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| Chilean director Alejandro Amenabar accepts his
award for best foreign film for his work on 'The Sea Inside' at the
20th IFP Independent Spirit Awards on Saturday, Feb. 26, 2005, in
Santa Monica, Calif. (AP) |
"The Sea Inside," the Spanish film based on the
true story of a bedridden
euthanasia lobbyist, won the Oscar for best
foreign film Sunday, beating out a tale of Adolf Hitler's final days,
South Africa's first Oscar nominee and two movies about the power of
music.
Directed by Alejandro Amenabar, "The Sea Inside" stars Javier Bardem as
Ruben Sampedro, the paraplegic, one-time ship's mechanic who was paralyzed
in a diving accident. Sampedro used a pen attached to a wand held in his
mouth to write impassioned essays asking to be allowed to end his life.
"This film is based on a man who despite his desire for death spread so
much life around him," Amenabar said in accepting the Oscar. "So the first
third part of this award goes to him, belongs to him, wherever he is."
Amenabar also dedicated the Oscar, the fourth ever awarded to a Spanish
film, to Bardem and the rest of the cast and crew.
"As for me, I'm just so pleased, because it seems I'm in charge of
keeping it in one piece for the rest of his life," he said, glancing down
at his Oscar.
"The Sea Inside" swept Spain's film academy honors last month. It
nabbed Goya Awards in a record 14 of the 15 categories in which it was
nominated, including best movie, director, actor and actress.
Sampedro fought a highly publicized but unsuccessful court battle to
allow doctor-assisted suicide, which is illegal in Spain, and died in
January 1998 after sipping water laced with cyanide.
Told partly in brightly colored flashbacks, "The Sea Inside" also
received an Oscar nomination for best makeup. Bardem becomes nearly
unrecognizable playing Sampedro in his later years. That award, however,
went to "Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events."
"The Sea Inside" may have benefited from a relatively early and
well-publicized U.S. release. It opened in eight major cities in December
and more widely last month, giving Academy voters more time to view it.
A top challenger, which opened in limited release
just last week, was Germany's "Downfall," which recounts Hitler's final
days in a claustrophobic
Berlin bunker.
Some in Germany criticized the film for its humanizing portrait of the
Nazi leader, who is seen stroking dogs and chatting amiably with female
aides.
Two nominees emphasized music. France's "The Chorus" tells the story of
a struggling musician who takes a job at a troubled boys school and works
magic through song, while Sweden's "As It Is in Heaven" depicts a talented
conductor whose leadership of a small town's church choir shakes up the
community.
The other nominee, South Africa's "Yesterday," was the first feature
film shot in the Zulu language and the country's first Oscar bid. It
profiles a mother's struggle to raise her daughter while facing the
poverty and the stigma of AIDS in a traditional society.
(Agencies) | 
Updated: 2005-02-28 11:08