They don’t tell each other what
they’re planing to do but Warren tells his big sister that he loves her. And she tells him how proud of him she is.
They hug tightly with tears in their eyes.
- She bought her ticket to go on the ferris wheel but some new developments happen and she just can’t. (Again,
won’t spoil the whole story)
- When her whole family is locked up in a room with FBI and police in the end, someone has to make a speech
about what happened for the town but also the medias. Her father don’t want to so he asks Belle to do it for him.
She does. And this is how she gets fame. Everybody is listening to her, she’s on TV. At the end of her speech,
she’s smiling even more. Her father is proud of her.
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