“Just be out there in it, you know? In the wild.”
The Scoop: 2007 R, directed by Sean Penn and starring Emile Hersch, Marcia Gay Harden and Catherine Keener
Tagline: Your great adventure on Alaska.
Summary: Young man disconnects from society and plunges himself into a series of wilderness adventures.
“I’m not a person, I know it. But I feel like one.”
The Scoop: 2009, Directed by Jeffrey Reiner and starring Eric Stoltz, Esai Morales, and Paula Malcomson
Tagline: “The battle for humanity has a beginning.”
Summary Capsule: A teenage girl thinks her father doesn’t know all that much… and boy, in this case she’s right.
“I will look for you, I will find you, and I will kill you.”
The Scoop: 2008 PG-13 Directed by Pierre Morel and starring Liam Neeson and Famke Janssen
Tagline: They took his daughter. He’ll take their lives.
Summary Capsule: EX CIA spook goes on a 90 minute killing spree to get back his kidnapped daughter.
“I will look for you, I will find you, and I will kill you.”
The Scoop: 2008 PG-13 Directed by Pierre Morel and starring Liam Neeson and Famke Janssen
Tagline: They took his daughter. He’ll take their lives.
Summary Capsule: EX CIA spook goes on a 90 minute killing spree to get back his kidnapped daughter.
“That Castle’s a slippery one”
The Scoop: 2008 R, directed by Lexi Alexander, and starring Ray Stevenson, Dominic West and Julie Benz.
Tagline: Vengeance has a name.
Summary Capsule: Ex-Special Forces instructor–not FBI agent–living in New York–not Miami–turns blood-soaked vigilante after his family is murdered by the mob. Chunks ensue.
“I’ve been condemned to live.”
The Scoop: 1985 R, directed by Geoff Murphy and starring Bruno Lawrence, Alison Routledge and Pete Smith
Tagline: The End of the World is Just the Beginning
Summary Capsule: Guy wakes up to discover that he’s the last guy on the planet. He promptly decides to take a sick day.
I’m a sap. I’ve said it before, numerous times, but making me cry at movies is often like shooting fish in a barrel, at least the first time through. And I love it.
Interestingly, it’s not always the sad moments that make me cry. I wrote this list before I wrote the introduction, and only three are officially truly sad moments. The other seven are bittersweet, some even more sweet than bitter. A few are even downright happy (well, by tearjerker standards). What can I say? Strong emotion makes me cry.
So, my ten moments I cry, no matter how many times I’ve seen the movie (and with #7, that one feels like it’s the triple digits.)
Actually, I think there may only be five total, so I guess that kind of takes the special out of it.
Bah! Whatever! Titles that work are just as lame as well though-out introductions! Let’s do this!
Oh, I will pause to mention that you are strongly encouraged to read first, and then decide whether or not you want to view. MRFH and its affiliates, subsidiaries and shadow governments are not responsible for any puking or nightmares that may result.
“It’s just like the first time I came here, isn’t it? We were talking about automobile insurance, only you were thinking about murder. And I was thinking about that anklet.”
The Scoop: 1944, Unrated, Directed by Billy Wilder and starring Fred MacMurray, Barbara Stanwyck, and Edward G. Robinson
Tagline: It’s Love And Murder At First Sight!
Summary Capsule: An insurance salesman with a taste for someone else’s wife gets mixed up with a rotten dame that might be the death of him.
“Nobody knows anybody. Not that well.”
The Scoop: 1990 R, directed by Joel Coen and starring Gabriel Byrne, Albert Finney and Marcia Gay Harden.
Tagline: Up is down, black is white, and nothing is what it seems.
Summary Capsule: Gabriel Byrne stretches his acting chops to play an Irish criminal who gets entangled in a complex web of deceit and betrayal.
