Rather than commenting on each scene, I am just going to let you watch them. This list contains spoilers, graphic scenes, and depictions of death or suicide. The top 10 depressing scenes in cinema:
10. The Sixth Sense
You need to skip to 02:50. The first clip (From The Champ) is not entirely joyful either. This scene contains spoilers.
9. The Truman Show
WARNING: Spoilers
8. The Royal Tenenbaums
WARNING: Depiction of suicide
7. The Green Mile
WARNING: Spoilers
6. The Rules of Attraction
WARNING: This scene graphically depicts suicide.
5. The Elephant Man
4. Death in Venice
WARNING: Spoilers
3. The Grapes of Wrath
WARNING: Spoilers
2. Requiem for a Dream
WARNING: Spoilers
1. Dancer in the Dark
WARNING: Extreme Spoilers
Notable Omissions: The Great Escape, Cast Away, House of Sand and Fog, Betty Blue
Technorati Tags: movies
I feel you might need to do an extention to this one JF. I can think of quite a few others,but then mabey the ones I am thinking of are just depressing to me. One of them for instance is the end of T2.
I remember The Green Mile. That is a great movie, I’m glad it’s on this list cause it was the first movie I though of when I saw the title of this list.
Blue Lagoon
no old yeller or brians song? those are two movies that can even the tough man to tear up.
Im Schindlers list, you know, near the end, where he starts crying because he thinks he could have saved more jews, only film ive ever cried to, more emotional than depressing i suppose
That scene in The Truman Show is only depressing until it is directly followed by the most uplifting and powerful scene in the movie.
But I digress.
I probably would have put the final scene of The Elephant Man at number one, actually every film featuring that piece of music.
Adagio For Strings is the most depressing piece of music ever.
wooo great list!
Have you ever seen the movie Old Boy? The ending to that movie was really depressing, but it ties together every event in the movie. It’s really great if you haven’t seen it.
Also, I’d have to agree with JMurf. Schindler’s List was one of the hardest movies I’ve ever had to watch!
Green Mile is one of my favorite movies. I am glad that it made the list.
One of the top 10 depressing scenes in cinema: The entire movie, “Requiem for a Dream”. I saw it with two of my best friends, a stoic sixty-something-year-old and his equally-stony son. They were both bawling openly for the last half hour of it.
I’ve added the rest of the items to my ‘must see’ list. Good job, as usual!
Angela: Old Boy is on one of the other lists here – if you search for it you should find it
FekketCantenel: I agree with your comment about Requiem for a Dream – definitely depressing. I love it though. Ellen Burstyn was brilliant in it.
I may be the only one here, but I cry like a baby at the end of Forest Gump. Both at the very end and at the scene with Forest and Bubba after the ambush.
I like these choices. I have seen them all except “Dancer in the Dark,” and they are all excellent choices for this topic.
One I would have had to consider adding is Rutger Hauer’s death scene in Blade Runner which can be found here:
the last scene in Soylent green is pretty depressing. Well i take that back, every scene in soylent green was depressing.
Where The Red Fern Grows at the end when the two dogs die is certainly worthy of this list. I don’t cry to movies but this one made me tear up like a little girl. The saddest part is when the second dog dies due to a broken heart over the death of the first dog.
I don’t think I’ve ever cried so much at the end of the green mile than any other time…really incredible movie.
oh man…DANCER IN THE DARK…..what a depressing film.
I’m not sure if you’ve seen it, but ONCE WERE WARRIORS has a couple of scenes that tear your heart out. i won’t spoil it just in case you haven’t seen it.
tonybrush: I love Dancer in the Dark. I have seen Once were Warriors – I did a road trip with two of the main actors in fact (the Aunty and the head of the Gang)
i guess its sad that my favorite movie on this list is The Royal Tenenbaums…
SelfDestruct, i cry everytime i see forest gump, and ive probably seen it about 40 times. its incredibly depressing though, i find it uplifting, mainly because of forest’s talk to jenny at the end.
sophie’s choice – the scene where sophie had to decide which one of her children she would have to abandon.
