Ever notice that every blockbuster movie has the same fundamental pieces? A hero, a journey, some conflicts to muck it all up, a reward, and the hero returning home and everybody applauding his or her swag? Yeah, scholar Joseph Campbell noticed first—in 1949. He wrote The Hero with a Thousand Faces, in which he outlined the 17 stages of a mythological hero's journey.

About half a century later, Christopher Vogler condensed those stages down to 12 in an attempt to show Hollywood how every story ever written should—and, uh, does—follow Campbell's pattern. We're working with those 12 stages, so take a look. (P.S. Want more? We have an entire Online Course devoted to the hero's journey.)

Ordinary World

Malcolm Crowe is a seriously successful child psychiatrist who just got a big award for his work in the Philadelphia area. It seems like he has it all: a beautiful wife, a great house, and professional success. Oh, and a very impressive wine cellar, too, from the looks of it. We get a peek when his wife, Anna, goes down to get a celebratory bottle.

Call to Adventure

Unfortunately, our glimpse of Malcolm's perfect life is just that—basically a blink. On the same evening Malcolm's celebrating his award, he and his wife find an intruder in their bathroom. The perp, Vincent, is a former patient of Malcolm's, and he's definitely not as impressed as the rest of Philadelphia with the doc's therapeutic skillz. Malcolm tries to calm him down, but Vincent isn't mellowing. He shoots Malcolm, and the scene fades to black.

As we soon learn, this moment changed everything for Malcolm. It changed his view of himself as a therapist since he failed Vincent so hard that the guy decided to shoot Malcolm before committing suicide. Also, it created huge distance with his wife.

Refusal of the Call

Well, hmm, this is kind of a tricky one to fit into Sense, since it's not obvious until much later how Malcolm refuses his journey. After all, it looks like he dives right into helping Cole.

However, as we learn later, that's not really what Malcolm's big journey is about. Rather, it's about him finally accepting that he died when Vincent shot him and becoming ready to embrace the, er, new state of things. He's not ready to do that when we first meet him, so we'd say that counts as a pretty big "refusal of the call."

Meeting the Mentor

Malcolm thinks that he is the mentor for young Cole, but that relationship actually works both ways: while Malcolm is trying to help Cole, Cole's also helping him right back.

Cole introduces Malcolm to the whole notion of "dead people who don't know they're dead," which definitely helps Malcolm out later when he's finally ready to realize what really happened the night of the shooting.

Also, Cole gives Malcolm advice for how to talk to his wife, which he's uniquely suited to do since he understands all too well how interactions between the living and the dead work.

Malcolm doesn't know he's dead, of course, so at first he thinks Cole's just giving him good advice for catching an angry wife when she might be receptive to hearing him (i.e., while she's sleeping). It works, though, and eventually leads to a kind of weird conversation between the two of them across that whole life-death gulf toward the end.

But we're getting ahead of ourselves. Point is: Malcolm and Cole mutually mentor each other throughout the film.

Crossing the Threshold

Malcolm's confidence as a therapist is obviously shaken by what happened with Vincent, but he commits himself to trying to help Cole. He definitely seems to see parallels between the two patients; helping Cole is a way of trying to make the past right.

Tests, Allies, Enemies

Unfortunately, Cole isn't ready to tell Malcolm his secret (that he sees dead people) right away, which kind of thwarts Malcolm's ability to help him. Malcolm struggles to get to the breakthrough with Cole, just as he did with Vincent, and he sees his marriage suffering as a result.

We see him show up late to an anniversary dinner with his wife, having lost track of time dealing with Cole. He tries to explain why he's letting Cole's case take over his life, but she's not hearing any of it.

Meanwhile, as Malcolm flails around with his issues, Cole encounters a lot of difficulties and bullying at school (including at the hands of a teacher) and beyond. He even ends up in the hospital after a particularly traumatic encounter at a children's birthday party.

Poor Cole has difficulties on all fronts, and even his mom, who desperately wants to help, doesn't seem to know what to do.

Approach to the Inmost Cave

After the incident at the birthday party, Cole finally decides to open up to Malcolm and delivers the movie's most famous line: "I see dead people." Malcolm doesn't believe him just yet, but at least Cole opened up to him. That's something, right?

Ordeal

Back at home, Cole continues to see ghosts, including a woman who apparently committed suicide after dealing with an abusive husband, and a boy who shot himself in the head with his father's shotgun. His mother knows something bad is going on with Cole, but can't convince him to talk to her. The whole thing leaves both mother and son frustrated and upset.

Meanwhile, Malcolm realizes that his wife is growing closer to another man. He tells Cole their sessions need to stop so he can focus more on his marriage. That talk doesn't go well, leaving both Cole and Malcolm teary.

Instead of talking to his wife, Malcolm starts listening to tapes of his old sessions with Vincent. Even though he was skeptical of Cole's big revelation at first (he thought Cole was hallucinating), he realizes that Vincent was communicating with ghosts, too. He can hear the ghost on their old session tapes.

Finally, he has the big piece of the puzzle that he would've needed to help Vincent. That ship has sailed, but maybe it's not too late for Malcolm to help Cole.

Reward (Seizing the Sword)

Cole and Malcolm come to the mutual realization that the ghosts are probably visiting Cole because they need help with something.

Cole puts the theory to the test with a young (ghost) girl who shows up in his room vomiting. He listens to what she has to say and then goes to deliver a message to her family.

That seems to be a turning point for Cole. He basically becomes a ghost therapist, and by listening to whatever messages they have to deliver, seems to convince the ghosts to stop torturing him.

Later on, there's literally a scene with Cole seizing a sword, y'all. It's part of a school play, but the message is clear: Cole has finally triumphed. And by extension, so has Malcolm. He finally did for Cole what no one was ever able to do for Vincent.

The Road Back

Chatting after the play, Cole and Malcolm agree that they aren't going to see each other anymore, presumably because Malcolm has done what he needed to do for Cole. We don't know—yet—that Cole has done the same for Malcolm. Cole suggests that Malcolm talk to his wife when she's sleeping to get past their communication barriers, and they part ways to deal with their respective home issues.

Resurrection

Cole, for his part, finally tells his mother his big secret. He's "resurrected" as a person who can now feel part of the world of the living.

Cole's advice to Malcolm works, too. During a discussion with his sleeping wife, he realizes what Cole has gently been pushing him to see the entire film: he's dead. That's why Anna has been sad and unwilling to speak to him. She can't even see him.

Malcolm painfully remembers and acknowledges what happened the night Vincent broke in: he died from a shotgun wound to the belly. He's resurrected as a dead person. How's that for irony?

Return With the Elixir

Malcolm is finally ready to let go of the physical world. He and his wife say "goodnight" to each other, which is basically code for that final goodbye that Malcolm has been delaying the entire movie.