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'more tears are shed over
answered prayers than unanswered ones..'
(Philip Seymour Hoffman,
Capote)
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V for Vendetta |
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Su-ki-da |
I can't help but chuckle
when someone on a forum asks whether people ever cry at a movie. It's like
asking if I sneeze when my nose is being tickled with a feather, a
rhetorical and immature question. I used to cry buckets, almost every
night. In the last couple of years a balance has been found that normal
people might consider healthier. They're wrong.
Natalie Portman is no
stranger to the salty water: over someone else's loss, a boyfriend or the
whole world, arms raised in the rain, she even admitted looking forward to
a good cry in Garden State. In fact, these scenes are so riveting
that they can't be discussed here, for fear of repetition. A lot of
other great weepies shall be shamelessly ignored, because of high overall
positions and/or inclusion in the depression category. What more than Aoi
Miyazaki in distress, waiting in silence for seventeen years after taking
her breakdown time against the cloudy blue sky of Su-ki-da, does a
movie lover need anyway? Tears should never be overanalyzed, so we'll keep
it relatively brief. Also, there's the matter of privacy: some tearjerks
are too recent and personal, call it a secret and everyone will start
fantasizing, to share with the rest of the world, yet. I admit, such a
rare occasion happened only Once, but it's important enough to
mention, if only as proof that I'm not the tragic 100% exhibitionist I
sometimes seem to be. Enough about me already, let's hand out the prizes!
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An honorary award goes to
Touched (2005, Timothy Scott Bogart). This based on a true story tv drama
stars Jenna Elfman, Randall Batinkoff and Samantha Mathis, in
probably the biggest sentimental manipulation in history. It's about
a man who awakes from a coma, finds out his son is dead and his
nurse has the hots for him. Sounds excruciatingly bad? It is and it
ain't! Its honesty becomes nervewrecking, when you let yourself go
with the flow and try to imagine how YOU would react if a loved one
returned from the dead. Touched is exceptionally over the
top, really, you've never seen anything this preposterous. It just
screams for destruction of all intellectual reviewers
forever, so help us God. Never rate or rank again, sounds great. For
a while.
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5. Heavenly
Forest
(Tada, kimi wo aishiteru, 2006, Takehiko Shinjo)
When you grow up, your
heart dies, with a twist. In Japanese divine looking Heavenly Forest
a kind young man meets the most adorable quirky girl ever, Aoi Miyazaki
again, who apparently only eats cute little donut biscuits. In the years
that follow, the purest imaginable love will be cherished, kept within.
Photographs at an exhibition and a whole bunch of letters gives crying
over lost opportunities a new dimension. Melancholia with awareness that
everything is forever.
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4.
In America
(2002, Jim Sheridan)
Mom, dad and young
daughters all need to find their own way in shared grief over a lost
son and brother. Eleven year old Christy rightfully declares she has
been carrying the family on her back for the past year. Under a full
moon, just before the credits roll, she finally sees her father's
sorrow break through the choke. In America is magical.
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3. Griffin
& Phoenix
(2006, Ed Stone)
Two years ago, one by
one, all my friends started to embrace this surprise, spinning a web of
remembrance and compassion. Griffin & Phoenix is special because
it has its big breaking point in the middle, not at the end like
Grace Is Gone (and various other usual suspects). Emotions bursts
through the roof when love obviously was meant to be. Because of
terminal truth revealed.
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2.
Sad Movie
(2005, Jong-kwan Kon)
What's even more heartbreaking
than crying thrice? Slowly accumulate all tears from various tragic
stories for almost the entire length of the film, don't let them enter
the eyes just yet. Show concerned love, dying family and other fiery
scars, but with restraint. Then turn on a neverending hose. Sad Movie
must be the most appropriate title ever: genuine Korean sentiment at its
megamultiple supersoaking best.
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1. Dancer in the Dark
(2000, Lars Von Trier)
Lightyears ahead of
the rest, Dancer in the Dark could well be the most effective
tearjerker ever made: injustice at its very worst triggers
overwhelming memento of my own helplessness. Remembering specific
scenes isn't even necessary for the eyes to go moist, writing about
it has been postponed many times.
This managed to do for tears what The Exorcist did for fears,
obliterating both heart and mind at a scary fundamental level. |
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