If you’re looking for a heartwarming romp that empowers the never-ceasing power of love, perhaps The Sea Inside would not be the best bet. However, if you’re looking for a haunting discourse on euthanasia that chooses not to vilify an advocate or opposition, preferring to examine the various rationale and contradictions inherent in each, then this is a fine film to indulge in.
Javier Bardem portrays Ramon Sampedro, the real-life author who waged a twenty-eight year campaign to end his life through assisted suicide. As a quadriplegic, Sampedro is bed-ridden, living on his brother’s farm and is tended to each day by his nephew Javi (Tamar Novas) , his father, and his sister-in-law Manuela (Mabel Rivera), who thinks of him more as her “son” than brother-in-law. And, this is where the tension exists, though it is exposited subtly.
The genius behind The Sea Inside is the lack of rigidity. At the end, it’s clear that the film supports Sampedro’s cause, but prior to his final monologue, conflict between the right to die and the privilege to live is fought in a veritable tug of war that pits Sampredro as a catalyst of both sympathy and pity. Ostensibly, it is understandable why Ramon wishes to end his life. For twenty-eight years, his single pleasure has been to dream about rising from his bed and flying out of his window and across the mountains to the ocean. Likewise, people look at his condition “as if it were something contagious,” and moving five inches that separate his hand from the hand of the beautiful attorney Julia (Belen Rueda) is “a false hope…a dream.” Here, the film transcends tropes that center on the inability to have sexual relations with another person and digs a bit deeper by showing the pain in not being able to touch anyone or anything. Instead of solely wanting an erection, Sampedro wants to run his fingers along Julia’s soft skin, bury them in a mountain of curls, and hold them to his face. But, he can’t. Ever.
At the same time, his existence is an obvious strain financially and emotionally on his family. For the most part, they don’t support his wish to die, and they do everything possible to show him love and keep him comfortable. At the same time, their knowledge that he wishes to end his life kindles resentment and self-doubt within each member, prompting them to wonder what they could have done better, or how could they make him change his mind? In these moments, the film’s sympathetic light cast on Sampedro is dimmed slightly as one wonders if he realizes how his family reads his desires. However, the question of whether they understand his desires needs to be asked as well. Ramon’s father sums the family’s dilemma up beautifully when he asserts that “there’s only one thing worse than having a child die on you – for him to want to die.” And this is the complexity of The Sea Inside. As a viewer, you sympathize for Ramon. You see his quality of life, but you also see the pain in his family’s eyes when he repeats once again that he’s “married to death” and “life like this has no dignity.”
Perhaps it’s Bardem’s acting, which can only be described as magnificent, but the most haunting part of The Sea Inside comes after Ramon’s optimistic explanation that “you learn to cry by smiling.” As tacitly as this line is delivered, it reverberates throughout the rest of the movie, and every smile that crosses Ramon’s face is juxtaposed with awkward conversations that border on unintentional insults. One case in point would be when Ramon flirts with Gene (a Right to Die advocate), Rosa (a townswoman who needs someone to talk to) or Julia (his lawyer) by asking them some variation if they’re “in love with him,” to which each tersely responds some form of “imagine that” and shrugs it off with a chuckle as if they are simply responding to a witty comment, something that is merely interpreted such because of the accustomed smile that he wears. Because of the casualness, these moments are most painful to watch, and it’s not until Ramon can no longer hide his emotions with a smile that the true impact of everything said before reveals itself.
Obligatorily, The Sea Inside also ventures into the church dialectic on euthanasia and offers a quadriplegic priest as the spokesperson demagogue. The debate between the two body-bound men is fantastically shot and director Alejandro Amenabar manages to successfully inject a bit of comic relief in a scene that is seemingly far from comical. At the same time, the seriousness of both men’s arguments is not elided. It’s present and forceful, and it leads to yet more contradictions. Even though the priest gets his comeuppance for ignorantly slandering Ramon’s family on television, it’s difficult to vilify him for his beliefs or fully condone Ramon’s.
If there were a villain in this film, it would have to be the legal system, but even that’s tricky given that they are following procedure, so while their refusal to let Ramon is cinematically dramatic, Ramon wasn’t allowed to speak on his behalf in the non-fiction version either.
In the end, the blame is so diffuse that there is no clear cut hero or villain. Tears will flow, whether you sympathize with the family, Ramon, Julia, or Rosa. Regardless, it would be wise to remember that those tears haven’t welled for three decades behind a damming mask passing itself off as happiness.
