`That's So Amenabar!' ; He's Been Compared to Bunuel. He's Mates with Tom Cruise. and His Latest Film - on the Subject of Euthanasia - Is Up for an Oscar. Just Where Did 32-Year-Old Alejandro Amenabar Go So Right, Asks Ryan Gilbey

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The last time I met the Spanish writer-director-composer Alejandro Amenabar, his boyish demeanour - all wide-eyed innocence, chipmunk cheeks and bouts of raucous chuckling - made him seem a good deal younger than his 29 years. That was back in 2001, when he was promoting his spook-story The Others and doing his best to ignore questions about Nicole Kidman (the film's lead actress) and Tom Cruise (its producer), whose separation had run parallel to the making of that movie. When I meet Amenabar again in a London hotel to discuss his equally subtle follow-up, The Sea Inside, it is impossible to ignore the fact that he has reversed the ageing process and will, all things …