The Sea Inside (2004)

☆ ☆ ☆ ½

The Sea Inside (2004) – A. Amenábar

Javier Bardem turns in another remarkable performance as Ramon Sampedro, a paraplegic right-to-die campaigner from Spain.  Acting primarily from the neck up (in middle-aged make-up), he is charismatic, bitter, and steadfast in his desire to die.  Director Alejandro Amenábar inserts Ramon into his relationship context: brother and sister-in-law taking care of him, impressionable nephew, and two potential love interests.  There are also flashbacks to his accident (diving into a shallow tidepool) and fantasy sequences where he is no longer paralysed (which break the film out of its one-room set and given the cinematographer a chance to zoom over the beautiful landscape).  Of course, all viewers will be waiting for the inevitable money shot (Sampedro died in 1998).  The arguments about euthanasia seem to take a backseat to the human drama in the foreground, except for a comical argument between a paraplegic priest and Sampedro shouted up and down the stairs (due to wheelchair inaccessibility).  I think the film would have been better as a whole if Amenábar had found a way to get more philosophical and political substance into it, but there is no denying Bardem.