Wednesday, July 7, 2010

I'm a big fat crybaby. I didn't used to be, then something happened to me. I don't know what it was. Love? A grasp on mortality? A grip on what is truly emotional? I don't know. But one year I got really depressed, and after that every piece of art that I sought out had to be my catharsis, and now I cry all the time when I'm sad, happy, empty, or, most of all, MOVED.

freakin' movies, freakin' makin' me cry all the damn time.

Top Katrina Is A Crybaby Movie-List:

1. In America
This may have been circumstantial, I'm not sure, but the last time I watched this movie was in a classroom setting and I had to keep myself from sobbing. And I had seen it before. Yet... I guess now that I can recognize my family and so many families that I love as having so much in common with the pain and hard work that is on display in this movie I'm just too in touch with their plight. This movie was actually key to understanding something about myself, too, which I don't mind talking about anymore:
The scene that most gets me is towards the end, when the mother is dying and needs a transplant and the little girl steps in to offer her blood. The dad wants to talk to her for a minute, so the doctors leave and he starts talking about how it's a big decision and that everything's going to be okay. She cuts him off, angrily, and tells him to come off it and stop "little girl"ing her, that she's been carrying the family on her back since Frankie died. Though the whole film is super emotional, that scene made me nearly break down. Afterward, my teacher singled out that scene as being the only unbelievable part in the movie. No little girl would talk that way, she said. Maybe not. But lots of little girls wish they could.

2. Toy Story 3. SPOILER. At the end, Andy, who is symbolic of every kid that grew up watching those goddamn movies, gives away all of his precious toys to this little girl who he knows will be good to them. When he gets to the bottom of the box, Woody is there (he meant to take Woody with him to college), by Woody's own choice. When the little girl reaches out to take the cowboy, Andy pulls back, for a minute unwilling to relinquish his childhood, gazing at the toy and understanding his significance. EVERY YOUNG ADULT'S HEART BREAKS, because this is the end of our childhoods too, all encapsulated by this animated college freshman and his old cowboy toy. He says goodbye. Big fat tears.

3. The Royal Tenenbaums. About 5000 scenes in this movie kill me. The ending, once the inscription on the stone is made visible, and Richie's attempted suicide were the first things that pried the well, but since then there are so many scenes that provoke me. Now it's the scene with Margot in the tent after Richie tells her that he wanted to die because of her, but it wasn't her fault, and the part where Chas's son climbs down the ladder to sleep next to him, and the part where Chas tells Henry that he's a widower too ("I know you are, Chas.") But most of all is the bit towards the end, in the marvelous uncut scene moving across the destruction of the wedding and the death of Buckley:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k4MRk_TJZAg (at 04:00):
"Thank you," "You're welcome."
"I've had a rough year, dad--" "I know you have, Chasie."

4. Finding Nemo
I don't even really like this movie. It's cute and all. But I was never a huge fan. Dammit, though, the part where Marlin leaves Dory and gives up and Dory's all alone.... I saw that scene about a year ago at a TV in Sam's Club and I just stood there in the aisle with a trail down my face. I must have looked like the most overgrown lost child.

Dory: No. No, you can't... STOP. Please don't go away. Please? No one's ever stuck with me for so long before. And if you leave... if you leave... I just, I remember things better with you. I do, look. P. Sherman, forty-two... forty-two... I remember it, I do. It's there, I know it is, because when I look at you, I can feel it. And-and I look at you, and I... and I'm home. Please... I don't want that to go away. I don't want to forget.

Marlin: I'm sorry, Dory. But I... do.

5. Passion of the Christ
Most people cite this scene. I used to cry just thinking about it-- it's beautiful and sad not just because of one's connection to Mary's story, but for anyone who understands what it's like to care for someone like a mother does for her child. (Mel Gibson, you is crazy, but you is one talented filmmaker)



6. Darjeeling Limited
One line: "I didn't save mine."

7. Little Miss Sunshine


.... if you are a part of a dysfunctional family, you just get it. there are no words. I don't know that I've ever had a theatre experience where I was laughing and crying so hard at the same time. When I think "Catharthis" this is what I mean.

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