Mar Adentro Mar Adentro (Portugese) 4.5/5
IMDB tt0369702

This is a really moving story of a quadriplegic in legal battle with the state of Spain for permission to Euthanise himself. Ramon Sampedro, the main character played by Javier Bardem, deserves our fullest appreciation for playing a role which allowed for little physical expression. The story gets carried through with great dignity and poignance, one that it fully deserves. The struggles in the life of a quadriplegic, the whole reason behind life and what it means to live, sets us thinking. It is hard to avoid these questions in the movie, as you are confronted by Ramon Sampedro throughout. All people around Ramon trying with all their hearts and love to assure him that it is still worth living, makes the movie more like a conversation. As the movie goes both ways on the issue, we are left alone to make up our mind. The movie is based on a true incident. So, we cannot pay as much attention to the ending as we must to the conversation that makes up the story.

It does make one wonder "Is life of a quadriplegic really a life worth living?" Especially when they feel like a vegetable. It also raises the question whether physically challenged have the same life as others, as we confront them in every walk of life. If so, why does the constitution(s) assert life as if it is equal. After all there appears to be irreconciliable differences, ones that can't be fixed purely by opportunities.

If there is movie you wish you had seen, this should make the cut.

Labels: Movies

  ¶ 7:55 AM