"The Sea Inside" is the emotionally touching tale of Ramon Sampedro, a former ship's mechanic who survives a horrific accident and becomes paralyzed. Forced to live life confined to a bed, Ramon remains good-natured even while fighting to be allowed to end his life.
INTERVIEW WITH ALEJANDRO AMENABAR:
What made you want to tell this story?
I don’t know. It’s something that, over the path of time, I’ve been falling in love with this story. In the beginning, it was the cast itself. It was interesting for me and to many people. Then it was the book, and [how it] talked about life and death and love. These were very general concepts that I really understood and they were really well written…Then it was when I researched his real life and I was told about all the anecdotes and how all these women were falling in love with him, that I thought it could make a good love story from one point.
Did you have a strong point of view on the euthanasia issue?
I guess that I might have connected with Sampedro somehow from the beginning. I guess that the first question I might have asked myself was, “What would I want to do if I was in that situation?” Now I think that I would, I think, I’m not sure of course, that I would go on living. I would get through it. Then comes the second question: should then I cheer him up and tell him that life is so beautiful or [tell] him that his life doesn’t belong to him, that it belongs to someone else? I think that simple reasoning gives me the answer.
How many weeks did you shoot of Javier Bardem sitting in bed?
I think it was ten weeks.
Bardem said he never got out of the bed between takes, that he stayed motionless in character.
Well, no between takes, no he wouldn’t.
Did Bardem remain completely motionless between takes?
No, I think he would move around. No, the thing is, if you want to edit from different takes, and actually, that’s something that I usually do, you keep the exact position so that they are in the same position.
How did you safely shoot the accident scene?
Well, Javier did it. You mean the actual shot where we see the head? That’s a shot in the open sea. We made it faster. The moment he crashes against the ground, that was made faster, and then slower again. I guess you sometimes have risk, of course. I didn’t think Javier was going to break his neck. We had trained before in a swimming pool to see how he could do it. He would put first his arm [and] that would protect him.
Do you tend to do a lot of takes?
They say that I waste a lot of stuff, so it must be that. But, I think it was 12-15 takes in general.
Have any quadriplegics seen the film and given you their feedback?
I saw it in Venice, they were at the press conference, they really liked the film. But I’m talking about these people that I met in Venice. I don’t know what the general reaction is in Spain. There has not been an official statement defending it or condemning it. I feel the film has not been attacked, though.
Has anyone been offended by the portrayal?
Yeah, there’s been some statements from the Catholic church saying that scene with the priest isn’t fair. Honestly, I try to be, I used some dialogue that I extracted from some newspapers of debates between priests and philosophers. I thought that the posture of the church should be in the film because they have a very strong feeling about euthanasia. Also because I know that, when some representatives of the church say that Ramon was searching for death because he was trying to bring attention to himself because his family didn’t love him so much, this is something that really hurt the family. So I did want that part to be in the film.
Was it hard to convince the family to make the movie?
No. They weren’t enthusiastic either. When I met them for the first time, before I started writing, I just told them that I was thinking about making the movie, but I wasn’t sure if it would wind up being the story of Ramon Sampedro or some fiction. I always asked them for anecdotes. The thing is that, the more I searched, the more I knew about Ramon, the more I fell in love with the character. So eventually I said we should tell this story.
Was his brother forthcoming about their relationship or is that something you found out through other people?
I found out through other people. It’s good to have different sources so that you can be more objective about it. I was worried how he would take that when he saw the film. When he saw it, he said, “So now I’m playing the bad guy again?” But no, he enjoyed it, actually.
PAGE 2: Alejandro Amenabar on the Cast and the Music
