The Sea Inside

—Overview
—About this Film pdf
—Spiritual Connections

“To be, or not to be: that is the question.� Thus Hamlet considered life and death and which he would choose.

Ramón Sampedro has already made his choice. He has chosen not to be, to die. But because he is a quadriplegic, he is unable, on his own, to bring that death about. For others to help him would be a crime. So in spite of his choice, he still lives 28 years after his crippling accident.

Alejandro Amenábar’s other well known films, Open Your Eyes (which was made into Vanilla Sky) and The Others also deal with the area in between life and death. In The Sea Inside he directly addresses the issue of assisted suicide (feel free to choose the term you prefer: assisted suicide, euthanasia, death with dignity, right to die).

Ramón fought a long court battle in Spain, even going to the European Court of Human Rights, seeking permission to kill himself or to allow others to assist him in the process. For him, the life of total dependence on others was unacceptable. He didn’t see any dignity in a life where he had to be fed, bathed, moved in his bed.

This is not to say that Ramón’s life was empty. He was cared for by a loving family, his brother José and sister-in-law Manuela and nephew. He was able to invent things that made his life more bearable. He was able to write, placing a stylus in his mouth, and create poetry that spoke of his life. But still, he was not ready to accept the limits that his life had assumed. For him, a life sentence in a body that would not work was cruel and humiliating.

In the film, we see Ramón 27 years after his accident. Two women come into his life. The first is Julia, an attorney who offers to take his case to the courts. She supports his right to die because she too has a debilitating disease that will eventually leave her incapacitated. She too would like to be able to die before her dignity is taken away.

The other woman is Rosa, a single mother struggling to get by, but seeing Ramón on TV goes to visit him, trying to give him reason to live. After a very rocky start, she and Ramón become close friends. She brings joy into his life, even though he still wants to die. Both women eventually fall in love, in their own ways, with Ramón, and he with them.

The film uses these two women to show us a broader picture of the issue of life and death. They represent the urge to live and the urge to die. Ramón understands and appreciates both, even though he has already made his choice.

For many this film will be anathema. Questions of euthanasia and assisted suicide run counter to the teaching of many churches. In the US, only Oregon allows physicians to give patients the means of ending their lives. But still, physicians often, in the final days of a dying patient’s life, will allow an increase in pain medication that becomes lethal, euphemistically referring to it as palliative care. The question of death with dignity is not a hypothetical question; it is one that people deal with every day.

The Sea Inside shapes this question as a very personal question. Ramón does not doubt that other quadriplegics find fulfilling lives in spite of their injuries. He wants only the right to act on his own situation.

Although the film clearly sides with his right to die, it also gives voice to the other side of the question. Sometimes this voice is more well done than others. The Catholic teaching is brought by a quadriplegic priest. He is determined to set Ramón right to convince him that he must live on, just as this priest has. His is the institutional argument. It comes across as somewhat wooden and uncaring, perpetuating the easy (and often wrong) assumption that the church is interested only in having its teaching accepted by all.

When the voice of choosing life is most powerful is when it too is speaking to the question at a personal level. Julia, Rosa, Manuela, and José all speak to the issue of life and death. Rosa and José are especially strong in their support of life. Rosa speaks from the positive position of the goodness of life, José from the negative position of the wrongness of killing another human, especially one you love. These are arguments that, like Ramón’s, are personal and from the heart.

And these voices make the point that life truly is special. Even Ramón would agree with that. Part of why he wants to die is that he does see life as precious, but he can no longer enjoy that life to its fullest. He has been reduced, at least in his mind, to an existence that only imitates life.

The question the film sets before us is who should be able to make such a choice. For many the question may seem inappropriate. They would maintain that all life is holy and must be maintained when possible. However, that approach condemns some to lives they consider intolerable. Should Ramón be allowed to have a say in how he lives (or not) his life? Should the courts or the church set limits on his rights? Should others be in danger of jail for helping Ramón do what he has chosen?

One of the things Ramón tells Rosa is that the one who loves him is the one who will help him die. Such an approach can come only from an understanding of the questions posed by this film as matters not so much of mind or law or doctrine, as of the heart.

Amenábar has crafted a film that may well get Academy Award consideration. There is no justice if it is not among the nominees for Foreign Language Film, and it may well get mainstream nominations as well. It will almost certainly be near the top of my top films of the year. Its power is not so much in the position it takes as it is in the question it poses and calls us to consider. Those who support the right to die will find a film that strongly and clearly champions their cause. Even those who would oppose such policies will find in the film ideas well worth their consideration, whether they adopt them or not.

—Overview
—About this Film pdf
—Spiritual Connections