How did The doctor not realize?

This is explained in the movie. Cole says that the ghosts don't know they're dead and that they only see what they want to see. We see some of this at the end of the movie. Throughout the film Crowe has difficulty opening the door to his office. What we see at the end is that this is because his wife blocked the door with a table.

Clearly what is happening is that Crowe and the other ghosts are not fully cognizant beings who are completely self aware 24/7. I agree in that case it would probably seem odd that not one person has an actual interaction with him for a year. He also would have noticed his wife going to his funeral, people coming over and paying their respects etc etc.

That's clearly not what's happening. Instead Crowe and the other ghosts only seem to be selectively aware of their environment and they seem to blink in and out rather than being aware of their environment the whole time. For example there's a couple of scenes with Crowe in his office but we never actually see him open the door and enter his office. Instead he's just appearing in it. Crowe travels to various areas in Philadelphia but obviously he's not driving a car. So his self awareness is kind of fuzzy. He knows that his wife has been ignoring him lately and he can interact with Cole more or less normally but he's clearly not fully cognizant of what's going on around him

Unless Alpert's covered in bacon grease, I don't think Hugo can track anything.

"ghosts don't know they are dead and they only see what they wanna see" that's the logic of it in this film .

My theory is that because Crowe is dead throughout the film, the laws of nature etc. are thrown out of the window. I think that in between the scenes involving Crowe and his wife and Crowe and Cole, he is in 'no mans land' where there is no consciousness. That way he isn't aware that he is dead. When it comes to the scenes where he is interacting with someone, he doesn't realise that he wasn't there the day before for example. There's also the possibility that in this 'no mans land's living in a fantasy and with he and his wife not talking in the real world, in 'no mans land' he could be arguing with her. That's why he isn't confused that his wife is ignoring him

While not ruining the film, it did seem like a not-quite consistent cheat. When he sees his wife in the restaurant he really acts like she specifically agreed to meet him him and at that particular restaurant, I don't see how that could be inferred from some other conversation.

Yeah. And the kid comes home and Bruce Willis is sitting there with the kid's mom, not talking to her. How did he get in the house? Walk through the wall? Did he not think it was weird he could walk through walls? She obviously didn't let him in - she can't see him.

It's a huge flaw that ruins the whole movie. But people really want to like the movie, so they're willing to overlook it. Also why is Kim Kardashian famous? No one seems to care.

I know this is an old thread, but not only did the movie mention that ghosts only see what they want to see, there is a scene at the beginning where Dr. Crowe goes to meet his wife for an anniversary dinner and she's already eaten. He says something about how time seemed to slip away from him or having trouble keeping track of time. The disjointed transitions throughout the film give the impression that Dr. Crowe is just popping up, here and there, without realizing it.

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It's been a long time since you posted but I wanted to respond anyway. If my parents' and paternal grandmother's marriages are anything to go by, married people don't speak to one another all the often.

With that said, I got the impression that Malcolm would make a plan in his mind and then suddenly be in that space and time (so would probably conclude that he went through the motions to get there). For example, he was shown going to the basement to get some of his (supposedly) old textbooks. We don't see him open the door (or pass through it). We just see him reaching for keys and then descending the stairs. Do you recall in the movie "Ghost" how the mean ghost guy explained "You have to do it with your mind!" when explaining how Swayze's character was supposed to get himself "engaged" with the physical world?

I think it's almost like the idea of us being so used to our own habits that we don't always think through every step along the way. I know that happens to me quite a bit. I guess it's just the brain's way of going on auto-pilot for things we've done a gazillion times already.


- Get busy living, or get busy dying. Andy (The Shawshank Redemption)