# What's the first movie you recall seeing that made you cry? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [February 20, 2011, 9:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-first-movie-you-recall-seeing-that-made-you-cry/572047 "2011-02-20T21:11:34Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![cruel\_butterfly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/5daacb/32.png) [@cruel\_butterfly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cruel_butterfly)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2011, 9:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-first-movie-you-recall-seeing-that-made-you-cry/572047/61 "2011-02-21T09:34:17Z")
Dot and the Kangaroo. It was made in 1977, but I’m pretty sure I didn’t see it until I was about five. I don’t remember exactly what the movie was about, but I DO remember crying and having dreams about that movie for quite a long time after. ---
**Author:** ![Koxinga](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/4af34b/32.png) [@Koxinga](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Koxinga)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2011, 9:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-first-movie-you-recall-seeing-that-made-you-cry/572047/62 "2011-02-21T09:38:26Z")
> [@multimediac17](#): > > Titanic, I would have been about 8. Jesus Christ, you people remind me of my age with relentless regularity. If TV movies count, it was an adaptation of _All Quiet on the Western Front_, at the end (with Ernest Borgnine and John Boy from the Waltons), when I was about 8 or so as well. ---
**Author:** ![Sampiro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/2acd7d/32.png) [@Sampiro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sampiro)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2011, 9:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-first-movie-you-recall-seeing-that-made-you-cry/572047/63 "2011-02-21T09:45:02Z")
[QUOTE=Poysyn] And I still won’t watch Dumbo. As a child it bothered me because I identified with Dumbo, now I could not imagine the pain of being kept from my child. [/QUOTE] Or the shame of being locked in a Crazy Elephant wagon. Trust me… it never goes away. ---
**Author:** ![longPath](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/bb73d2/32.png) [@longPath](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/longPath)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2011, 12:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-first-movie-you-recall-seeing-that-made-you-cry/572047/64 "2011-02-21T12:37:00Z")
Mine was [Dog of Flanders](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0052745/) The second was more memorable: [Die Brucke](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Die_Br%C3%BCcke_(film)) I saw it on late-night TV. It upset me so much (I was maybe 12 or 13) that I went for a long, agnst filled walk to contemplate life, the universe and everything. I was picked up by the police who accused me of being drunk and or stoned and otherwise up to no good. My parents were delighted to be woken up at 3AM by the police who gave them a lecture on parenting. :rolleyes: I tried to explain but they weren’t interested to hearing about “Man’s Inhumanity to Man” from a troubled teenager. ☹ So I switched to watching The Three Stooges and getting stoned. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Dung\_Beetle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dung_beetle/32/7945_2.png) [@Dung\_Beetle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dung_Beetle)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2011, 1:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-first-movie-you-recall-seeing-that-made-you-cry/572047/65 "2011-02-21T13:35:28Z")
When I was a kid in the seventies, certain movies were shown once a year on TV and the event was practically a national holiday as far as we were concerned. I remember well assuming the position to watch Snoopy, Come Home…lying on the floor on my stomach, propped up on my elbows with my hands concealing the side view of my face so my brother wouldn’t see me crying. Of course, he was doing the exact same thing. Snoo-oo-oo-oo-py, Snoo-oo-oo-py, why oh why did you roam? Come home, come home. ---
**Author:** ![not\_what\_you\_d\_expect](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/not_what_you_d_expect/32/3246_2.png) [@not\_what\_you\_d\_expect](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/not_what_you_d_expect)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2011, 1:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-first-movie-you-recall-seeing-that-made-you-cry/572047/66 "2011-02-21T13:40:35Z")
> [@thirdwarning](#): > > That was my first thought, but then I remembered Romeo and Juliet came out before that. > I’m sure there were probably others that I don’t remember, earlier than that, and Thomasina might well have been one. But for Love Story, there were five of us girls sitting in the row in the theater, and fortunately one of the others had thought to bring a box of tissues. We passed it back and forth. My mom took about 5 or 6 of us girls too and we brought tissues with us also. It was quite a production. ---
