In today’s guest post, blogger Clara Fercovic writes about some of her favorite saddest movies:
Well, you know them. You’re watching them and you’re thinking: “Mother of god, life can be awful. Why people have to suffer so much! I’m not gonna cry, I’m not gonna cry. Think of something positive. Or something that makes you angry. Oh no, a tear is coming. I’m gonna cough to try to pass this heavy lump in my throat. Oh, what did she or he have to say that line? That’s the saddest thing…”
Anyway, I sacrificed myself for you, and re-watched some of these sad films. I included movies in which the predominant feeling is sadness or those whose endings are very dramatic. So, grab your tissues, here we go. (Warning: spoilers ahead).
10 – The Umbrellas of Cherbourg (1964)
Plot: A girl and a boy fall in love and have a child but can’t be together.
You can’t hold your tears when…they say goodbye at the train station.
9 - Waterloo Bridge (1940)
Plot: Vivien Leigh thinks her boyfriend Robert Taylor is dead so she finds a socially rejected way to survive (mentioned in five other movies in which tragedy was caused by chance).
You can’t hold your tears when…the camera focus a little special object after some tragic event and then Robert remembers Vivien in the bridge.
8 – The Wedding Night (1935)
Plot: A writer (Gary Cooper) falls in love with a girl (Anna Sten) from a strict family of farmers.
You can’t hold your tears when…at the end, Gary looks out the window and “sees” the love of his life disappearing.
7 - This Land Is Mine (1943)
Plot: Awesome Charles Laughton and Maureen O’Hara play a coward teacher and his love interest, respectively, in this World War II film.
You can’t hold your tears when…Charles sees how a teacher he admired and respected is killed. But the worst part is the ending, one of the best fictional uses of the Declaration of Human Rights.
6 – Camille (1936)
Plot: An impossible love between a Paris courtesan (Greta Garbo) and a young nobleman (Robert Taylor).
You can’t hold your tears when…Garbo faces Taylor’s father ( Lionel Barrymore) and when Robert visits a “very weak” Camille in the last scene.
5 – A Star is Born (1937)
Plot: After two actors marry, the success of their careers enter into a inversely proportional relationship.
You can’t hold your tears when…the granny takes her granddaughter to the station. And when Fredric March embraces Janet Gaynor knowing it would be the last time and then he says “do you mind if I take just one more look?”
4 – Make Way for Tomorrow (1937)
Plot: An old couple (Victor Moore and Beulah Bondi) realize they have the worst children in the history of cinema.
You can’t hold your tears when…these people are humiliated and separated, which is practically the whole film.
3 – Three Comrades (1938)
Plot: After World War I, three German friends (Robert Taylor, Franchot Tone, Robert Young) meet Margaret Sullavan and their lives change forever. Adapted by F. Scott Fitzgerald.
You can’t hold your tears when…you watch the final scenes. Really.
2 – The Small One (1978)
Plot: A poor family have to get rid of their old donkey, a task that is entrusted to the kid.
You can’t hold your tears when…the last time I saw this one I cried my eyes out like the whole film, especially when the kid tries to cheer up his little animal and the ending.
1 – Ever in My Heart (1933)
Plot: Barbara Stanwyck marries a German before World War I.
You can’t hold your tears when…the family faces tragic situations (I mean TRAGIC) and the ending.
Honorable mentions: Letter from an Unknown Woman,I Remember Mama, Penny Serenade and Doctor Zhivago.
What are the saddest movies that you’ve ever watched? Let us know in the comments!
Hailing from Chile, Clara Fercovic is a writer whose favorite directors include Alfred Hitchcock and Billy Wilder. For more information, visit Via Margutta 51 and on Twitter at @viam51.