I have to admit I’ve only ever seen one of the movies, but I have The Sixth Sense on my Netflix.
The one I’ve seen is The Truman Show. Such a good movie, but it was so sad when he found out the truth. Ironic how his name was Truman.
I strongly recommend ‘Threads’ and ‘Come and See’ – both very great films, both soul-crushingly depressing.
Also, the scene in ‘Amores Perros’ where El Chivo comes home to his dogs… just awful.
Barns,
Who directed Threads? I want to watch it (admittedly, I am a depressing movie-fanatic), and I can't figure out which one it is.
http://youtube.com/watch?v=82Oc5ny3hjg
Sophies Choice, she is forced to either choose one of her two small children not to be killed at the concentration camp or have them both killed.
Should been number one.
ive seen a lot more depressing scenes in asian cinema…this should be renamed
Oh F****CK! I just spent some time typing in a thought on this thing when something happened and I was shot into another page elsewhere and was unable to retreve what I had just wrote!!AAARRHH! Damn ghosts in the machine!
Anyway, I cant repeat exactly- nor do I want to, but the jist of it was in agreeing with MRSELFDESRUCT and BLACKMAMBA :
My name is Diogenes and I too am a Forest Gump cry baby.
I hate to admit it. I wasnt one of the millions of saps that saw it in the theater, but in catching it on t.v. I found myself absorbed and getting choked up and ..yes crying. What the hell? I have consistantly like everything I’ve seen of Zemekis, but Forest Gump? Why?
Anyway I agree.
I highly recommend “Forbidden Games” by Rene Clement. No no no, it’s not an erotic thriller, but one of the most beautiful and sad films I’ve seen. some heavy tear jerking stuff.
I agree with the top 5 hereas being pretty depressing scenes (but maybe not as a top 5 completly). Unfortunately, with Dancer in the Dark, I saw it with someone in thier livingroom and they were entirely removed (and unmoved) by & from it . I fought back weeping as the person next to me remaind stone faced and careless. How the hell this could be with so many difficult moments I just cant understand.
I suppose viewing it like this when I did, placed me in a more extreme sensibility…So It remains in my memory. Actually as I recall this, I am connected to the original connection to having seen a similliar ending with the film “In Cold Blood” A somewhat different effect, in story as a whole, is gotten from both endings, but very halting none the less.
Requiem for a Dream, that one gets me everytime. And hey, what about Ol’ Yeller?
This may sound really odd, but the end of Von Ryan’s Express with Frank Sinatra always bothers me. I was fairly young when I saw it and it was the first time I can remember seeing a movie where the main character (the hero) dies instead of riding triumphantly off into the sunset.
Odd, but true, despite seeing all sorts of depressing movies over the years, Von Ryan’s Express is still the first I think of. Just goes to show what sort of impression can be made on a young mind.
The Grey Zone is the most depressing movie ever. I linked one of the less depressing scenes from youtube; for the remotely sensitive I would recommend against watching this longer clip. The movie makes Schindler’s List look almost lighthearted. The film is about the Sonderkommando XII in the Auschwitz concentration camp in October 1944. These prisoners were made to assist the Germans in shepherding their victims to the gas chambers and disposal of the bodies in ovens. Oh, did I mention that it’s based on a true story? Details are too depressing to post here; read the link.
For most depressing children’s movies I’ll nominate The Littlest Horse Thieves, a pleasant little film about a group of plucky children trying to save a bunch of coal mine ponies from the glue factory. Which they do, except for the one who, at the end, accidentally gets left behind to die in a mine fire. Ooops. I had the pleasure of seeing this as a child, which probably explains a lot about my outlook on life now.
requiem for a dream is a horribly depressing movie and hands down the most depressing book i have ever read.
By far the movie that made me cry openly was the end of “My Life” with Michael Keaton. I am a grown man and I cry like a baby whenever I see that flick. Please check it out!
you know, earlier i just looked at the list and made a comment about a movie i thought was depressing. just now, i had some extra free time so i decided to watch every one of these clips back to back to back… the result: don’t feel all that well…
which is my way of saying excellent list
what is the name of the song from “the royal tenenbaums”?
