Tear Jerker / Film: A to B

aka: Film A-B

• The ending of 8 Seconds, the story of Lane Frost. Lane is butted by the bull, and it immediately changes scenes to his funeral.
• Adaptation. at the end: So happy together, la la la, so happy together. The best part is that both you and the movie know that this is a cheesy, cliche and overused technique. Yet it works.
• The ending of Terry Gilliam's The Adventures of Baron Munchausen. Not only for that awesome tearjerker scene of the Baron's funeral so gleefully up-ended and laughed at by the Baron himself, but the revelation that the invaders HAVE been routed, that huge cheer, and then Sally's sly "So...it WASN'T just a story, then?" Followed by the Baron's mock-glower and flinging of one last rose to her. Just beautiful stuff - a real happy tear-jerker.
• The ending to An Affair to Remember yanks on the heartstrings, even though it all turns out okay.
• Agora has several tear jerkers, which is perhaps not surprising considering its a movie about Hypatia, a Greek philosopher who was murdered at the hands of rabid Christians. There's several sad moments before that happens; just watch the movie.
• At the end of A.I.: Artificial Intelligence, David gets his wish in a very emotional scene.
• The scene in A.K.A. where Benjamin (a male prostitute who has fallen in love with the main character, Dean,) says "Could you marry me? A boy like me?" Also, the scene where he and Dean are having sex and Dean keeps telling him to "tell me I'm nothing" and eventually "hit me" (what he is saying stems from sexual abuse he had to endure from his father).
• A Kitten For Hitler: A boy travels to Germany to give Hitler a kitten for Christmas. He ends up getting skinned alive and turned into a lampshade when Hitler realizes he's Jewish.
• Hephaestion's inevitable death in Oliver Stone's Alexander is made all the more poignant when Alexander, who has become progressively disillusioned with his dreams throughout the film, starts speaking to him hopefully about all the great things they have yet to accomplish and how they will grow old together. Hephaestion dies in the middle of the speech. If only it actually happened like that...
• In the film adaption of Alex Cross, the titular character's wife getting killed as well as the scene of him trying to comfort his daughter over her death.
• Shunji Iwai's All About Lily Chou-Chou is an all around somber and harrowing affair. This scene, in the context of the film, is unbelievably moving.
• The "Valse Triste" scene from the film Allegro non Troppo. It features a cat running through the ruins of its former living quarters and thinking there are people still there. After while, it realizes all the joyous moments were just an illusion and the reality was that everything was lost and gone forever. As a wrecking ball destroys the wreckage, the cat itself vanishes, as it was just a faded out memory itself...
• Zack's scene in the desert at the end of Alpha Dog when he realizes what's about to happen. It becomes much harder to watch following Anton Yelchin's death.
• Amélie.
  • Every single moment, from where she helps the blind man walk and describes what she's seeing to the romantic chase scene with the arrows to the scenes where she gets revenge on Collignon for Lucien to where she makes tapes for the Glass Man to where she has the stewardess take the gnome all around the world to fulfill her father's dream of traveling the world...ah, well you could name scenes from the movie all day. The tears during this movie are of joy, never sadness. When Roger Ebert said that you see this movie, and then when you think about it later, it makes you smile, he wasn't kidding.
  • The scene where Amelie is watching TV and imagines that she's watching her funeral, and it's describing how she never really did anything in her life, and it makes her start crying. Also near the end when she's imagining her love interest coming up the stairs to her apartment and bursting into the room, then hears the rustle of her bead curtain and turns only to see that it's just her cat. So sad. But that makes the scene all the more heartwarming when she goes to follow him and sees that he's really there.
  • The scene in which Amélie gives the former resident of her apartment back his box of trinkets from when he was a little boy, the TV screen just became a blur.
  • The scene when Nino finally discovered the truth behind the mystery photo booth man. He was simply the repairman. Though this might not pass of as a tear-jerking moment at first glance, put yourself in Nino's shoes and think about what it's like trying understand an unusual person to the point where you're devoting your life to it, and then after many years realize the truth and satisfy your own curiosity.
• The death of Jeff in ...And Justice for All.
• The '30s era gangster film Angels with Dirty Faces: The scene at the end, where Jimmy Cagney's character is being dragged kicking and screaming towards the electric chair is gutwrenching. Doubly so since the film implies that he may be doing it on purpose to discourage the teenage toughs that he befriended earlier from following in his footsteps.
  "All right, fellas . . . let's go and say a prayer for a boy who couldn't run as fast as I could."
• Awakenings:
  • The scene where Dr. Sayer (Robin) watches the home movies that he and Leonard Lowe (Robert DeNiro) filmed, which show Leonard's gradual deterioration back into his catatonic state.
  • "You told him I was a kind man. How kind is it to give life, only to take it away?"
  • Dancing in the cafeteria: if you've seen it, you're crying now. The barely contained anguish on Paula's face almost obscures the fact that, as Leonard dances with her, his symptoms completely subside.
• The A Word. It's a short documentary done by Lindsay Ellis, otherwise known as The Nostalgia Chick, about what she went through when she had an abortion in December 2009. It's a pretty huge shock to see this badass, in control, dark-humored woman suddenly lay herself bare and look actually quite lost and uncertain throughout the movie. (It also makes you smile even harder when you see her around and know that she's A) alright and B) can joke about it.)

