No Extra Part

Someone asks me a question today: "what is the best movie for this year (so far)?"

And the answer instantly popped up in my mind: Hugo.

As we all know, it is Martin Scorsese's, and as you may know that he, as far as I know, never make a crappy movie. Hugo is a piece work of art and creativity, and I don't care that people tell it is not commercially succeed, Hugo still outstanding.


When I've been asked what makes Hugo great, I've said immediately: because the focus of the story is different every 15 minutes interval. The story is not segmented, but the story flow and develop smoothly to the end which, for me as a viewer, haven't predicted before. It is very rich and exceptionally well written and directed.

Hugo starts with a story of an orphan boy, live in the Grand Station in Paris, try hard to avoid being captured by the station's police and manage to steal some components from a little toy shop. It turns out, he wants to fix an automaton left by his deceased father, with the faith that the automaton hold a message from his father.

At first, I thought that what this movie would be: a boy trying to fix an automaton with a whole challenging moment in the process (FYI, I didn't read the invention of Hugo Cabret prior to watch the movie), but then, the boy - Hugo, can finally fix the automaton in the first quarter of the movie. And from then on, the movie developed to a bigger issue, solves the clue left in the automaton and goes down to the ending. The way each scene interwoven to the end is fantastic, the plot is effortless to follow, and it's so natural to the point I believe that all that story actually happened. Hugo maybe on the top of my list of beautifully crafted story of all time.

And there's more, the message. Here's the highlight: finding your right place and functionality in this universe. You know, when an adult talk about this issue, the whole story will be deadly serious or romantic or worst- cheesy, but when a boy like Hugo talks about this thing, it feels real and innocence. I quote one of my favourite line in the movie:

"I'd imagine the whole world as one big machine. Machines never come with any extra part. They always come with the exact amount the need. So I figured, if the entire world was one big machine, I couldn't be an extra part. I had to be here for some reason. And that means you have to be here for some reason, too".

When Hugo spoke that line, I feel chilled down my spine. Because believe it or not, I've discussed similar thing with my friend long ago. The part of 'I had to be here for some reason' is exactly the word I tell my friend at the time. So, yes, this movie move me beyond any other movie can. And this message is what this movie about: finding the reason of your existence. It can be started at an unpredictable moment and move forward to a whole different situation that will bring you realization of what your reason would be. It's no use to just asking around endlessly, it's more about fight your best and seize the moment, break the barriers and limitation around you and move on to your true reason of existence, your true functionality to make the world work. Like Hugo said, we are not extra parts, we're all here for some reason.