- Nominated by the Spanish Cinematographic Academy, to represent Spain in the 2004 Oscar Awards, Foreign Language film.
- Three months before Spanish premiere, Alejandro Amenábar gave a photo to the media to be shown all over the nation to make people get used to Bardem's make-up and forget about it while watching the film to pay attention to his performance.
- When Belén Rueda was phoned to be informed about she had just been chosen to play a role in an Amenábar film she hung up. She thought they were kidding her.
- This is the second Spanish movie about Ramon Sampedro's life. The first one was Condenado a vivir (2001) (TV).
- This was the most awarded Spanish movie at the Goya Awards, winning 14 of the 15 awards for which it was nominated.
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Trivia items below here contain information that may give away important plot points. You may not want to read any further if you've not already seen this title.
- SPOILER: Lola Dueñas' character should have been called Ramona Maneiro, but Ramon Sampedro's family told Amenábar that they didn't want the name of Ramon's "assassin" to appear in the movie, so Amenábar called the character of Lola Dueńas, simply "Rosa".
- SPOILER: The film is based on the true case of Ramón Sampedro who in fact suffered from paralysis after a diving accident for over 25 years. Eventually, Sampedro committed suicide. For his screenplay, Alejandro Amenábar left the original name for his lead character instead of altering it.
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