The Sea Inside

Perhaps, like me, you approach this true-life melodrama about a quadriplegic seeking to die with dignity, which won an Oscar for Best Foreign Film last year, only with a sense of duty? Wrong. This is beautiful filmmaking of a very high order, wonderful if you believe the point of movies is to make you think and feel. Director Alejandro Amenabar is absurdly young (born 1972) to have added this estimable work to his well-done thrillers, Open Your Eyes and The Others. A complete filmmaker, he even composes the music, and comes across as a latter-day combination of Hitchcock and Sirk. With impeccable acting across the board, the film is anchored by a towering -- while supine -- perfomance from Javier Bardem, with four superb and lovely actresses orbiting around him and his plight. Set along the Galician coast of Spain, this film is breathtaking in a variety of ways. And the dvd includes an unusually comprehensive making-of documentary, well worth an extra hour of viewing. (2004, dvd, n.) *7+* (MC-74.)