What I got out of the actual death was that Aurora and Emma made an eye communication. They loved each other like children and parents love each other, and whatever anger and mistakes that had been made were forgiven. I will always love you. That’s what happened there, in that split second before she died.
Well, I blubbed when I first watched Dead Poet’s Society (having said that I was 14 at the time)
Heres a curve ball one: The Majestic (don’t laugh, I know its cheesy)
I can’t help get a little sniffly when I come to this specific spot in this movies, either.
Colours of the Wind - Pocohontas
Boo hoo hoo… it’s done it again.
I came here to post this. That, and when Jackson comes home and Jack Jr. is crying and pointing toward his mom on the back porch, unable to communicate what had happened…OMFG. And when they pull the plug. I pretty much bawl uncontrollably for twenty straight minutes during this movie.
The scene in **ROTK ** (?) where Faramir and co. are trotting down the streets of Gondor, grim and silent. And then the followup where they’re charging across the plain. The music and the plunging black horses and their riders.
Even thinking about it makes me shiver.
Me too.
I have a couple that haven’t been mentioned here so far. I cried twice during Cinderella Man, once at the end and once when Mae steps outside the apartment to cry because her kid is sick and she honestly has no way to help him.
Also (don’t laugh) during Riding In Cars With Boys when Beverly sends Ray away because she knows it is what has to be done even though she knows it will emotionally destroy her son.
Another vote for * Terms of Endearment* Wow, I’ve seen the movie about five times and the hospital scene with her two sons gets me every time.
I cry at everything. Beaches, Terms of Endearment, Steel Magnolias, ET, etc., etc…
But two honorable mentions:
1- I had not read the LotR books, so when Gandalf was killed by the Balrog, I was inconsolable. And then, when we saw TRotK, I cried pretty much throughout the entire movie, at the majesty and the horror and the drama. I say these are the finest films of my generation.
2-This is TV, but kills me every single time (and I’ve seen it multiple times a year on TNT) - when Mark Greene dies on ER. It breaks my heart, and seems to transcend the serial drama brain tumor plot.
Yes, I’m almost tearing up now…
It wasn’t cheesy.
I cry at almost every movie I see. I cry at many TV shows and even some commercials. Hell, I even cried at the South Park movie when Kenny sacrifices himself at the end. Odd, because I very rarely cry at all at real things that happen in my life.
Two scenes from TV stand out in my mind. One of them was in the show The Practice. A shleb independent lawyer comes to The Practice firm and asks for help in defending a man he knows for a fact is innocent of indecent exposure, because he has photos of the mans naughty bits and they are huge, not at all like the description of the victim. THe man is ecstatic. He’s never won a case in his life, and he’s probably 45. He has no confidence, and for once he has an airtight case.
The case goes to jury, and the verdict is found guilty. It turns out that one of the jurors knew about plastic surgery and stated categorically during deliberation that the man’s equipment had been modified. When the guy from The Practice finds this out from questioning members of the jury, he immediate goes to the judge and it is declared a mistrial, because the jurors aren’t allowed to throw in additional evidence. THe jurors of course hadn’t known this.
The pathetic lawyer, however, is sitting on a bench just outside the courtroom with a Columbo style rain coat, a cheap suit, and his brief case on his lap clutched to his chest, with the most despondent look on his face you’ve ever seen. There’s suicide in his eyes; even with what seems to be an attorney’s dream case, he can’t win.
I hated Kelly for writing that. I cried for hours; The idea of someone trying his best for years upon end and never, ever succeeding is one that is intrinsically tearful for me.
The other scene was episode 6, season 4 of Babylon 5, when the Alliance finally kicks both the Vorlons and the Shadows out of the Galaxy. Now these guys have been running around like the lords of creation, not only killing sentient life forms, but destroying planets without the slightest hesitation. But when in negotiation, they finally realize that it’s their time to leave, they turn to Lorien, the uber Old One, who was old when they were young (as they were old when we were young). The Shadow, who were particularly ruthless, lifts his foreleg (a puppy gesture trying to win affection from an older dog) and asks with a teary catch of fear in his voice: “Will you come with us?” They were afraid without him. I cried for a few hours over that one too.
If you want a decent tear fest at the moment, try this bittersweet film that I saw today (about 6 and 1/2 minutes):
But as I said, I’ll tear up at virtually anything. I’d have to say my biggest single one is self-sacrifice to others or to duty.
Not to be deliberately unpopular but, Terms of Endearment was a good movie, but its emotion leaned too much towards schmaltz for me. Iron Giant too. It wasn’t schmaltzy, but I just wasn’t quite believin’ the characters enough to get emotional over them at the end.
The goodbye scene at the end of Schindler’s List is rough. Talk about a scene that has earned your genuine emotions! I shudder imagining Liam Neeson having to do that scene more than once.
The final scenes in The Effects of Radiation on Man-in-the-Moon Marigolds is devastating. The smart, cute little girl who never hurt anyone finally has something to be proud of, smiles for the first time in her life, and then- jesus-tap-dancing-christ! If you’ve never scene it, um, don’t!
