Most of us have a story about crying at the movies. Some people have a lot of stories about crying during a lot of movies. No judgment. The point of watching, at least for most of us, is to ride the wave of the story, and sometimes that story is really freaking sad. There’s a difference, however, between being sad during a movie’s runtime and that sadness lingering with you for a period of time after you’re done watching the movie.
That was a hot topic of conversation over the weekend, as a post on Reddit asking people about the most depressed they’ve ever been after watching a movie made it all the way to the front page. Thousands of people dropped in their favorites and tens of thousands of people upvoted the choices they liked best, and to my surprise, an animated movie wound up being the most talked about. No, it wasn’t Up. It turns out there are a lot of people going through their lives still thinking about how incredibly sad Fox And The Hound is.
The initial comment about Fox And The Hound got more than 2,000 upvotes and hundreds of comments with people chiming in with their own takes on the movie. A comment calling it one of “best Disney classics” got almost a thousand likes, and there were dozens of other comments that were some version of this one…
Every time I watch that movie, I tell myself I'm strong enough to tough it out. I am, in fact, not strong enough to tough it out. No matter how many rewatches.
That’s one thing I really respect about classic Disney animated movies. There are so many of them that aren’t afraid of heavy topics. Some people feel like little kids shouldn’t be exposed to sadness or loneliness or traumatic events, but they’re a lot more resilient than these people give them credit for. Life is fantastic, but it’s also really sad sometimes and art should speak to that, even if it’s directed at children.
Not all of the movies talked about were directed at children, however. The impetus for the post was Leaving Las Vegas, which is a profoundly adult movie and one of the bleakest and most depressing I have ever seen. That movie still lingers with me personally, as Nicolas Cage’s performance is filled with darkness but also enough light to continually remind you of how dark it is.
Other popular movies discussed were Wind River, Dancer In The Dark, What Dreams May Come, Manchester By The Sea, Requiem For A Dream, All Dogs Go To Heaven, The Pianist, The Wrestler, Glengarry Glen Ross, The Green Mile and The Virgin Suicides. One poor guy also brought up the fact that he took his wife to see The Road, and she’s still not happy about it, which is especially funny since that movie came out 16 years ago.
The Road. My wife is still miffed that I talked her into seeing this with me.
The hardest I’ve ever cried at the movies was during Up, but I think it’s very telling that that wasn’t a popular choice in this conversation. The Pixar favorite is incredibly traumatic during part of its runtime, especially during the saddest montage in movie history near the beginning, but you also leave that movie feeling hopeful about humanity. It’s a ride, but the ride ends on a high note. The same can’t be said for all of these movies, many of which leave viewers on a more somber note, alone in the woods for their own good.
But that’s not always a bad thing. One of the most important goals of anything artistic is to have an effect. You want people consuming it to feel something, even if it’s sadness, and all these movies clearly accomplished that. So, if you’re in the right frame of mind, I recommend all of them. Just make sure and swap to waterproof mascara first.