**Author:** ![PeskiPiksi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/e495f1/32.png) [@PeskiPiksi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PeskiPiksi)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2011, 1:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-first-movie-you-recall-seeing-that-made-you-cry/572047/67 "2011-02-21T13:45:21Z")
_Where the Red Fern Grows_. For some reason it was the go-to movie for rainy days at my elementary school. I can remember sitting at my desk, sobbing so hard I couldn’t catch my breath. ---
**Author:** ![Fiddle\_Peghead](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fiddle_peghead/32/3506_2.png) [@Fiddle\_Peghead](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fiddle_Peghead)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2011, 2:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-first-movie-you-recall-seeing-that-made-you-cry/572047/68 "2011-02-21T14:19:35Z")
_Born Free._ I remember it like it was yesterday. ---
**Author:** ![JohnT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnt/32/15048_2.png) [@JohnT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JohnT)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2011, 2:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-first-movie-you-recall-seeing-that-made-you-cry/572047/69 "2011-02-21T14:57:39Z")
When I was 7, 8 I was on vacation @ Daytona Beach (FL) when, during a rainy day and we were all stuck inside, I caught this B&W (possibly French) movie about a young boy and girl who, IIRC, performed funeral services for animals (it was during a war, I think…). If it wasn’t funeral services, it was something akin to that, but regardless: dead animals were a big part of this film (or, better, a big part of my _memories_ about this film). Regardless, it was extremely sad… Any help identifying it would be appreciated. 🙂 I also cried during _ET_ and _Titanic_. ---
**Author:** ![JohnT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnt/32/15048_2.png) [@JohnT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JohnT)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2011, 3:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-first-movie-you-recall-seeing-that-made-you-cry/572047/70 "2011-02-21T15:02:16Z")
I posted this before, and since it’s a good story, I’ll do it again… > [@](#): > > We (the family) were driving to see my wife’s family up in New Jersey one Thanksgiving. Sophie, our six year-old, was in the back with a little DVD video player, so Daddy fired up a couple of favorites from when he was younger. > > The first was _Roger Rabbit_. Oops! There’s a lot of innuendo in this one… might be a while before we pull it off the shelf again. > > Well, the next was _ET: The Extra-Terrestrial_, which she adored from the get-go. She was all happy and “look, momma” and excited about ET. Momma was sitting beside her. > > So we’re driving up I-81 through Harrisburg and I hear GASP! “What’s wrong with ET? Oh no!” “He’s going to be OK, isn’t he?” “No!” … comments like that throughout the sickness/army scene. > > Then ET dies. My little girl is highly upset, her hands clenched around the DVD player, holding it tightly (she has it in her lap this entire time). “This is a bad movie! This is a BAD movie!” > > “Sophie, do you want to stop?” > > “No!” (shakes head furiously, in a way only small children can). > > So ET comes back to life. And she is thrilled, her emotional high as deep and meaningful as her low of 5 minutes earlier. And it’s back to the “Look, momma”'s and “Awwwwwww!”'s, and Sophie is happy, cheering Eliot and ET on as they escaped the “astronaut guys”, flying up in the air on their bikes, landing in front of the spaceship. > > “Momma? What’s happening? ET isn’t leaving is he? I don’t want him to go!” And she was upset again, but not nearly as upset as earlier. > > “I’ll… be… right… here…” > > The spaceship flies off, the music swells, and the credits start to roll. Sophie does two things: > > 1. Refuses to turn off the credits, watching them the whole way through. > 2. When they are done, and the DVD is at the menu, she looks up… > > “Can I see it again?” > > So she did, but after a long talk about the movie and what she saw, and What It All Meant. We pulled into a hotel and hooked the DVD player up to the TV so she could see it “big screen”. > > ET was **the** movie for the next two weeks. ---
**Author:** ![Biggirl](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/biggirl/32/3294_2.png) [@Biggirl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Biggirl)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2011, 3:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-first-movie-you-recall-seeing-that-made-you-cry/572047/71 "2011-02-21T15:13:06Z")
West Side Story. I saw it on TV with the whole family, it must have been the TV premier because I remember it being a big deal. I couldn’t have been more than 7. The “how many bullets?” speech still chokes me up. ---