• Backdraft: "That's my brother", the close-to-dying words of Kurt Russell's mortally wounded firefighter character to the medics who are taking him away, as he finally comes to respect his brother (Billy Baldwin) as a firefighter while the brother courageously holds off a wall of flame.

• Bartleby was advertised as a zany comedy. Well, it started out funny, but it slowly became clear that Bartleby wasn't just eccentric, he was desperately mentally ill and helpless. His co-workers torture him, his boss's inability to deal with him wrecks everyone's life, and when the boss finally does manage to get rid of him it feels rather like taking the family dog out for a car ride and leaving him by the side of the road. When the boss experiences a guilt trip and tries to help him, he's just slightly too late, and Bartleby dies of neglect and exposure.
• In Batman Returns, the Penguin's funeral. His own penguins bury him at sea, and it somehow works.

• Regardless of what you think of Elmo basically ruling Sesame Street over the last 20 years, Being Elmo: A Puppeteer's Journey will make you shed Tears of Joy, don't even try to question that.
• Ben-Hur (1959).
  • Sure, it's 3-1/2 hours of pure awesomeness, but at the end when, during the storm following Christ's death, Judah Ben-Hur's mother and sister are miraculously cured of their leprosy by the blood of Christ washing down from the Cross.
  • The last half-hour of the film counts as this, from Judah carrying his dying sister and mother into Jerusalem in hopes of bringing them to Christ, to Judah returning the life-saving act of kindness Christ had done him three years before by attempting to give Him water during the Way of the Cross, and finally, coming back to his old home, reconciling with Esther after hearing Christ's words of forgiveness, and suddenly seeing his mother and sister come in, completely cured. When Charlie cries, YOU cry.
  • The scene where Judah Beh-Hur, in chains, is led past the carpenter's house. He falls. Cries out: "God ... help me." Guess who does. Silently giving him water, gently stroking his hair like a father comforting a crying child. And even worse is when Judah tries to return the favour, in Jerusalem...
• Bent is a film about a gay man falling in love inside a concentration camp. This is inevitable.
• The ending of Bicentennial Man.
  • The concept of Bicentennial Man.
• Billy Elliot - when his father breaks down in Billy's brother's arms, sobbing, "Let's give him a chance! Give the boy a fucking chance!"
  • The final scene is very moving too.
• The climax to A Bittersweet Life is pretty devastating as a whole, but the tearjerking part comes when the main character awaits the silent gunslinger's judgment. He suddenly understands why he had to be punished, why he had to get his vengeance, why he was so determined despite his own confusion. He fell in love, and it cost him everything.
  Kim Sun-Woo: This is too cruel...
• The ending of The Blind Beast, despite the squickiness and the voluntary nature of it. It's psycho, a Heartwarming, terrifying, and a tearjerker all in one.
• The ending of Emilio Estevez's Bobby.
• The Boondock Saints series:
  • The boys' reactions to Rocco's death is terribly sad. The victim gets shot while tied to a chair. The brothers are witness to the act and they are also tied up and powerless to do anything. Murphy throws himself, chair and all, to the ground and crawls to Rocco to rest his head on the victim's cheek and cry. Connor is reduced to screaming at Rocco, God, Yakevetta, and anyone else who will listen.
    • Rocco's last words are pretty badass.
  Rocco: (to Connor and Murphy) You can't stop. You get out of here. Don't ever stop.
  • Connor screaming and struggling to get loose as the mafiya thugs drag Murphy out to be executed.
  • In the second film, the boys' father also dies, making their lives all the worse for it.
• The ending of The Boy In The Striped Pyjamas.
• The end of Boys Don't Cry, made all the more worse because it was based on a true story.
• The ending of Terry Gilliam's Brazil will do a number on your tear ducts. Be sure to see the Director's Cut - apparently the American version was butchered by the studio and the ending was wallpapered over with sunshine and lollipops.
