Too Sad for Film?

I guess I can already hear most people disagreeing with me, but really, have you ever seen something in a film that made your stomach turn or your chest hurt because it was so incredibly sad?

That's how I felt when I saw The Boy in the Striped Pajamas. I didn't sleep for a few days after that. I don't think it's based on a true story, either. So it just seems, why would someone even think of a movie like that? Isn't it a little too much? Was for me. Makes me wonder what the point of it really is.

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**Tia**
Movies in Tucson

Nothing is too tragic to commit to film. It's a matter of perception.

As in "The boy in the striped Pajamas" The prison guards and officials don't even see their charges as human, so they could commit all manner of inhumanity and unspeakable cruelty without even batting an eye. Sadly, these people exist in real life. Hence the phrase, the banality of evil. Maybe that's the point. Patriots and zealots will always pursue their goals to the point of abstraction and close the deal, whatever the costs will be (to others).

If you thought "The boy in the striped Pajamas" was a downer. You need to stay away from a movie called "Lily-4-ever" That's the only film, where I can honesty say it actually hurt to watch it. But I can totally understand why the director needed to make that film.

I think it's good to have tragic movies and as weird as it might sound, tragic events happen in our lives. I kinda look at it as if we don't then everything else wouldn't be the same, for better or for worse.

However, I have not seen the movie you are basing this thread off of so I can't give a full hearted opinion.

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But I, being poor, have only my dreams; I have spread my dreams under your feet, Tread softly because you tread on my dreams. W.B. Yeats

I agree that certain films can be too much, but also need to be made. I also believe that a film can affect two people differently. Like if someone who is in a situation with a parent or grandparent who is struggling with Alzheimers than a viewer could say it was really hard to watch The Notebook. Same thing could be said with My Sisters Keeper. If you are a parent who has a child with Cancer you certainly aren't going to want to watch that.

The only film that crossed the line of emotional tragedy for me was Lars Von Trier's infamous Dancer in the Dark with Bjork. It kills you again and again with the most pathetic displays till your heart has gone to the point of no return, and all you can do is shrug it off and remember that Vespertine was an awesome album.

Lots of people have criticized the insane amount of tragedy in the above as being manipulative and "cruel" to the character. Absolutely effective manipulation IMO.

Grave of the Fireflies was maybe a little bit easier to deal with because it was a Japtoon, but I never viewed America or Japan the same after that. The worst thing about it is that IT ACTUALLY HAPPENED JUST LIKE THAT.

It's a film I might never watch again even though it's brilliant.

I wept profusely during both for the soul of humanity. No joke.

Maybe it's just proof that Von Trier is "too sad" or "too effective" that I seem to shut down when watching his movies. I wouldn't say that they're really more manipulative than any other movie or that that's even necessarily a bad thing to be, but they do seem to have this almost dogmatic fascination with evil dogma that is perhaps a little bit self-defeating. Anyway, I remember when watching Dancer in the Dark and especially Breaking the Waves, thinking here is a beautiful movie with exceptional acting (both Bjork and Emily Watson), and all of it's creative resources directed at telling a story with the utmost clarity, but that remains fairly simplistic. Stern God, brutal/indifferent society, pure martyr.

The movie I cried the most at was Straight Story, which may be comparable to Dancer in the Dark, in that it (arguably) presents an rosy inner world to escape from a much darker reality, but I found Lynch's touch in that movie far, far subtler and his "dark" reality to be less preachy.

I'm very happy to hear that you BOTH cry at movies. You just went up a few notches if you care.

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It's what you learn after you know it all that counts. - John Wooden
My IMDb page

>dogmatic fascination with evil dogma

DOGME 95 COLLECTIVE LOLZ

Emily Watson's performance is so, so, so, so great in Breaking the Waves. I love this movie so much because of what it says about love and devotion and how they can be dangerous when they are really meant. I didn't cry at BtW though. Except a little during the Bowie song "Life on Mars" right before the end. Those inter-titles were some of the most beautiful photography ever.

>cry

I didn't reply to your other comment earlier mark f, because well...

I BAWL, mark. I BAWL. I'm such a baby girl, but I really value being one. I think being a baby girl means being able to feel deeply. Especially for the characters one screen. I don't know. I'm pretty stoic around others but films, which I usually watch privately, especially when you're in the right mood... oh man, films open me up...

I only said I "almost" cried at City Lights because I only teared up and maybe only a few tears came out. Maybe some sniffles.This is not really crying. No to my high standards. I BAWL. I BAWL.

At novels and television and music and everything. I BAWL.

I need to see the Straight Story to complete my viewing of Lynch if for no other reason.

Even if I cried at Prospero's Books?

Just wanted to add that even if I didn't find Breaking the Waves to be emotionally affecting, I can remember at least one scene that was very funny. It's at the beginning during the wedding, when the oil-rig guys are getting drunk and one of them is showing off to one of those small-towners by chugging an entire can-o-beer and then crushing it in his bare hands. The little old guy responds by chugging a glass of water, crushing the glass in his bare hands and proceeding to pick out the shards. (Temperence = baaad-aaass).

Completely deadpan. Great acting.

Conclusion: Von Trier should let himself be funny more often. He's got Dostoevsky's natural talent for it and also his unfortunate propensity to sermonize.

EDIT: maybe I'm coming across as a little too negative. I definitely agree that Watson's performance was very powerful, and yeah, those titles: amazing.

That was a great gag. I did lol.

He has a comedy out called The Boss of it All that I've been dying to see.

I'm going to make a von Trier thread now, I think!

Kes. That's just unwatchable

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You cannot have it both ways. A dancer who relies upon the doubtful comforts of human love can never be a great dancer. Never. (The Red Shoes, 1948)

Tragic movies are sometimes good until you watch them with your girlfriend....

I've never cried at a movie. Does this mean I drop a few notches?

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"Don't be so gloomy. After all it's not that awful. Like the fella says, in Italy for 30 years under the Borgias they had warfare, terror, murder, and bloodshed, but they produced Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci, and the Renaissance. In Switzerland they had brotherly love - they had 500 years of democracy and peace, and what did that produce? The cuckoo clock."

Not for that, no.

But how often do you ever cry?

Let me think again about whether you go down a few notches...

Yes, definitely think it over.

I love how youtube had the exact clip I was looking for.