Handlung

Elizabeth Masterson (Reese Witherspoon), an emergency room physician in San Francisco whose work is everything. Elizabeth loves gardens and that is her designated "Happy Place", where she goes mentally for rest and relaxation. She has been on her shift for 23 hours straight. Despite everything, Elizabeth always has a smile on her face and is friendly with patients. She has no life outside of her work and sometimes she feels lonely because of that. Dr Walsh (Ron Canada) confirms Elizabeth's position at the hospital as an attending physician, which is why she was working so hard. She gets in a car crash while on her way to a blind date at her sister's.

Three months later, landscape architect David Abbott (Mark Ruffalo), needing a fresh start after his wife's death, takes a sublet on Elizabeth's apartment. David has looked for many apartments but was not able to find something that he liked. Either they were too modern, too Victorian, and so on. The flier for Elizabeth's apartment flew off a notice board and fell on top of David. The apartment was only available for a month, but David likes it as the apartment comes with a roof, a couch and sky windows. David spends his time watching old videos and drinking beer on the couch.

Elizabeth begins to appear in the apartment, and both are confused. She thinks he is a squatter, and he thinks she broke in. David tells his therapist friend Jack that he is hallucinating a person.

They soon realize she moves through walls and objects. Elizabeth does not know who she is, and insists she is not dead. David unsuccessfully tries to have her spirit exorcised using priests, oriental remedies and even Ghostbusters. As only David can see and hear her, others think he is hallucinating and talking to himself. Elizabeth asks him to help her discover who she really is. David talks to her neighbors but they did not know her.

David enlists the help of a psychic bookstore clerk, Darryl (Jon Heder), who says Elizabeth is not really dead. He also tells David he has clearly got a blocked heart and needs to let go of the woman who was previously in his life. Darryl says that David has dark aura around him, and it is killing him. When Elizabeth says he should get over being dumped, he storms out, and Darryl tells Elizabeth to not disrespect the dead. She finds David and he explains about the death of his wife Laura. Elizabeth won't allow David to have a drink and possesses his body to make him throw his drink and walk out of the car in front of Jack.

David agrees to help Elizabeth to find out who she is and checks with all her neighbors. But they have no recollection of Elizabeth, as she was never home. Elizabeth tells David where she keeps the spare key to her apartment (underneath the fire extinguisher in the apartment lobby). They visit the dry-cleaners as well but get no clues. They walk around the neighborhood to see if Elizabeth can recognize a place that she used to visit frequently. Checking a restaurant she recognizes, a man has a medical emergency, so Elizabeth helps David save his life. Suddenly, she remembers being a doctor, and they go to the nearest hospital, where it all comes flooding back. Dr. Fran Lo (Rosalind Chao), her mentor, takes him to Elizabeth, who is in a coma. When David touches her hand, Elizabeth feels it, meaning she is still connected to her body.

Elizabeth's sister Abby (Dina Waters) arrives, and Dr. Brett Rushton (Ben Shenkman) - Elizabeth's rival - notifies her that Elizabeth signed a DNR (Do Not Resuscitate) order. He asks her to sign off on disconnecting life support, and she says she will consider it.

David and Elizabeth bond. When he takes her to a beautiful, landscaped garden he designed, she tells him she senses she has been there before. In fact, she was dreaming of the garden (in the opening scenes of the film), while catnapping during a long shift.

When David is told he has been offered a long-term lease, he realizes Elizabeth will be taken off life support. He tries to prevent it by going to Abby's to tell her that she is communicating with him. While there, Elizabeth discovers that her niece Lily can see her. David begs Abby to keep her alive, but she has already signed the papers, with life support ending the next day. As a last-ditch effort, David blurts out Abby's secret from her wedding day, freaking her out so she drives him out of her house.

Elizabeth opts to spend her last night with David in the apartment. The next morning, he is determined to prevent her death by stealing her body from the hospital. He enlists his friend and therapist Jack (Donal Logue) to help. It turns out Jack is Abby's former college boyfriend, and the two had set up David and Elizabeth for the blind date on the night of the crash; David can see her because they were meant to meet. He admits to Jack and Elizabeth that he loves her.

Security guards catch them trying to steal Elizabeth's body. As they pull Jack away from her, her breathing tube comes off. Elizabeth is now dying, and David frantically kisses her body, while her spirit fades away. Her heartbeat returns and she awakens from the coma. She recognizes Abby, but not David, and he sadly leaves.

Sometime later, Elizabeth moves back into her apartment. Drawn to the roof, she finds David, who has transformed it into a landscaped garden. He reveals he had gotten in using the spare key her spirit had shown him. When Elizabeth asks for her key back, their hands touch, her memory of the events during her coma are restored, and they kiss happily.

The final scene fades away from the rooftop to show Darryl staring into a snow globe, happy with "seeing" how things have turned out.