I always thought watching Alfred Hitchcock films was good for the brain.

Or at least, my brain.

Turns out it may be good at reaching others' brains -

http://www.cbc.ca/news/health/alfred-hitchcock-film-offers-neuroscientists-clues-to-vegetative-state-1.2767010

Alfred Hitchcock film offers neuroscientists clues to vegetative state

Brain-injured patient, a man in his mid-30s, responded to key turning points in film

CBC News Posted: Sep 15, 2014 5:16 PM ET Last Updated: Sep 15, 2014 5:16 PM ET

A short Alfred Hitchcock film has helped neuroscientists in London, Ont. to detect awareness in a Canadian who was thought to be in a purely vegetative state for 16 years.

Researchers at Western University used a specialized MRI scanner to analyze the brain activity of 12 healthy participants and two people with brain injuries as they watched a suspenseful, eight-minute clip of Hitchcock's Bang! You’re Dead, the scientists said in Monday’s issue of the journal The Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the USA (PNAS).
One of the brain-injured patients is a man in his mid-thirties who hasn’t interacted with anyone in 16 years. His brain was deprived of oxygen after a blow to the chest.

"What we saw is that his brain changed at all of those key moments in the movie in exactly the same way as a healthy volunteer," said study author and neuroscientist Adrian Owen, a professor at Western.

"Essentially we were getting at consciousness. We were measuring or detecting the fact that this patient was able to follow the plot."