One I’m really embarrassed to admit, from TV, the final scene in the final episode of Jim Henson’s Fraggle Rock. After five years everything falls apart, then comes back together!
But the worst for me is one somebody already mentioned, namely Allegro non Troppo. Just typing those letters here tears me up like Pavlov’s dog. No other piece of film can do that…
The hands-down best movies for inducing copious waterworks, and two movies I will never ever watch again, except perhaps, perhaps, if a loaded gun is pointed toward my head and held by a known psychopath, are
Life is Beautiful with Roberto Benigni
and
Sophie’s Choice with Meryl Streep.
I cried for days after seeing those. Never again. Never, never again…
Emma Thompson’s *Wit *left me in a blubbering heap - it’s one of those movies I want to see again, but I don’t know if I can.
Whale Rider. I made it to the speech, my mother started blubbing during the hospital scene (IIRC the first or second scene).
And Captains Courageous - Spencer Tracey’s final scene gets me every time.
I rarely cry at movies - my husband’s the one for that. A.I. got me, though - at the scene where the mother’s leaving him in the woods. Got my husband, too, I don’t remember what scene, and my son, at the Flesh Fair. It was a Tearful Triumvirate!
My husband’s trigger is father issues. Big Fish went about like you’d expect.
My usual trigger (*A.I. *notwithstanding) is a little more weird: it’s *happy *endings. Happy, beat-all-the-odds, life is a beautiful thing and people love you unconditionally 'cause you’re so fracking awesome endings. Swelling orchestral movements to beaming actors with arms spread wide to panning crane shots. A tearjerker leaves me cynical and cold, but a happy ending gets me every time. I didn’t cry when Jack died, I cried when Rose’s pictures showed what a great life she led anyway.
I cry at the end of Yentl, for god’s sake. Every. Single. Time.
Heresy! Heresy, I say! OK, spoilered:
[SPOILER] The robot, who has been kept secret, “comes out” in order to rescue a couple of kids. The military panic, and attack him, and he goes into full battle mode: he’s a damn war robot. The square-jaw FBI dude panics, and calls in a nuclear strike: a missile is heading for the town. They’re all going to die.
The robot, having been appealed to by Hogarth, pulls back from rampage mode, and decides that he won’t be a weapon for someone else: “I am not a gun”. He’s free. But now someone has to save the town, and so he takes off and launches himself on an intercept with the missile. He’s going to sacrifice everything, including his new found life and friends, to save everyone.
His final words to Hogarth echo what Hogarth told him in the woods: “I go. You stay. No following.” He’s going to die to save his adoptive son. And then, just before he impacts with the missile, he closes his eyes beatifically and murmurs to himself, “Suuupermaaan.” He is not a gun, he’s a hero.[/SPOILER]
This is the one scene in a movie where if you don’t cry, you are not a Real Man.
Lots of things make me almost tear up, but only one movie has ever made me actually cry, with the sobbing and actual tears and stuff: Stardust. At the end.
Some other close calls are Gladiator (at the end), Forrest Gump (when Bubba dies and at the end), In America, I am Legend (when the dog dies), Cinderella Man, Goblet of Fire (when Cedric dies), Mark Green’s death on ER, Jurassic Bark , …I guess I’m becomming sentimental in my old age.
American Splendor
Breaker Morant
The Butcher Boy
Breakfast On Pluto
Goodbye, Lenin
They all made me cry floods.
I’m sure I would have cried had I got that far, it sounds really touching. From what others have said about the end and “Superman” I just assumed he’d flown away or something.
Empire of the Sun,
The end and the middle when the Japanese Pilots are preparing to become Kamikaze and when Jim reveals to the doctor that he can’t remember what his parents look like, when finds the relief drop full of food and he attacks it like a wildman and of course during the he gave me a mango scene.
Gallipoli
What are legs?
Steel springs.
What are they going to do?
Propel me down the track.
How fast can you run?
As fast as a leopard.
How fast are you going to run?
As fast as a leopard!
I’ve only seen The Color Purple once, because I refuse to watch it again.
I’ve seen parts of it since then–caught it on TV–and I think to myself, “Um, no, I have to go to work in a couple of hours…if I have to be seen in public today people will assume my boyfriend beats me or my dog died…” and then I change the channel.
Even the happy parts are tragic, because they are so ephemeral, and you know this while you’re watching it. When Oprah’s character has to skip Christmas with her family after all, because that silly stupid woman is too scared to drive??
I hate that movie.
And Breakfast at Tiffany’s is my favorite movie of all time…for reasons that a.) don’t need an explanation and b.) defy most of them anyway.
And I’m fine up until the very end, when Holly Golightly is screaming to find her cat, and then–right when he says “Meow!” and she finds him–the orchestral “Moon River” starts, and she falls apart, crying and apologetic, and runs to Paul, aka Fred, soaking-wet cat stuffed into her coat…
I’ve seen it over a dozen times.
And I still get just as pathetically misty as the first time I saw it. I think it’s pathetic, but something about that movie makes me stupid.