Saturday, September 22, 2007

Top Ten Movies That Make Me Cry or MAN, Am I Sappy

Yeah, so I cry big time at movie and tv shows. Practically every episode of Friday Night Lights and Grey's Anatomy (before it started sucking) makes me cry. Half the reason I stopped watching E.R. was that I couldn't handle the emotional roller coaster that every episode put me on. (The other reason was that the entire original cast left and it got really repetitive.) My brother used to be too embarrassed to go to movies with me because I would cry. A lot. And he would hiss at me to shut up. Now, he just rolls his eyes.

Here's my list of movies (and one television episode) that make me cry:

  1. Whale Rider; If you haven't seen this beautiful, lyrical film, dude. Get on that, would you? Keisha Castle-Hughes is SO great as Paikea, a young Maori intensely drawn to her people's traditions, but pushed away by her Chief grandfather because she's a girl. Near the end of the movie, she wins a contest at her school with a speech about leadership and tradition (that she wrote for her grandfather) and is delivering it in front of the whole town and her grandfather isn't there. She goes ahead anyway and she's so heart-broken and crushed and her little voice is just trembling and seriously? That scene could make like, mannequins weep.
  2. The Return of the King; I am a huge Lord of the Rings geek. So, when the third movie FINALLY came out? I was totally hyped up for it. My brother, BW and I went to see it on Christmas day and the theater was so packed that we couldn't find seats together. Which is good, since I was in tears for most of the movie. But I broke out in actual SOBS at the scene where Frodo collapses at the top of Mt. Doom and Sam picks him up, slings him over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes and says, "I can't carry the ring, but I CAN CARRY YOU!" and hauls ass for the volcano.
  3. Little Women; The Winona Ryder/Claire Danes version. When Beth dies. And sometimes, when Well-Manicured Man (X-Files geek!) gives her the piano. When Claire Danes cries, I cry.
  4. Brokeback Mountain; I was crying for the entire last twenty minutes of this movie. Ridiculously sad. Especially the part where Ennis is hugging his shirt that he finds in Jack's closet.
  5. Finding Nemo and Lilo and Stitch; Yeah, yeah, I know. But I cry EVERY TIME when Dory is telling Marlin that she wants so stay with him because "when I look at you, I'm home." And Ellen DeGeneres's voice breaks on "home." DUDE. And the end of Lilo and Stitch when Stitch says that he wants to stay with his new family because even though it's "little and broken," it's "still good." Hilariously, I was working in a video store when both of these movies came out and since they were kid-friendly movies that didn't suck (and those are few and far between, lemme tell you) we used to watch them in the store a lot. And ALL of my coworkers knew that I would Cry. Every. Time. and would watch me when those scenes came up. Bitches.
  6. A Christmas Story; My family and I watch the TNT 24-hour marathon every Christmas. We all know it by heart, we all love it to pieces, we've all seen it a million times. But the scene where Ralphie gets his BB gun? And his dad is coaching him on how to load it? And doing these little hand motions and looking at him with such love and pride and nostalgia? Gets me every time. It was made especially poignant by Darren McGavin's death last year.
  7. A Walk to Remember; This was completely unexpected! I only watched this movie to mock it. I thought it was going to suck. And it kind of does. But if you only watch the Jamie/Landon scenes, it doesn't. Mandy Moore and Shane West have really good chemistry and are totally cute and you really buy them as a couple. And they get married because she's always wanted to get married in her mother's church and she's got cancer or something and why not? Surely, their love will cure her, right? NO. She totally DIES. I was NOT expecting that. Mame's comment on this story? "Bea. ANYTIME you watch a movie based on a Nicholas Sparks book, someone is going to die." Lesson learned, Mame.
  8. The Joy Luck Club; Gah, the scene where Jing-Mei's mother tells her that she has the "best-quality heart?" Embarrassingly, the last time I watched this movie, I was watching it for a class in college. I wept. My classmates and professor pretended not to notice. Thanks, guys!
  9. The Last of the Mohicans -- KIDDING. I only put this in to piss off Mame. It doesn't really make me cry, but I do like it! Despite what she says, the literary snob!
  10. Sense and Sensibility; I am such a sucker for movie/books/plays/tv shows where Character A loves Character B but doesn't think that B loves him/her back. They angst and cry about it and then it turns out that B DOES love them! YAYS! I think this movie is why. I imprinted on it early. The scene where Edward comes and tells Elinor that he loves her and his "heart is -- and always will be -- yours." And then she freaks the fuck out, laughing and crying and hiding her face in her apron. I think this was the first time I ever cried with happiness at a movie.
  11. Joan of Arcadia, episode 1.12, "Jump;" Man, do I love this show. Remember? The one with Amber Tamblyn (Tibby from Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants) where she talks to God? Yeah, that one. Most of the episodes were brilliant, but "Jump" is absolute GOLD. In this episode, Joan's friend, almost-boyfriend Adam (Christopher Marquette) is really depressed for a lot of reasons, some having to do with Joan, mostly having to do with his mom's suicide a few years ago. Joan confronts him and Adam tells her that his mom had left him a note and he's never read it because he's afraid that she will say that her suicide was his fault. Joan tells him that not knowing is probably worse and leaves. Adam shows up at her house first thing the next morning; with the note, not having slept. He tells her that he needs her to read it first and warn him of it's contents. Joan looks at the note and overwhelmed, passes it to Helen, her own mother. As Fiona Apple's cover of "Across the Universe" plays, Helen (Mary Steenburgen) reads the note aloud. In it, Adam's mother talks of her love for him and closes saying that, "In a world of pain, you were -- and always will be -- my joy." The look on Adam's face during this entire scene: fear, hope, love, joy...KILLS me. I've probably seen this episode a dozen times, I cry every time.
So, there's my list. I'm sure I now don't have a shred of credibility left. Heheh.

4 comments:

Auntie Mame said...

Last of the Mohicans? Really? ReaLLY? Ugh, I hate that you even mentioned it.
That being said, I totally agree with your list. Notice neither of us mentioned "City of Angels"?
Probably because you are a horrible, horrible, whore.

Anonymous said...

I soooo TOTALLY agree with Mame's inclusion of "The Notebook." Seriously, like the saddest movie. Ever. And, "Michael" got lots of "somethings" in his eyes throughout the entire thing. Who am I kidding...the bitch bawled. :)

~Josephine

Bea said...

Wait, Josephine...you don't remember what happened when you and I went to see "The Notebook" in the theater? How I thought you were going to kill me because I COULDN'T STOP LAUGHING?! I'm totally saving THAT one for another blog entry...Heh.

Anonymous said...

Well, yes...I remember that, but that is because you are strange slag...who has no soul. :)

I don't typically cry at movies, but this one got to me...saddest ever, well besides like Schindler's List.