If you’re like me (emotionally constipated), you have some films that you keep locked and loaded for when it’s time to let it all out, and when you put them on you make sure to have a couple boxes of tissues at the ready for when the dam breaks. But even if that’s not how you deal with your problems because you’re an adult who goes to proper therapy, we all have those films that make us emotional no matter how often we’ve seen them. What movies make you emotional every single time?
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Definitely Grave of the Fireflies. Original 1988 version? 2005 live-action flick? DOESN’T MATTER. No matter which versions I watched, both of 'em ripped my heart out. Oh, and don’t forget Departures: a 2008 Japanese drama movie that won an Academy award in 2009 is about a failed cellist who got a job as a mortician.
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Okay embarrassing confession time.
I will always cry at Moulin Rouge
I can’t stand to see Ewan McGregor sad!
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Oh, and Star Wars: The Force Awakens? At first, I wasn’t interested, but then… it soon became the first Star Wars movie that made me cry during the climax.
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That one’s on my list to watch! I’ve heard it’s brutal 
There’s a few Pixar movies that make me a little teary, but Inside Out without fail makes me ugly cry. I’ll purposely put it on when I feel like I need a good release lol.
But I started this thread because I’ve been rewatching Lord of the Rings (extended edition) and I just openly weep through most of the second half of Return of the King. (I do the same when I read the book.)
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Million Dollar Baby. I’m not ashamed of my tears (it’s part of being human I say) but I was trying to keep it together in the theater, not all entirely successfully. But when I watched it again, at home, all alone… there was no holding back, let the floodgates open! “There, there, let it out, you’ll feel better, me.”
Sometimes I’ve cried because I found something beautiful, I believe Once made me tear up on a few occasions for that reason.
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Kudos to you on the question. I have a several of these. Ridley Scott’s G.I. Jane (1997) tears me up EVERY TIME. The relevancy when released, Ridley Scott’s direction, Demi Moore’s determination, Mortensen’s finest work as an actor, the soundtrack, the script. I honestly could pop this in anytime. It is a 90s Top Gun and I suspect that was the intention. Viggo as Master Chief works as antagonist and sympathizer depending on the scene. The final interaction when she earns her commission and he reveals his true feelings is touching. He walks back to his room. She rushes to her locker to grab something and she eyes a book of poetry. A circled poem within is what he said to her at the start. She looks up and stares at him as he gazes back and she and we realize he saw something in her all along. I lose it at that moment and my eyes fill with emotion.
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I’ve cried at a few movies, but the one guaranteed to do it for me is What Dreams May Come. Beautiful movie, but it hits hard.
Robin Williams is also fantastic in Bicentennial Man. I cried when I read the short story. I cried when he expanded that to a full novel and I read it. I cried when I saw the movie. It’s just so… human.
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The ending of G.I. Jane (1997).
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I don’t re-watch movies that make me cry in general, but I do remember crying a lot at the end of Breaking the Waves.
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I don’t like to cry when watching a movie. It just leaves me feeling sad afterward. For that reason, I also very rarely rewatch a tear-inducing film.
That said, the most recent movie I cried at was Clerks III. I saw it when Kevin Smith toured it before the official release.
Damn you, Kevin Smith! I came here to laugh, and you made me cry! 
(There were plenty of laughs though.)
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I’m a big softy, nearly every film mentioned in this thread has the potential to get the water works going for me. Heck, I almost teared up just reading @BruceLeePullen doing a recap of GI Jane, and I don’t even recall the scene he was referencing. The worst tear jerkers for me are probably movies that feature pets passing on. Marley and Me is pretty memorable for getting me going about a half hour before the movie ends, and then they just keep on going back to that well. I was a blubbering mess by time the credits rolled. Up may be worse, even though they spared the dog, as it had me crying through the first half hour of the movie, and then just couldn’t resist going back for one more round before the end. Okay, I better stop now before I start crying again…
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The beginning of Up when it shows the romance with and eventual death of Ed Asner’s wife’s character is definitely a tearjerker.
The end of Coco was too.
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For me, it really depends on my mood when I watch. Some days it can be almost anything at all tender and I’ll tear up. Some days, the world could end and I’d be unaffected.
That said, there are two scenes that usually hit me and they’re in very different shows.
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When Goose dies in Top Gun. Just those few seconds when Maverick realizes that he’s dead. Nothing else in that movie gets to me, not even when we see him talking to Goose’s widow. Just that first moment of knowing that his friend is dead, especially after his earlier declaration that when he flies his crew and his plane come first.
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This might be weird, but there’s a moment at the end of the MST3K episode Santa Claus where Mike sings, “I’ll be home for Christmas” and then sighs deeply. It might be because I first saw that episode when I was in grad school and far away from my family, but in the midst of a silly puppet that makes fun of bad movies, I found a moment of poignancy that surprised me.
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Which results in creativity!
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Oh yeah, I specifically refuse to watch dog movies for this reason, cuz I can’t handle the dog dying. And it kills me when I’m watching a regular movie and a dog dies. I love I Am Legend but I have to spend the whole time reminding myself not to get attached to his German Shepherd
That’s how I feel about certain sitcoms. Especially when I get attached to the characters and then one of them leaves or there’s a nostalgia-heavy finale. Or sometimes they just write emotional episodes because they know they’ve roped you in with comedy and now they know they can get ya with a genuine moment (“Jurassic Bark” episode of Futurama…)
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For me, it’s the ending of E.T. - A good friend that’s now gone was with me to watch it, same with Breakfast Club.
I also remember crying at the end of Bad News Bears, the emotional buildup, a quiet kid finding his voice, the solemn resignation of defeat…and that music !
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Star Trek II. The entire chamber scene. And Shatner’s delivery of “…human” just catches my breath every time and I cry.
Nani singing “Aloha ʻOe” in Lilo & Stitch.
Multiple points in Big Hero 6. (“Are you satisfied with your care?” )
Boromir’s death in Fellowship of the Ring.
David Tennant’s “I don’t want to go” in Doctor Who.
All of Babylon 5’s “Sleeping In Light.”
And Val Kilmer’s whole scene in Top Gun: Maverick.
(Really, my Achilles heel is men crying. That gets to me.)
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I admit it, I cry at movies A LOT. Don’t cry much in real life, but man, give me an emotional flick, and I need a box of hankies.
A couple of recent ones that I did not expect to cry at were Ghostbusters: Afterlife and Everything Everywhere All At Once.
But for the most part, it would be a shorter list of movies I don’t cry at.
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