Top-10 Tearjerkers

Spent the last 2 hours crying my eyes out... Like my sister says, "I guess that means the girls in your class are going to do really well this semester..." Yes, watched The Notebook and they were right. About the crying at least. It's not a spectacular movie, but 1) it's a Nick Cassavetes movie (the guy always casts his mother in his movies- that's kinda creepy...) so it was well-crafted if nothing else; 2) the chemistry between the leads was really good; which brings me to 3) they convince you that their story is worth using half a box of tissue for.

Those who know me know that this is clearly not the first movie I've cried myself through, nor will it be the last. But as a self-professed pudding of a sappy sentimentalist (try saying that ten times in a row...), I defend my kind and say that there are movies that make you cry, and then there are movies that *really* make you cry. Sobbing at Bruce Willis bidding Liv Tyler farewell in Armageddon does not count. True-blue tearjerkers sustain the emotion throughout the movie- trust me, tear ducts are manipulable... So here's the list of my top-10 favorite tearjerkers. Bring on the Kleenex!

In no particular order...
1) The Mask
No, I did not cry when Jim Carrey turned green. This is the one with Eric Stolz and Cher where he suffers from the Elephant Man disease.
The part where I lost it:
When he was at the fair and walked into the Hall of Mirrors and saw a reflection of himself looking *normal*. He was so comfortable with how he looked right until then...

2) The Road Home
This is the one with Zhang Ziyi before she became Ziyi Zhang. I watched this with Jude's family and had such a hard time hiding the fact that I was a complete puddle. So embarassing...
The part where I lost it:
When she fell sick from sheer pining when he was summoned to Beijing by the Communist government.

3) Shadowlands
Watched this with my best friend. I think we couldn't speak after we came out of the theatre.
The part where I lost it:
Basically after she fell sick, I was watching it through a torrent. When she died, that was it.

4) Tombstone of the Fireflies
Need I say more?
The part where I lost it:
When the girl started hallucinating and ate pebbles from the candy tin her brother bought her. Jude bought me that exact tin of candy once and I thought I was going to cry right there at the supermarket.

5) Untamed Heart
I told people this before. Every line in this movie is calculated to make you bawl.
The part where I lost it:
Caroline: I have fallen...
Adam: Are you hurt?
Caroline: I wasn't finished.
Adam: Finish.
Caroline: I have fallen so in love with you, so much more than I said I would.
I know it sounds cheesy here, but you have to watch it in context. After 40 minutes, I gave up on tissues. I was using a bath towel.

6) The Hours
One of my all-time favorite movies. Ever. I don't think I've watched anything with such sustained melancholy. Not tragedy like The Pianist or Schindler's List. Melancholy.
The part where I lost it:
The sequence where Julianne Moore lies on the bed and begins to be engulfed by the gushing waters. Guess what else was gushing...

7 Stepmom
Gets me everytime I watch it even though I know Susan Sarandon is going to die. And the little boy just kills me...
The part where I lost it:
The blanket she makes for them. C'mon...

8) Dead Poets Society
You know the moment he makes them tear up their textbook that it isn't going to end well, but you hang in there. By the time Robert Sean Leonard kills himself, you're too far lost...
The part where I lost it:
"O captain my captain!"

9) Truly, Madly, Deeply
Like Ghost, but so much better, and British. The was Anthony Mighella before The English Patient, and Alan Rickman way before he was Professor Snape. Done so well, and so heartbreaking.
The part where I lost it:
When he came back from the dead and played the chello with her. Less sexy than Patrick Swayze and Demi Moore in the pottery scene, but just as if not more evocative.

10) Ladyhawke
It can't get more painful than this: only being able to look upon each other as man and woman for that split moment between sunset and sunrise before he becomes wolf by day and she is cursed to be a hawk by night.
The part where I lost it:
Phillipe: Are you flesh, or are you spirit?
Isabeau: I am sorrow.

** Ok, in response to my husband's bafflement at some of my choices, I have defend this list by saying that tear-jerker status does not necessarily equate quality. A soppy movie isn't always a good movie which is why only some of these films are also on my Desert Island Movie List.