I agree with this entirely.
I do sometimes opt not to see a film that I suspect will just leave me a blubbering wreck, even if that film gets fifty million good reviews and everyone is telling me I’m a horrible person for not wanting to see it (Schindler’s List, cough).
No, of course I don’t dislike it. If I’m reading The Dogs of Babel where the wife’s death is an integral part of the story, it would be pretty stupid to say it’s done to fuck with the reader’s emotions. The death is part of the plot, and the story is awfully sad all on its own. On the contrary, I dislike everything I’ve read by Jodi Picoult because to me it seems like it’s calculated to say “Ha, now that I’ve got you good and hooked, I’m going to introduce a terrible twist! Cry!” and I don’t appreciate that.
But it’s never bothered me to the point of being unable to deal with the book or whatever itself.
You really should see the film. It’s funny through the vast majority of the film and a wonderful portrait of that particular time and place.
I know I haven’t seen it either and I don’t really know what it is about, but simply knowing the fact that it’s a dog that dies on his master’s bed is getting me all faklempt.
My (adult) brother nearly had to be escorted out of the theater for Marley and Me. I sympathize, but at the same time, I was asking him what was he thinking even going to the movie in the first place – I mean, one look at that book and that dog on the cover and you know it’s not a good choice for people I’m related to. I wouldn’t touch that with a 10 foot pole.
When I cried during Titanic I felt like my brain had been violated. I knew that it was just a combination of hormones, the score and manipulative, sappy storylines (the mom putting her kids to bed), but dammit – it worked. I was seriously in a red-eyed huff.
Yeah, but they marketed that movie as a big old Owen Wilson comedy with mad hijinks and everything…I’m glad I didn’t go on the basis of the ads.
The part that got me and still gives me a lump in my throat was based on an eye-witness account - Benjamen Guggenheim saying “We’ve dressed up in our best and are prepared to go down like gentlemen.” Here’s one of the richest men in the world choosing his honor over his life.
I think the whole point (to the extent that art needs a point) of what some posters call emotionally manipulative is to put you through the wringer so you achieve catharsis on the other side. That’s certainly my experience whenever I watch a movie that makes me sob – it pulls a lot of tension away and afterwards, I feel relaxed and clear-eyed.
But in general, I don’t think it’s a criticism of art to say it exists just to induce an emotional reaction. Well, yeah.
–Cliffy
I was told ahead of time when I picked up Prayer for Owen Meany that I would cry at the end. I’m actually not that big a fan of John Irving’s stuff. But damnit, he made me cry, the bastard.
I only get pissed when I cry and I think the movie/book wasn’t worth me crying over…most recently I didn’t like that I cried at the end of Benjamin Button.
What killed me about My Dog Skip was that Skip died still waiting for his Master to come back home, there was no final reunion for them. The Eternally Loyal Animal gets me every time (cf. Jurassic Bark). I certainly was some comfort when I left home that the dog I grew up with didn’t bond with me as completely as he did with my Mom. I don’t think he missed me much…but if Mom had died/left…he would have been one depressed little doggy in his final years.
Been there. My Mom had a little Yorkie, and they were devoted to each other. My brother had bought a duplex and had one side for our Mom and he lived in the other side. I’d stay with my Mom while visiting. She died of a stroke, and my brother had the little dog. And every time I’d take Skoshi out for a walk, she’s want to return to that side of the duplex…to see Mom.
Fuck it…I’m crying now.
When I read The Cider House Rules over a weekend, I cried a lot at the end.
And I thank John Irving for introducing me to a fabulous person (character), even though it didn’t turn out so well…
I cry at practically everything, and will go out of my way sometimes to watch something just because I know I will cry. It’s that feeling of catharsis, as said above. I have never been an emotional wreck over something, I have a good cry, and then I feel so much better. Oh my god, I watch Pan’s Labryinth about once a month, and as soon as I hear that music, I’m bawling. Hell, I cried during Space Buddies when the russian dogmonaut reunited with “his boy Sasha” (Yes, I watched Space Buddies, I’m a film snob who also enjoys talking dog movies).
Last weekend on vacation I read The Kite Runner and cried at around fifteen different parts. The only times I didn’t like crying was the times on the plane, but on the beach by myself? Good ole bawlfest! So no, I don’t dislike it at all, I actually judge how a good a movie is on if I cry or not (this applies to dramas and whatnot, not comedy or horror), which is why I didn’t think Kate Winslet should have got the Oscar for The Reader. I didn’t cry, because I didn’t really care what happened to her character.
