1/10. AS GOOD AS IT GETS might be my favorite movie; it competes with BEING JOHN MALKOVICH and a few others in this constant jockeying for position in my brain. Something new I noticed, right after Carol the Waitress says, "If you ever mention my son again, you will never be able to eat here again. Do you understand?"
Melvin Udall looks down at his hands, which have been arranging the plasticware in front of him, and they freeze -- and this foreshadows the part when he later reveals that his father used to beat his hands whenever he made a mistake practicing the piano. This isn't the first time Melvin regresses to a prior state -- he blurts out "NO TOUCH!" when confronted by Frank, Simon's agent -- but it's much more subtle. It's movies like this that remind me that people with mental illness, or even just peculiar/obnoxious traits, aren't necessarily trying to be wicked, nor even difficult -- that everyone has a reason for being "how they are" and how people are is really just a brief snapshot we've taken. I really love the grace they are able to find within themselves, to push through their differences.
My buddy is a huge connoisseur of cinema and has this sprawling collection, but the one genre largely absent from his collection is comedy. "There's little repeat value in comedies," he says, "No need to own a film I'm never going to watch again." I think he's got a point, but at the same time I feel AS GOOD AS IT GETS' humor never gets stale.