Needle In the Hay by Elliot Smith
watch the movie pay it forward that is one sad movie
american history x has quite a few
american history x has quite a few
and american beauty too
Diogenes: I still haven’t read or seen In Cold Blood but I will – I love Capote’s writing.
Jack: Needle in the Hay by Elliot Smith. You can see a live performance of it here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zfWxa-FN8X4
The funeral scene in Four Weddings and a Funeral always gets to me.
Fil: yes – that is a good scene – especially the inclusion of the Funeral Blues by Auden – beautiful poem. Benjamin Britten set it to music – stunning.
I had the misfortune of watching the end of “Se7en” on DVD before going to bed. I remember just laying my head slowly on the pillow thinking, “Hope? What hope? There is no hope.”
Still depresses me to this day.
strych9: that is a great film
Simon Birch is quite depressing. I remember watching it at a friends house one day- 3 of us were there, and at the same moment all of us looked at one another, and we were bawling like babies. Braveheart also has a few very sad and depressing scenes
Cassady: I enjoyed Simon Birch – but I loved the book it was based on more
“Jude” with Kate Winslet. The ending is EASILY the most depressing of any movie. It comes out of nowhere and makes the whole movie pointless.
jf, Must agree with you about Simon Birch (I have a problem calling it that). That is still one of my top 5 books. I cried beginning to end watching The Elephant Man. Amazing film. The Green Mile was brilliant as well, and as daggy as it may sound, Dead Poet’s Society gets me every time.
The Champ was bad for me when I saw it when I was younger.
The Green Mile was just so unfair to me. (as I guess it was supposed to be)
Personally I recently saw bridge to Terabithia, which had a depressing scene but was an important part to the movie.
Then there is the great depressing movie Babel that is also fairly recent. Man, it was just depressing from start till end. I was sorry to have seen it.
Not sure it can really be encapsulated in one scene but “Life is Beautiful” destroys my emotions when i watch it.
Excellent choice of “The Truman Show”. That movie gets so little respect, but the music of that scene along with Jim Carey’s acting and the visuals of being alone are tremendous.
BTW, i read your lists all the time jfrater and this is my first comment. I love this site. Possible list idea…”greatest comedic lines from movies”.
DiscHuker: Thanks
I have noted your suggestion – an excellent one. I love Life is Beautiful – I own it on DVD.
to jfrater- a return reply:
” In Cold Blood” is an excellent book and movie. Both have their controversies of which I think still apply. The book is one of the best “investigatve insights” regarding the actual time of the actual events that occured, that I have read ( “Into The Wild” , I had read shortly before and I also think highly of in the smae way. I havent seen the movie yet)
“Into Cold Blood” the movie, is known for having been filmed in the places and the actual house of the murdered family. And it was madee close enough after, like tthe book.
jf, you are the best, thanks for giving me the link and thanks for putting so much time and effort into the lists and comments.
Diogenes: I just looked the 1967 film up on IMDB – it was nominated for 4 oscars! I will definitely have to watch it. And it is a Conrad Hall film so it will have to be good.
Im suprised no one has mentioned Whats Eating Gilbert Grape. That definately has a few, and Land Before Time for sure
The ending of the Movie “High Tension” is pretty depressing (and creepy).
http://youtube.com/watch?v=1gEfkP-JiWU
If you want a depressing ending try “Miracle Mile” .. It’s actually an engrossing if not a preachy, idealized little flick.
How about “Simon Burch”. That whole movie is one big depressing scene. Or “Pay It Forward”. The end of that movie makes you want to vomit.
Titanic?
Anonymous: totally.
We can also add “Bad Santa” and “Monster Ball” – both starring Billy-Bob Thornton.
The scene in “Gigot” where Jackie Gleason is trying to explain the concept of Jesus and Mary to a prostitute’s daughter: but he is a mute WWI veteran…
And you all must be too young to remember the scene from “Old Yeller” when the son has to shoot the dog!
loop: that is definitely true of me (too young to remember old yeller. Do you have a clip for it?
No “Million Dollar Baby”?