Sob story.
There are some things about me that I just can't change: I'm tall. I have green eyes. And I'm a crier. I cry when I'm happy and when I'm sad, and, occasionally, when I'm bored. It's not something I need medication for--it's just the way I've always been, and presumably will always be. Commercials make me cry. "Property of a lady" entries in Sotheby's auction catalogs make me cry. Abstract thoughts about major life changes make me cry.
I'm sure you can imagine that the average tearjerking movie and I get on like a house on fire. So in honor of this evening's viewing of Finding Neverland, here are the six movies most likely to turn me into an ocean of tears:
I'm sure you can imagine that the average tearjerking movie and I get on like a house on fire. So in honor of this evening's viewing of Finding Neverland, here are the six movies most likely to turn me into an ocean of tears:
- Schindler's List, 1993. I'm relatively sure that if you rolled Rodin's Thinker in front of a TV and forced it to watch this movie, it would cry, too. As far as I'm concerned, they key "I may just die of dehydration right here" scene in this black-and-white movie is the appearance of the girl in the red coat. The first time I saw it, I was all "oh look! Hope! She's highlighted so we'll know that she survives!" How quaint of me--of course she's highlighted so we'll be sure to notice her on top of a pile of bodies shown several scenes later.
- Little Women, 1994. Is there an incarnation of this book that fails to bring on the waterworks? Poor, boring, pointless Beth's tragic death gets me every time.
- The Fox and the Hound, 1981. I haven't seen this movie since I was six years old, so scarred am I by a tragic ending that I can't even remember. Someone dies, I guess. All I know for certain is that my parents still like to tell the story of how I alarmed fellow theater-goers with my loud, pathetic sobs.
- Titanic, 1997. It's profoundly uncool to admit that you like this movie these days, but I myself didn't see it enough times to account for the gazillions of dollars it made, so somebody out there isn't fessing up. At this point, I've built up an immunity to cute baby Leonardo DiCaprio floating off into Davy Jones' Locker, although I cried every single time I saw it in the theater. The killer, as far as I'm concerned? Little old Rose's purple-painted toenails.
- A Little Princess, 1995. The only movie on this list so wonderful as to have a quote in my Magic Lunchbox of the Best Things Ever Written: "I am a princess. All girls are. Even if they live in tiny old attics. Even if they dress in rags, even if they aren't pretty, or smart, or young. They're still princesses. All of us. Didn't your father ever tell you that? Didn't he?"
- Sleepless in Seattle, 1993. It probably takes a special kind of weirdo to cry through this entire movie, but let me assure you that I am that very kind. Soppily romantic and essentially just dumb, Sleepless in Seattle is everything I ask for in two hours of entertainment. In response to a question about why he loved his life, this answer sealed my lifelong devotion: "It was a million tiny little things that, when you added them all up, meant we were supposed to be together...and I knew it. I knew it the every first time I touched her. It was like coming home...only to no home I'd ever known." Do you hear that noise? It's the melting of my cheese-loving heart.