A scene of absolute perfection.

This film changed my life. I can't think of any other time that a film so completely embedded itself in my mind. I saw this film last year for the first time, and have seen it about fifteen times since.

Every time I watch it, I try to figure out what it is that makes it work. Throughout my many attempts at analyzation, I've come to this conclusion: The film is made from the heart. I hear that John Patrick Shanley wrote it after a near-death experience, which would explain the sincerity of it. Although it does falter a bit in the last third (everything with the Waponis is disposable), the majority of the film has much to say and says it very well.

My favorite scene is when Joe exits the medical building after being told he has a brain cloud. In one long slow take, Joe takes in this barren ugly street with new eyes. In his moment of reawakening, he encounters a person walking with a giant dog and hugs each of them whole-heartedly. At any other time, he would have just walked by them, without noticing, to continue his drab existence.

This is an incredibly important moment. Not just in the context of the film, but in each of our lives. How often do we have moments like these, moments in which we can just stop what we're doing and actually open our eyes to what really surrounds us and appreciate the unappreciated?

What would you do if you had just been told you're dying? Would you do what Joe did: hug the first person you see? Straighten a crushed flower as he does immediately afterward? Quit your horrible job then change your life completely? Does it really take the prediction of death to make one "see anew" like that, or is it something that everyone has the power but not the nerve to do? How many of us long to do what Joe did? How many of us have the willpower to do what Joe did, or, like him, do we need a booster of impending doom to do it?

This is what movies are supposed to do. A more perfect scene in cinema history I have rarely seen.