Hugo is the 2011 Martin Scorsese film about an orphan boy, Hugo, who secretly maintains the colossal train station clocks in 1930s Paris. Hugo had a tender relationship with his father, until his father died tragically in a fire. Now Hugo is struggling to survive, scrounging for scraps of food, and stealing parts from a toy shop so he can rebuild a mechanical man that he and his late father had tried to restore.

Hugo and his friend Isabelle, another orphan, both about 12-years-old, are up in the tower surrounded by the massive and intricate workings of the train station clock. Referring to the head librarian of Paris, the kind and loveable Monsieur Labisse, Hugo says: "He's got real … purpose."

"What do you mean?" asks Isabelle.

Hugo says,

Everything has a purpose, even machines. Clocks tell the time. Trains take you to places. They do what they're meant to do …. Maybe that's why broken machines make me so sad. They can't do what they're meant to do. Maybe it's the same with people. If you lose your purpose, it's like you're broken.

When she hears the word "broken," Isabelle immediately thinks of "Papa Georges," her sad and bitter godfather, a broken man who has had his dreams crushed by life.

Hugo says, "Maybe we can fix him."

"Is that your purpose," Isabelle asks, "fixing things?"

Hugo: "I don't know. It's what my father did."

Isabelle: "I wonder what my purpose is."

Hugo: "I don't know."

Isabelle: "Maybe if I'd known my parents … I would know [my purpose]."

They together walk to the inside face of the giant clock. Below them is a stunning, breathtaking view of Paris lit up at night, with the Eiffel Tower in the distance. Hugo continues:

Right after my father died, I would come up here a lot. I'd imagine the whole world was one big machine. Machines never come with any extra parts, you know. They always come with the exact amount they 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.

The scene ends with an overhead shot of two giant, interlocking, turning wheels and Hugo and Isabelle surveying the spectacular view of Paris.

This scene is from Chapter 10, start and end time: 1:18:32-1:20:52