Movies I Love: The Feels!

*Preemptive apology! I’m very sorry for the lazy writing of this post, but I’m finally allowed to work on my novel project again, and pretty much all of my focus is on reading through the first draft. It’s been a huge blow to my ego to do so, by the way, but that’s a whiny story for another day.*

            Movies are probably my favourite things to discuss, debate, gush over, and complain about.  They start discussions, forge bonds, even initiate change in the world. I personally love them to an obnoxious degree. I’ve conditioned friends to start rolling their eyes the minute I say, “So have you guys seen…?”

            I’m also a bit of an emotional masochist…uh, when it comes to movies. I love films that give me a big emotional response. Sad movies rip me to shreds, and I can’t get enough! It helps that I’m a wuss and will start tearing up the minute I hear a minor chord from a violin. I love entirely too many movies to say that this is a true Top List, but I can think of quite a few sad drama-type movies that I think everybody should see at least once.

            So in no particular order, here is a good compilation of movies off the top of my head that give me “all the feels.”

Let the Right One In

            Let the Right One In is probably the best vampire movie to come out in a decade in the oversaturated Twilight-era genre. Let the Right One In is the story of a young outcast befriending a stranger in his neighborhood; a strange “girl” named Eli.

            This movie is, in a word, haunting. It has some of the most beautiful and ghastly images (someone pours acid on their face, for example, and wow) and horrifying relationships I’ve seen in a while. Though it is a vampire movie, and there is definitely violence in it, it’s understated, cinematically gorgeous, and the young actors are exceptionally talented. There are two versions of the film, the original Swedish version and an American remake called Let Me In. The remake is good, and it remains fairly close to the original, but if you can handle reading along with subtitles, the original is worth the effort. CGI has become a big turnoff of mine, and the CGI in the remake is just comical at points, especially when compared to the subtlety of the original. And the book, ohhh God, the book is fantastic. It’s the only one that goes into detail about why I put the word “girl” in parentheses. But we’re not talking about books. See this movie. It’s dark, beautiful, fairly tragic, and spins a fresh take on vampires, which as of right now is sorely needed.

American Beauty

            This is a favourite movie of all time for many people, and with good reason. The story of a man’s midlife crisis and the transformation f him and his family, American Beauty is, well, beautiful. The writing is beautiful, the cinematography is beautiful, all of it. This movie has been talked about in film classes all over the country, so I won’t get too much into it. Just see it. If the ending doesn’t choke you up, you’re not human.

Shutter Island

Dear God, this scene...

            This is a seriously overlooked movie, and I’m not entirely sure why. Maybe it’s because there’s a little too much emphasis on the “mystery” or the “twist” of it, and the plot is pretty flimsy. Unlike The Sixth Sense, many people don’t enjoy a rewatch of Shutter Island once they know how it ends. That’s never been an issue for me. I love Shutter Island for two reasons: I have a wicked talent crush on DiCaprio, and this movie is visually gorgeous, especially the dream sequences. Madon’, I love the dream sequences. There is one scene in particular, somewhat early on, I think, that involves Teddy Daniels (Leo!) and his wife, and I just burst into tears. I can’t even describe how beautiful it is to me…there’s water, and embers, and ash fall…if ever there was a scene that is Dee Catnip, oh, this is it. And the ending! Sweet zombie Jesus! My heart was broken and it was beautiful. It’s been a very long time since I’ve watched this movie, and it’s still burned in my brain.

Bridegroom

            I almost didn’t put this one on the list because it’s a documentary about something that really happened, but it so emotionally shattered me that I just couldn’t leave it out. It’s a movie about the death of a man’s fiancée, and the aftermath of the situation. It has snippets of video diaries, interviews from friends and family, and dear God, it just rips out your heart. I think there are two points that make it a very strong film: First, it’s more about their relationship than Tom’s death, and secondly, while it does focus on the lack of rights gay couples currently have, they didn’t turn it into a political campaign. It remained tightly focused on Tom and Shane’s relationship, and Shane’s life just after Tom’s death. There were tears in my eyes the entire time I watched this, and though it is a documentary, I had to count it in here. Watch at your own emotional peril.

Gangs of New York

            Now, I don’t just love this movie because of my bizarre attraction to Bill the Butcher (don’t judge me) or my aforementioned DiCaprio crush. Gangs of New York is an absolutely amazing film. Set in 1860s New York, orphan “Amsterdam” Vallon struggles to gain the trust of notorious gang lord Bill the Butcher, the man who murdered his father, in order to get close enough for revenge. I am a sucker for the Five Points era of New York, and the writing and acting are phenomenal. It doesn’t start to get sad until near the end, when the raids happen, but once it gets started, it’s a downward spiral of tears. The last monologue (and image) gets me every time: But for those of us what lived and died in them furious days, it was like everything we knew was mightily swept away. And no matter what they did to build this city up again... for the rest of time... it would be like no one ever knew we was even here.

Interview with the Vampire

            I love this movie. No one writes vampires like Anne Rice, nobody does Lestat like Tom Cruise, and we can all ignore what Antonio Banderas did to the character of Armand…right? Well, maybe that last one is just me, but overall, the film adaptation of the (after) life of Louis de Pointe du Lac is breathtaking. (Spoilers) I always lose it the moment Louis touches the charred corpse of Claudia and she just crumbles into a soft cloud of ash. Oh, God…where are the tissues…

Equilibrium

I feel...fuzzy...

