454. MAR ADENTRO (2004)

Title: Mar adentro (The Sea Inside)
Year: 2004
Country: Spain, Italy, France
Genre: Biography, Drama
Running Time: 125 min.
Directed by: Alejandro Amenábar
Starring: Javier Bardem, Belén Rueda, Lola Dueñas
imdb: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0369702/

Mar Adentro is a remarkable film about Ramon Sampedro, a Spanish quadriplegic man who fought for more than 28 years for the right to end his own life. Don't let that put you off, though! Sure, it is sad (and you might want to pretend that your cat allergy has flared up again to disguise the sniffling sounds you'll be making at some stage in the proceedings), but it also has grit and balls. Indeed, it features Golden Balls himself, Javier Bardem, who puts in quite an extraordinary performance.What I liked most about the film is that it doesn't shy away from showing just how hard it is to accept Ramon's decision to die -- even for those who support it and fight through the court system for him to win that right. In one scene, Ramon's brother tells his gawky teenage son, "You don't understand what you're helping him do. When he's dead, he's dead. You can't undo it." And that's the nub of the question: for ultimately, we are a selfish lot and the thought of losing someone we love -- even if they're suffering, or even if they feel that their life is not worth living -- is more than we can bear. And we would rather see them mortified by illness, immobility, loneliness than consider our own life without them. A raw, courageous film. The scenes of young Ramon, the quintessential embodiment of masculine vigour and strength, as he stares at the water that will take those very attributes away are astonishing. Indeed, the way in which this hunk of a man manages to contain his exuberant physicality, silencing it within the shell of Ramon's post-accident body, gives credit to Bardem's acting talents.
by Red

Cosmopapi rating: 79%