Corrected entry: When Alex wakes up after his vision of the crash, he leaps out of his seat and tries to get off the plane. The male French teacher says 'Alex, qu'est-ce que c'est?' Literally translated, this means 'Alex, what is it?', but in a very literal sense; for example, you would say 'qu'est-ce que c'est' if you were asking what an unfamiliar object is. To say 'what is it' as in 'what's the matter', the teacher should have said 'Alex, qu'est-ce qu'il y a?' Would a 'veteran' French teacher have got this wrong?
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Correction: Qu'est-ce que is an accepted means of asking what it is that woke Alex up. It may not be perfect French, but it is acceptable and understandable. I know of many instances where language teachers use whichever vernacular is going to be most quickly and easily understood by the student. Also, even language teachers don't always use perfect grammar.
rswarrior
I'm French! Born and raised! For the teacher to say "Alex, qu'est ce que c'est" is perfectly acceptable! Not sure why you are being so picky about the teacher's French! In fact I'm fairly confident with his accent that the man is French Canadian.