You changed my life. You changed my life, and I've known you four days. This is the start of something really big, but right now, I gotta go.
- Andrew Largeman, Garden State

I don't know what it is about Garden State that got me. Admittedly, I wasn't in the best movie-watching mood prior to watching the show, and that really was an injustice to the movie. I didn't really get into it till more than halfway through, and then, it grew on me in a big way. It's not quite a coming-of-age movie, nor is it one about self-discovery. It's more about the awkwardness of living, of somehow living life and grabbing the moments when you can, without quite knowing the purpose of your existence. I loved how Andrew (Zach Braff who also wrote and directed the show) and Mark (Peter Sarsgaard in a wonderful laid-back performance) interacted as old high school friends as well as the rather different kind of chemistry between Andrew and Sam (Natalie Portman), a troubled pathological liar. It isn't the physical kind in which they can't keep their hands off each other, but more the kind of intellectual, kindred spirits who just happened to meet kind of chemistry, the kind which seems far more real to me than the former. In fact, that's what I liked about the film - that it's filled with quirky characters who, to me, seem to be exactly the kind of characters than I've run into, the kind of people that, for no explicable reason, become really close friends within a matter of weeks, such that I wonder how it is that we can be so close, and yet have only known each other for that short a time.

And of course, how could I not mention the beautiful soundtrack? Zach Braff, already known for his penchant for relatively unknown bands (just look at the soundtrack for Scrubs), also put together the soundtrack for the movie, which features amazing songs from Frou Frou (Let Go), The Shins (Caring is Creepy and New Slang), Colin Hay (I Just Don't Think I'll Get Over You - a song which conveys incredibly understated angst) and Iron and Wine (Such Great Heights - a great acoustic guitar cover of The Postal Service's original).

While Garden State wasn't released in Singapore, the DVD can be found for sale for here.