Psalm 34 - Moments of Awe

Goodness, I loved the way that Fischer translates several verses of Psalm 34. I read these before bed on Wednesday night and they were “wow” moments. Here they are:

Your angel makes camp
Near those who are brushed by awe...
Come, children, listen to me
I will teach you how to fall back in awe...

Near those brushed by awe and how to fall back in awe. What beautiful imagery that brings to my heart and my mind. It gets me going back to moments when I saw things like this image from a few days ago that evoke a sense of unreality and mind-bendingness.

Which led me to thinking back about moments like that in movies but the more I tried to think of just one “awe” moment in movies, the more others kept coming to mind. So in a bit of stream of consciousness, I came up wtih this list (which is definitely far from exhaustive). Note the list also includes several that my family suggested as well.

• The appearance of the Imperial Star Destroyer at the beginning of the first-released Star Wars movie and later the Binary Sunset scene in the same film.

• The ending of Arrival

• The painted world of the afterlife in What Dreams May Come

• The visual feast that was the first Avatar film (story questionable)

• The moment Dorothy walks out of the black-and-white house into the vibrant color of Oz in The Wizard of Oz

• The ending of The Last Temptation of Christ

• The cinematography of the documentary Free Solo about a man free-climbing El Capitan in Yosemite

• The final lightsaber duel between Luke and Vader in Return of the Jedi (when the music rises with the chorus...wow)

• Too many scenes to count in the Lord of the Rings films but notably the lighting of the beacons, Sam’s speech, Aragorn’s speech, and “for Frodo!”

• The first reveal of the dinosaurs in Jurassic Park

• When the musical cue Portals plays in Avengers: Endgame and we hear Sam say, “on your left!”

• The ballroom scene in the animated Beauty and the Beast

• The visuals of Inception

• Ellie meeting her father in Contact

• The dance in space with the robots in Wall-E

• The ending of Schindler’s list when the real-life families of those Oscar Schindler saved visit his grave

• The ending of The Shawshank Redemption

• The opening montage of Up

• The science of Interstellar

• The Do You Hear the People Sing? moment in both the film and stage production of Les Miserables (excluding the moments when Russel Crowe sings in the film)

• The last scene of Rogue One as well as several other amazing moments in this Star Wars film

• The stargate scene of the end of 2001

• The whole of The Matrix - I had never seen anything like that in film before that

• The last 30 minutes of E.T.

• The emotional wave that I felt in the last third of Toy Story 3

• The first time I saw Into the Spiderverse

• Hello, my name is Inigo Montoya...you killed my father, prepare to die (Princess Bride)

• The plastic bag scene from American beauty (ignoring the problematic-ness of the rest of the film)

• The diner conversation in Heat

• Pretty much all of Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon

• The opening sequence of Raiders of the Lost Ark

• The moving rock sequence from Everything Everywhere All at Once

There were a bunch of others that my family suggested that got into TV shows as well:

• Peggy Carter’s “I know my value” from Agent Carter

• A bunch of moments from Doctor Who

• Vander’s speech to Vi in Arcane about power and influence

• Two core turning point moments in Andor

• Several of Bartlett’s speeches from The West Wing

• A specific moment in the third season of Battlestar Galactica that I will not spoil for my friend (MAMD) who hasn’t seen the show yet.

I am sure I could keep going but each one of these were mind-bending in their own way or they brought a sense of inspiration or deep emotion. With each, there truly was a sense of being brushed by awe and/or falling back in awe.

I’m curious, what moments would be on your list?

Grace, Peace, Love, and Joy,
Ed

PS - Scout’s ear gives the weather report…windy