I remember seeing Jurassic Park when it first came out in the theaters. I saw it at a matinee showing, so it was broad daylight when we came out of the theater. I was an adult, seeing the movie with my husband.
I swear to god, even knowing how retarded I was for doing it, I was totally looking around the parking lot nervously in case there were any velociraptors lurking around.
Really.
Also, after seeing Jaws I’d get nervous swimming… in swimming pools.
So what movies have caused you to have nightmares or cry or do something that you feel really stupid about, given the context?
In college some friends and I were watching “Ordinary People.” During as especially poignant/depressing scene (well, yes, there were many,) my friend Dan and I began laughing hysterically and couldn’t stop. Kind of ruined it for everyone else.
Well, I don’t feel stupid about it, but it was a bit ridiculous considering the sheer extent of how emotional I was.
In the last season of Inuyasha (the new episodes on Hulu): When Kikyo died for the final time, I cried for 10 minutes straight. I’m talking bawling, wailing like a banshee, tears-dripping-down-my-face crying. I cried more for Kikyo than I did for my grandmother. It was a really touching moment, full of emotion regarding the triangular affair between her, Kagome, and Inuyasha, but… damn.
I’ve had a lot of emotional reactions to a lot of movies, so it’s really hard to pin down just one. So I’ll go ahead and just mention the three that jump to mind:
The Prestige - Near the end, when everything is coming together. Borden is heading to his death and Angier is describing what effectively amounts to repeated suicide. I had a pretty emotional reaction to this. I wasn’t crying or anything, but it touched me.
Crash (the 2005 film about racism, not the 1996 one about sex) - When Lara Ruiz is apparently shot point blank by Farhad I was pretty moved.
And finally- the only anime film I like- Sword of the Stranger - During the climax of the film when The Man With No Name draws his sword for the first time in the movie and the music picks up super loud and shit, my blood was pumping big time.
Edit: I just realized that we’re supposed to be listing movies that we feel ridiculous for having emotional reactions to. Apologies. I don’t feel silly for having been affected by any of these films.
While watching the Rugrats movie, I cried my eyes out when the dog, Spike, fell off the bridge, even though it was a kids’ movie and he’d almost have to be fine. I think it’s the same weekend I cried throughout most of The Mighty, even the non-sad parts, because I knew how the movie would end.
PMS sucks that way.
I can tell you the two most awkward moments I’ve experienced in movie theatres.
The first was when I was involved in a college production of The Imaginary Invalid. After the show, pretty much the whole cast got together to go see the just-released Pulp Fiction. During the scene where Butch Coolidge is wailing on Marcellus Wallace in the rednecks’ gun shop, one of the rednecks points a shotgun at Butch, cocks it, and says, “Take your foot off the nigger!” For whatever reason, I found that line so absurd and odd that I let out a pretty loud cackle. In a theatre. With others present. And I was the only one who did.
The other (similar) incident: my best friend and I were in a theatre watching The Patriot, and during a scene where Mel Gibson is in a local tavern trying to conscript soldiers for the rebel cause, a grizzled old Walter Brennan type comes up and declaims, “You c’n have my nigra!” Again, both my friend and I cackled at the sheer preposterousness of the line. And again were the only ones who had that reaction.
And I assure you, I’m not racist. In fact, some of my best friends are black, etc., etc.
I cry during every animal movie. Milo and Otis, and Homeward Bound, especially. I mean, I CRY! Happy ending? Cry. Lost doggie? Cry. Kitty fell in a river? CRY! I’m tearing up right now.
When we saw the original Star Wars movie many moons ago, it was so awesome! We drove home in the evening on the busy highway, and I swear to God, all the taillights, the headlights, streetlights, and the sheer rush of the car zipping along - I felt like it was US in Han Solo’s ship. The weirdest feeling, just that one time - now we’re just driving along down Rt. 81 to get to the rez, but there was that one time we were flying through space.
When I walked out of the theater after seeing *Who Framed Roger Rabbit, *I totally expected to see “toons” scurrying around in the street (even though I was in my 40s).
At the end of the last episode of the show Spaced:
Tim and Daisy, the two friends with romantic tension, make a tenititve move towards getting together. They’re watching TV, and she lays her head on his shoulder, and he nervously leans his head back, and that’s the end of the show.
I don’t know why but after seeing that, I burst into tears, and just sat there, bawling for, like, 15 minutes. It was one of the most unexpected, unexplainable cries of my life.
And, like many others here, I could be found in nearly incoherent sobs, shaking my head and muttering, “Over a damn cartoon *dog!” *after a certain episode of Futurama.
The end of The Office (UK version, Christmas special) made me cry like a beaten child. I know why, rationally, but bloody hell. I well up at pictures of sad kittens, but that was uncontrollable sobs.
For whatever reason (I mean, it’s certainly not a favorite of mine), I broke down into a sobbing mess for about twenty minutes after finishing The Curious Case of Benjamin Button.
This is really embarassing now, but… after seeing the Blair Witch Project in the theater, I made my friend pull the car around so I wouldn’t have to walk past the “trees” in the parking lot. This was a mall parking lot, and those anemic, isolated trees were probably shorter than me.
I had a similar reaction to The Blair Witch Project, but in my defense, I was living out of a tent in a campground full of Rennies with a twisted sense of humor. By the time I got back from the theater, they had those little stick dudes hung up all over the f’ing trees outside my tent!
The most embarrassing emotional reaction I ever had to a movie was when I sobbed heartfelt tears of pity throughout the entire viewing of…Naked Gun.