            I was surprised to find out that Equilibrium is treated as a B movie. Why?! Christian Bale lives in a dystopian world where emotion is illegal. The population takes a drug to suppress human feeling. Art, music, literature, anything designed to stir the soul is contraband, to be destroyed immediately. And now as I write this out…okay, I can see how it loses people. The plot is definitely a stretch, to put it mildly. The actors can’t really not emote like they’re supposed to; Taye Diggs is supposedly on the emotion-sucking drug and he’s still viciously ambitious. Christian Bale during his ‘numb’ scenes still gets confused, remorseful, a little irritated. Living without emotion is impossible. However, I still thoroughly enjoy Equilibrium. The fight choreography is, to use the technical term, fucking boss. It’s as impossible as The Matrix’s fight effects, but without the dated CGI. And I don’t know how he does it with such a heavy-handed plot, but Christian Bale makes me feel what he’s feeling. When he first hears Beethoven, I cry. When he’s looking out at the world for the first time off the drug, I cry. Again, this movie might just move me. You might not be able to get past the clunky dialogue and the moral being bludgeoned into your brain in a less than subtle fashion. But I still recommend it to everybody, because it’s just fun. And it ends the way The Matrix series should have ended. Just saying.

Pan’s Labyrinth

            Ingenious in so many ways. Visually breathtaking. Emotionally heart-wrenching, especially the ending. Though if you’re not used to foreign films, a heads up; it’s way more brutally violent than you’d think, given the subject matter. Again I won’t linger on this one since it’s so ridiculously acclaimed, but if you haven’t seen it, see it. It will break you in the best ways.

Brokeback Mountain

Aaaand I'm crying.

            Brokeback Mountain tells the story of one of the most heartbreaking romantic tragedies put to film. People who dismiss it as “that gay cowboy movie” are too ignorant and pathetic to realize what they’re missing. This is one of the best movies I’ve ever seen. An adaptation of a short story, it somehow remains perfectly true to its source material, and I still can’t figure out how they made a two hour movie out of a 30 page short story. Subtle is the best word to describe Brokeback. It doesn’t spoon feed anything to the audience. It relies on no stereotypes of homosexual relationships. It does not jump onto a soapbox. It is simply the story of tragic love, over a span of decades. It is powerful, perfectly acted (Ledger, especially, is amazing as the soft-spoken but complex Ennis Del Mar), and hard hitting. The ending of this movie utterly destroys me. Get over whatever jokes you’ve heard or prejudices you have, and watch it. Watch it.

Unbreakable

            One of the two films I adore from Shamylan, and I can’t really describe it without giving things away. Just watch it. Bruce Willis. Samuel L. Jackson. “They called me Mr. Glass.” Tears.

Black Snake Moan

            Speaking of Samuel L, this movie makes me feel so much! I don’t necessarily cry every time I watch it, but Black Snake Moan is powerful. A recently divorced farmer discovers a half-naked, beaten up young woman on the side of the road, and takes her redemption into his hands. It is a tragedy that the marketing was so exploitive. If you watched the movie because you saw the poster and thought it was going to be some kind of sexy southern slave thing, you came out of the theatre disappointed. There’s sex in it, but you don’t feel good watching it. You’re watching an extremely damaged girl struggle through PTSD, and it is dark. Samuel L. Jackson is compelling as Lazarus, and he and Christina Ricci have wonderful chemistry. This is one of those movies that I watch over and over again. I never get tired of it.

Requiem for a Dream

Her story scares me the most.

            I refuse to give a description. Watch it. By the time the credits roll, you’ll just be staring at the screen, slack jawed and tear-stained. This movie is worth a thousand of those idiotic DARE programs we had to go through in grade school.

Edward Scissorhands

<3 Forever and ever.

            I have to preface this by admitting that Edward Scissorhands has been my favourite movie for over a decade. Yes, it even beats out TDK, by a hair. It justifies every Johnny Depp/Tim Burton train wreck that’s happened since their collaboration on this film. I adore this movie. A partially mechanical young man, incomplete and all alone, is taken in by a family in suburbia. This movie is heavy handed in the Tim Burton way, both visually and in the characters, most of whom are parodies of housewives and bumbling suburban breadwinners. You pretty much know exactly where the plot is going. And I don’t care. I don’t care! Edward Scissorhands makes me laugh and cry. It breaks my heart every single time I watch it. I sob hysterically when “I love you.” is whispered in Edward’s ear. There is something so beautiful about this movie, and even though Tim Burton tries over and over again to rehash the “misunderstood loner” story, he’ll never, never top this one.

Watch it every Christmas!

The Boy in the Striped Pajamas

            Okay, I really have to warn you about this movie. If you don’t like sad movies, stay away. Even if you only kind of like sad movies, I wouldn’t recommend it. The Boy in the Striped Pajamas emotionally annihilates me. Annihilate isn’t even a good enough description of what happens. I don’t think there’s a word in the English language that can properly explain what I feel when I watch this movie. It’s about two children forming a friendship; one the son of a Nazi soldier, the other a young Jewish boy in a concentration camp. It’s brilliantly crafted and handles some very dark and emotional content with great skill. You can watch 99% of the movie and be moved, but it’s the ending that makes a little black crater where your heart used to be. I can’t even…this movie! I remember kids buying the novel for school when I worked at Booky Wooks, and I was shocked when they said they were watching the movie at the end. I’m not one for censorship (if that’s not too fucking obvious), but I was very surprised that they were permitted to watch such an emotionally hard-hitting film with the way schools handle their children like their psychological wellbeing is made of glass. Watch The Boy in the Striped Pajamas at your own peril. The ending makes me want to curl up into a ball in the shower and rock like a mental patient.

            There are plenty more movies that give me the feels, but these are certainly a good baseline of what makes me cry like a pansy. Grab a box of tissues, a soft blanket, and a cuddle buddy, and turn on the tears!






PS--Just had to share how AWESOME my hair looks right now!