MOVIES: THE CRYING GAME

Well, here it is. Captain Mike’s first drop in The Bucket! Some of you know that I have my own awesome blog, Moranadu, on which I ponder the meaning of dreams, weird experiences, personal obsessions and whatnot. Troy’s Bucket being primarily a pop culture blog, I will try my best to limit my comments here to movies, music, comedy and such.

Anyway, here we go. I am a reasonably intelligent and sensitive young man. I have been watching movies all my life, and like most other people I have cried at the movies a few times. In fact, I cried the very first time I went to the movies when my mom took me to see “Fantasia.” The dinosaurs in the “Rite of Spring” sequence scared the crap out of me. Mom did the right thing and took me out of the theatre. It’s a good thing she did, too. If I had stuck around for the “Night on a Bald Mountain” sequence with that giant devil dude, I probably never would have seen another movie again. But everything worked out for the best.

Here are ten of the movies that made me cry, or at least get a little misty. To avoid SPOILERS, I shall list all the movie titles in BOLD FACED CAPSLOCK, so if you don’t want to know the sad or inspiring thing that happened in that movie, please move along. Here they are, in alphabetical order.

ALMOST FAMOUS – My favorite scene in my favorite movie of all time. The band is on the bus. Morale is low. “Tiny Dancer” starts playing. One by one, they all start singing and remember what amazing, crazy, wonderful lives they are leading. “I have to go home.” “You ARE home.” Perfection.

EDWARD SCISSORHANDS – The last 10 minutes – Love, beauty, sadness and Danny Elfman’s glorious music. Bittersweet and gorgeous.

THE ELEPHANT MAN – Pretty much the whole thing, but John Merrick’s dying words and the dream that followed made be ball my eyes out.

GLORY – The campfire scene, “Give ‘em hell, 54th!” and Shaw’s body being moved into his regiment’s mass grave – Classic Man-Cry moments, all.

THE LORD OF THE RINGS: THE RETURN OF THE KING – When Frodo is boarding the ship and gives his friends a farewell smile… well, if that doesn’t make you miss your friends, you don’t love your friends.

MEET JOE BLACK – The whole long finale. Some say it’s too long, I don’t care. Anthony Hopkins’ character reminds me of my dad, and how I’d hate to lose him.

MILLION DOLLAR BABY – The sad smile and tear in Hilary Swank’s eye just before she gets put to sleep will rip your guts out.

MY GIRL – Okay, I was 13 when I saw this movie, but when the little girl busts into her friend’s funeral and demands that they put his glasses on… c’mon! It’s fucking sad!

THE NEVERENDING STORY – If the sight of Atreyu’s beloved steed Artex being sucked down into the Swamps of Sadness doesn’t make you tear up, you have no soul.

SAVING PRIVATE RYAN – Giovanni Ribissi’s slow, painful death is goddamn excruciating.

So there they are. I encourage the multitudes to chime in with their own picks. G.I. Jeff will likely tell us all about watching “Lonesome Dove” for the first time. If Industry Guy Speck ever decides to put fingers to keyboard, he might tell you about how verklempt he got over Ben Affleck’s I-wan’t-to-be-a-great-dad soliloquy from “Jersey Girl.” And we all know how emotionally wrenching the third season of “Survivor” was for Cody.

I have now hijacked Troy’s Bucket and made it a safe place for the sharing and mending of our collective pop culture wounds. To borrow a phrase from another Man-Cry masterpiece, let the healing begin!