In terms of a feel-good cinematic moment that lives long in the audience's memory, there are few scenes that can top a movie moment where reinforcements arrive at the last minute; a technique that has been used by some of the best movies of all time. Providing a welcome reprieve out of left field just when all appears to be lost, these uplifting sequences conjure up a happy ending in circumstances where such a conclusion didn't even seem like a possibility just mere seconds earlier.

From powerful heroes unexpectedly arriving on the scene of a blockbuster showdown to army reinforcements showing up to save the day just as the battle appears lost, this technique has been implemented to great effect by an array of genres, from the best superhero movies all the way to the finest war movies of all time. While such unashamedly feel-good scenes inevitably attract allegations of cheesy filmmaking,...