Breaking Emotions: Tears & Surprise

Excitingly Mettel Ray has started up her second blogathon after the great success of her ‘My Movie Alphabet’ one last year (check out my entry here). This time around she has one called ‘Breaking Emotions’ where we are given an emotion (or two) and we have to respond with scenes that cause us to experience it. For more details check out her site via the link above.
This week I am taking on both Tears and Surprise, so read on for my choices!

Here are my top three emotional moments from films which I love to watch but which will have tears leaking down my face, almost without fail.

3. Thelma and Louise – Ending

Each time I watch this film I become more and more emotional when the ending comes around and the two decide to drive on over the cliff rather than get taken in by the police. Thelma and Louise are possibly my favourite onscreen friendship, and it’s heartbreaking to see them drive to their death.

2. Blue Valentine – Ending

There isn’t too much happiness in this film, but there’s enough to make Gosling walking away, whilst trying to convince his daughter to return to her mother, a seriously upsetting ending. Having watched this film a few times now, I can testify to it not getting any easier to watch.

1. Lord of the Rings: Return of the King – Frodo departs

There are multiple moments in this film which can bring me to tears, sometimes those are tears of happiness, but this scene is most certainly not one of those. It’s a heart-wrenching, tear inducing moment which should make anyone cry. Also, knowing the on set problems, and the multiple takes needed across multiple days, makes the fact that this scene remains so emotional a real testament to the actors involved in it.

If you haven’t seen Children of Men, Fight Club or Psycho then you will want to skip past these three, and don’t worry, I’ve chosen non spoiler images for them so you’re not going to see any big reveals on your way past. Here are three of the biggest surprises I can remember experience when watching a film.

3. Children of Men – Julian’s car journey

One of the main reasons I sat down to watch this one was Julianne Moore, however despite being top billed, it wasn’t long until she was shot and killed, taking me completely by surprise. It’s a clever trick, top billing an actor and then killing them, and one which at the time I wasn’t too appreciative of!

2. Fight Club – Reveal

This is one of the most unexpected and well conceived twist I have ever witnessed, I was literally left shocked for ages after. I can’t think of a twist which worked so well except for…

1. Psycho – The end of Marion Crane’s journey

I have written before about how, back before I really got into film, I knew nothing about Psycho when I went into a cinema re-screening and watched it for the first time. Thus, when our protagonist is murdered in the shower it was for me like seeing it back in 1960 – I just was completely thrown. It seems incredible now that I once went into this film unaware of what would happen, but I’m very lucky that I did!

So there are my picks for part two of Mettel Ray’s blogathon! Let me know what you think below, and be sure to check out her site here!

Tags: blogathon, Blue Valentine, Children of Men, Fight Club, film, Lord of the Rings, Mettel Ray, Movie, Psycho, Return of the King, Surprise, Tears, Thelma and Louise