By 
Who doesn’t love a good cry. Well…me, first of all. And I’m guessing you. That’s why we don’t do it.
We welcome everyone here to Last Movie Outpost, but I’m going to take a stab and assume that most of you reading this are fully grown males who aren’t known for being in touch with their feelings (except toxic rage, of course). We’re men. We’re manly men.
Tights are optional
And we never, ever cry at movies.
Except that’s not quite true, is it? Not if you’re honest with yourself. There was that one time your vision got a bit blurry and you wondered if you were due an eye test. There’s no shame in it, even though the rest of us would point at you and laugh if we saw it happen.
The truth is that if you invest in a movie and give yourself over to the emotions they’re trying to elicit, then you open yourself up to the risk that they might one day make you cry. It’s why I avoid movies that feature dogs on the poster. I know what they’re trying to do.
I asked the LMO writers to write about a scene or movie that got each of them. It could be a one-off anomaly never to be repeated, or something that gets them every time. It could be tears of sadness or tears of happiness.
The only thing I’m not accepting is tears of rage, because that would be too easy nowadays.
*TOXIC RAGE INTENSIFIES*
*Inhales deeply*
Okay, here we go.
Hawkzino – Damn You, Spielberg
Nope, it’s not E.T: the Extra-Terrestrial that did it for me. I was glad to see the back of the ugly git. Instead, it was Spielberg’s other two letter acronym movie title: A.I: Artificial Intelligence.
If you were to ask me which scene specifically set me off, I would simply answer ‘yes.’ It’s the only time in my life I was a blubbering wreck from start to finish. But here’s an example:
In my defence, it was a weird time in my life. My son had recently been born, and my empathy levels for Haley Joel Osment’s stupid boy robot were somehow dialled up to eleven. I once read that a man’s testosterone levels drop temporarily after their child is born, so we become more nurturing and less Clint Eastwood. Damn you, nature!
That’s my excuse, and I’m sticking to it. I’m happy to report that I’ve long-since returned to my stoic, cowboy-like ways, and can safely say it was a one-off anomaly, never to be repeated.
But I’m not watching it again. Not even that clip above. Just in case.
Wrenage – A Whole Can Of Whoop Ass
I no longer cry, but occasionally my eyes piss excess testosterone. My ocular cavities are relief valves for the barely-contained manliness within. I am essentially a werewolf with alopecia. The following scene is one that recently made my Y chromosome enter the juicer of my flexing pecs and squeeze drops of high-octane androgens into my blood, which is as red as a rare steak. In fact, my blood is made of pureed rare steak. Pressure built, and testosterone leaked down my cheeks to fall to the floor and burn holes through the stone foundation of my hunting lodge.
A number of things about this scene started the process of the burbling man chemicals. The raw grit of Swayze (gone too soon), the turn of Randall Cobb from bully to brother, and one of my personal favorite actors, Fred Ward, lurking in the background, also gone too soon. Plus, the absence of a father gone too soon hovering over it all…
Despite being an ultra man, I am still human. Prick us, do we not break the needle off on our iron flesh? You don’t have to answer. Now, if you’ll excuse me…
Stark – Should I Be Afraid?
We all cried at ET, even Hawkzino despite his lies above. We were all young ‘uns and it was genetically programmed, as a piece of entertainment, to hurt us. That was childhood, it therefore doesn’t count. As you get older, trifling little bits of fluff designed to tug on a children’s heartstings don’t move us. What moves us instead are themes.
Themes such as mortality, the value of life, what being loved truly means to us as humans, and the overall human experience. This brings me on to my particular ocular faucet opener – Meet Joe Black.
Meet Joe Black is loosely based on the 1934 film Death Takes a Holiday, which is itself based on the 1929 play Death Takes a Holiday by Walter Ferris, which is in turn an English-language adaptation of the 1924 Italian play La morte in vacanza by Alberto Casella. Phew!
Whatever it is based on, you all know the story. While preparing to celebrate a milestone birthday, billionaire and hyper-successful media businessman and devoted family man Bill Parrish is visited by Death who has a request. Show Death what human life is really like and in exchange he will grant Bill extra days of his life.
As Death experiences the complexities of family relationships, the skullduggery of the boardroom and experiences love for the first time, both he and Bill grow, ironically, as human beings. Death is still Death though, a chilling force personifying the end of all things. So, inevitably, it ends where it has to.
After taking nearly 3 hours to make you sit there and reflect on how you have chosen to live, the connections you have formed with others, and the legacy you are going to leave behind, you have to face the end just like poor old Bill Parish.
The entire romantic, business, and family subplots all meet at a singular point and we get to see a character we have grown to respect over three hours facing finality with a level of stoicism that makes every real man proud, then they have one final exchange:
“Should I be afraid?”
“Not a man like you.”
At which point, I really do appear to have something in my eye.
Boba Phil – Fast Cars and Heart Strings
I don’t cry, I’m not a girl. However, there are two things that do spring to mind, that made me ‘have something in my eye’. The first is, I’m sorry to say it, but Furious 7.
You have Dom banin’ on about ‘fambly’ and there’s that song in the background, See You Again by Wiz Khalifa, isn’t my cuppa tea of a song, but damn it pulls on the heart strings here. You have Brian pulling up alongside Dom in his car, much like they did in the first movie. I love how it was Paul Walker’s brother who was in Brian’s car, but they deepfaked Paul’s face on him.
Then there is the montage of Walker throughout the movies. The final shot of the two cars taking different roads is beautiful. Say what you will about the F&F franchise, but that moment really hits hard.
I also have to mention Cinema Paradiso, my all-time favourite movie. Weirdly, I’ve only seen it once, as the memory of it is something special to me, and I don’t want to spoil it. The entire movie is the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen, with stunning music by Ennio Marconne.
The end of the movie, if you know it, is the most heart-wrenching thing I’ve ever seen. It’s beautiful, it’s poignant, and yet so happy. For me, the entire movie reminds me of me and my dad in our cinema. Happy times that I miss a lot. I was going to post the ending, and started watching it on YouTube, but I can’t bring myself to see it. I seem to have something in my eye.
Drunken Yoda
I didn’t cry when my dad died. For some reason, I get out my blubbers in the movies. It’s weird, I know. But on the other hand, it’s an easy to control and schedule when you need to get something out. Keeps you from having a nervous breakdown in the Home Depot.
So are some in no particular order:
“I can’t carry it, but I can carry you!” – Sam, Return Of The King
E.T. gets hit with the paddles and little Drew Barrymore’s reaction.
“Dad? You wanna have a catch?” – Ray Kinsella, Field Of Dreams
“I could’ve done more!” – Schindler’s List
and finally The Phantom Menace entire movie. Not that it meant to be a tear jerker. I just felt my soul die.
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