• Brian's Song. Oh, yes, you will cry. It's okay, guys. Really.
  • It was even parodied by Pinky and the Brain: the episode titled "Brain's Song" has the titular mice taking control of worldwide TV and broadcasting a Tear Jerker about a football player (so Brain could get all power possible from the saddened world leaders).
• Brokeback Mountain:
  • The final scene with the shirts in the closet.
  • "Jack, I swear..." Reality Subtext is a bitch.
  • Jack's flashback to Ennis holding him, especially the look on Jack's face as he watches Ennis leave. In the flashback he looks sad, but still hopeful and in love. In the present he looks cold and bitter and like he has no choice but to accept that it's hopeless. And then at the end, Ennis has reversed the shirts so that Jack's is inside his, like he's holding him one last time.
  • The line "Tell you what... truth is, sometimes I miss you so bad I can hardly stand it."
  • "I wish I knew how to quit you." "Then why don't you? Why don't you just let me be? It's cause of you Jack, that I'm like this." Then they hold each other and sob at the impossibility of ever being together and happy... "I just can't stand this anymore Jack."
  • "He said he wanted his ashes scattered on Brokeback Mountain." [...] "He always said it was his favorite place." Just the look on Ennis' face. And Lureen's too; you get the impression that maybe she knew.
• A '30s film called Broken Lullaby was about this young Frenchman who killed a German soldier of about his age during WWI. Consumed with guilt, he went to visit the dead soldier's elderly parents, only to end up pretending to have been a close friend because he didn't have the heart to tell them the truth. Near the end, he tearfully confessed his deception to the deceased's fiancee while playing one of the saddest violin pieces ever. She talked him into keeping up the pretense.
• The Brothers Lionheart has it in spades.
  • "We jumped... I made it... Jonatan didn't."
  • The death of Mattias.
  • "Jonatan... Nangilima... I see the light!"
  • The scene in the town square of Briar Rose Valley, when Tengil's soldiers start rounding up men. Jonatan telling Skorpan what will happen to them ("They'll drag rock to his fortress until they can't work any more. Then he gives them to Katla.") and the man who stands up to Tengil.
  • The teacher's eulogy at Jonatan's funeral.
• The scene where Jennifer Aniston prays to God in Bruce Almighty.
• A combo Tear Jerker and Heartwarming Moment in Bubble Boy, where he finally reaches his crush's wedding, having travelled for days to reach it - and he removes the bubble-suit. She's protesting his actions, knowing that he'd die due to his lack of immunity, to which he replies, while hugging her: "I'd rather spend one moment holding you, than the rest of my life knowing I never could." And he collapses. Don't worry, he gets better.
• The Bucket List
  • The ending. Sure, the whole movie is about two dying guys living their last days to the fullest, but the last shot is of the two guy's ashes on Mt. Everest.
  • Carter's eulogy letter. Morgan Freeman is emotion incarnate.
  • Jack Nicholson's character crossing off the list "kiss the most beautiful girl in the world" after seeing his granddaughter for the first time.
• The Butterfly Effect:
  • The hero is trying to commit suicide but realizes he can't even do that.
  • In the director's cut there was a completely different ending in the original cut Evan tells his childhood friend, Kayleigh as a child never to see him again to undo all the terrible events that happen when he attempts to change time. Thus apart from that first meeting they never meet again This can be a tearjerker but the director's cut has the following ending: Earlier in the film Evan's mother mentions how she tried to have a baby but each died and Evan was the lucky one. At the ending Evan decides he must go back in time when he was just a baby in the womb. He strangles himself willingly with the umbilical cord and kills himself. As a result he never existed.

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