I do realize my crying is ridiculous, and I tend to cry at happy things more than sad things.
Exactly. A death as part of a story is one thing; when the whole point of writing the story is to lead up to making the reader cry, that’s when I dislike it. I think Old Yeller is an example of the latter. The whole point of that movie was to make people cry.
I kind envy you folks who say you feel catharsis after crying from a story. I never ever have had that experience. For me, if a movie/book/whatever makes me cry, generally speaking that means that I will feel shitty and depressed for at least a full day afterward. But then, I’m bipolar so my emotions don’t always get off the train when the ride’s over.
For a book/movie/TV show to move me to tears, it has to catch me in the right mood and provide the right stimulation. Or, it has to play on emotions that I’m almost always in an emotional state about. The death of a character or real person I cared about deeply will do.
I saw Star Trek Saturday night, and I cried three times during it. I won’t explain the middle one, because it’s a spoiler, but the first time I cried was, literally, the minute the Paramount logo came on the screen. I turned to my more-than-slightly-bewildered girlfriend and said simply, “I miss Gene.” The third time was at the end of the credits when the film was dedicated to the memory of Gene and Majel, so it was pretty much the same cry I’d started two hours before.
When I saw Superman Returns, I was pretty much a puddle from start to finish, because they reused so much of John Williams’ score from Superman: The Movie, and as far as I’m concerned, that music will always be Chris Reeve’s music.
When Dumbledore dies at the end of Half-Blood Prince, I cried for fifteen minutes. I just couldn’t stop. My dog had no idea what was going on. My wife slept through it.
I can’t even explain to people what I like so much about the TV show Quantum Leap without getting teary.
None of these things bothers me. I would wonder what was broken in me if they did.
Can I take a guess? Because the only SK character death that made me flat out cry like a little girl was Wolf.
KneadToKnow!!! Just wanted to say that Quantum Leap is one of my all time favorites, and I would cry from the theme music. Never mind the beginning of Superman, Star Wars, freaking Jurassic Park, ok, so orchestral music really makes me bawl, way more than Old Yeller dying does. Like I said, I cry at joyous things much more than sad things. Probably the reason I enjoy crying 
Sorry… I got so involved with making a spoiler box in my last post that I forgot to answer the OP.
I hate being manipulated, so if I read or watch something that tries too hard to be ‘moving’ than that’s it, I don’t like it. I would regret wasting my time if I watched a movie or read a book gave me that impression. Maybe I am jaded, I don’t know.
On the other hand, if a movie or book makes me cry because it touched me without being overly dramatic, then I enjoy it. It doesn’t have to be high art, either. The most recent movie I watched that made me sad for a good day after I saw it was the remake of Dawn of the Dead. The ending just got to me. They were screwed no matter what.
God, I HATED that book! It was quite possibly the most idiotic series of waking up sequences ever. First he woke up from the nightmare–but he was still in the clutches of the evil nurse! Then he woke up again–in the parent’s car! Then he woke up again–and they hadn’t even gone on the trip! Then he woke up again…as a dog. Seriously?! You take the weakest, most cliched ‘twist’ ending in any story ever and use it FOUR TIMES? What the fuck? What were you possibly thinking? Were you thinking? Or did you just pick random pages from the file of M. Night Shyamalan rejects and mix them all together? And that story was actually interesting before that, too. They were…what, in the drywall or something? I was wondering how they could possibly escape. They don’t. They wake up over and over again. As dogs. Fuck!
I pretty much do, especially if it’s unexpected or, as others have said, that seems to be the whole point of the story.
Example, I cried at the end of The Boy in the Striped Pajamas… but I knew going in, there was no way I wouldn’t.
On the other hand, for A Walk to Remember… I went into it (well, put the video in) thinking it was going to be a sappy romantic movie. Instead I started crying half way through and cried for several hours after and just felt like crap the rest of the day.
It didn’t help that I was pregnant and hormonal at the time, but I would have utterly avoided it if I’d known.
I didn’t like that sort of thing any better when watching City of Angels, and I wasn’t hormonal and pregnant at the time. It just… pisses me off. It’s not cathartic for me, I just feel yucky and horrible after I cry especially if it’s over something sad. Happy tears are a different animal, especially since I’m not bawling my eyes out when it comes to those. More like a few sniffles and tears easily wiped away with a sleeve or kleenex… not a whole BOX of kleenex.