**Author:** ![ThelmaLou](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thelmalou/32/390_2.png) [@ThelmaLou](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ThelmaLou)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2011, 3:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-first-movie-you-recall-seeing-that-made-you-cry/572047/72 "2011-02-21T15:18:06Z")
Bambi And Dumbo… the momma in the cage caressing little Dumbo with her trunk… ☹ ---
**Author:** ![Arglefraster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/3bc359/32.png) [@Arglefraster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Arglefraster)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2011, 5:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-first-movie-you-recall-seeing-that-made-you-cry/572047/73 "2011-02-21T17:21:30Z")
The Neverending Story, when Artax dies in the swamp. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Man\_In\_Black](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/bcef8e/32.png) [@The\_Man\_In\_Black](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Man_In_Black)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2011, 5:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-first-movie-you-recall-seeing-that-made-you-cry/572047/74 "2011-02-21T17:30:13Z")
When I was a kid, Interview with the Vampire brought a tear to my eye when Claudia died. ---
**Author:** ![Sattua](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sattua/32/11906_2.png) [@Sattua](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sattua)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2011, 5:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-first-movie-you-recall-seeing-that-made-you-cry/572047/75 "2011-02-21T17:31:47Z")
_The Last Unicorn_. I was four. ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2011, 5:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-first-movie-you-recall-seeing-that-made-you-cry/572047/76 "2011-02-21T17:41:44Z")
> [@Heyoka13](#): > > The First 3 Lives of Thomasina _The Three Lives Of Thomasina_ was the first movie I remember seeing in a theater. The interplay between Patrick McGoohan’s character and his daughter after he had Thomasina put to sleep was more than I, as a seven year old, expected from a Disney movie. ---
**Author:** ![Leaffan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/leaffan/32/299_2.png) [@Leaffan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leaffan)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2011, 5:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-first-movie-you-recall-seeing-that-made-you-cry/572047/77 "2011-02-21T17:53:13Z")
I don’t think I’ve ever cried emotionally at a movie, but “Darby O’Gill and the Little People” had a screaming banshee in it that made me want to crawl back into the uterus. Scariest damned thing I’d ever seen in my life up till that point. I was maybe 4 or 5 at the time. ---
**Author:** ![from\_a\_to\_z](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/5fc32e/32.png) [@from\_a\_to\_z](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/from_a_to_z)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2011, 8:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-first-movie-you-recall-seeing-that-made-you-cry/572047/78 "2011-02-21T20:02:28Z")
> [@JohnT](#): > > …B&W (possibly French) movie about a young boy and girl who, IIRC, performed funeral services for animals (it was during a war, I think…)… Jeux interdits (Forbidden Games) perhaps? [imdb](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0043686/), [Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forbidden_Games). ---
**Author:** ![Stainz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecd19e/32.png) [@Stainz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stainz)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2011, 8:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-first-movie-you-recall-seeing-that-made-you-cry/572047/79 "2011-02-21T20:03:36Z")
Bambi first. I think the second was E.T. ---
**Author:** ![JohnT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnt/32/15048_2.png) [@JohnT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JohnT)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2011, 8:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-first-movie-you-recall-seeing-that-made-you-cry/572047/80 "2011-02-21T20:10:41Z")
> [@from\_a\_to\_z](#): > > Jeux interdits (Forbidden Games) perhaps? [imdb](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0043686/), [Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forbidden_Games). As soon as I saw the title, I thought “THAT’S IT!!” Thanks! [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-first-movie-you-recall-seeing-that-made-you-cry/572047.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-first-movie-you-recall-seeing-that-made-you-cry/572047.md?page=5)