Movies to Make Your Kids Cry

By Martha Brockenbrough
MSN Cinemama

Only a real sicko would make a kid cry on purpose.

I'm kidding, of course. Making kids cry is great fun for perfectly well-adjusted parents. Who among us hasn't at least thought about saying, "Quit crying or I'll give you something to cry about?"

Seriously, though, some kids do lose perspective on how great they have it. Though there are plenty of sad cases to be found in your local newspaper, the typical child in America has food, clothing, shelter and access to free public education -- along with loving relatives. Given all this, what's all the crying about?

The movies, though, are a different story, especially when you dig back into the video archives. Remember "Bambi" and "Dumbo"? Those were movies to make a kid glad to be eating leftover meatloaf, what with the rampant parent mortality/institutionalization. Poor Dumbo, being driven to drink because of his huge, huge ears.

Sigh. They don't make movies like they used to.

Today, family movies are mostly about laughs. There are exceptions, of course, such as the lovely adaptation of "Bridge to Terabithia" that came out last year. That was some old-fashioned misery -- and it's no wonder. The book it was based on is a classic.

This is not to knock funny movies. They're a treat, but there is a downside. With so many aiming for laughs, it's hard to be fresh. It's almost a guarantee, for example, that any time a secondary character is in a body of water, fart bubbles will rise.

To paraphrase Tolstoy, all happy movies are alike, and all sad movies are sad in their own way.

Depending on the kind of crying you want your child to experience, there is certainly a movie here to make boys and girls cry their sweet little eyes out.

For the Kid Who Is Crying Because You Won't Get Him a Dog

This kind of crying practically deserves a column of its own. The "Air Bud" and "Beethoven" franchises aside (but please, no mocking or my kids will cry), dog movies are historically two-sleeve affairs. It would be nice if kids used hankies instead, but let's be realistic.

"Lassie" is a good starter movie, particularly the 2005 remake starring Peter O'Toole as the nasty Duke. Beware, though. This movie could ultimately backfire, because Lassie doesn't die. And, while I don't like to give things away, the dog portraying Lassie clearly has not been neutered, either.

No, if you really want your kid to think a Webkinz is good enough, rent "Where the Red Fern Grows." There are two versions of the movie, which is based on the weepy novel by Wilson Rawls. The 2003 version is particularly nice, and features performances by Kris Kristofferson, Dabney Coleman, Dave Matthews and a promising Joseph Ashton as young Billy Coleman.

Billy is growing up poor in the Ozarks during the Depression. Too strapped to own even a pair of shoes, he has his heart set on a hunting dog. He earns enough money doing heavy chores, and buys a pair of puppies that become the greatest coon dogs in the area ... before the inevitable tragedy strikes.

If this isn't enough, then "Old Yeller," a 1957 classic, will surely set your children weeping. It's set in the 1860s and tells the tale of a boy left in charge of his family ranch while his dad is out driving cattle. A mutt that looks suspiciously like a yellow lab shows up at the farm. The boy, Travis, isn't so sure about the dog, but his brother loves him. Old Yeller, as the dog is named, saves the family in all sorts of ways. As with "Red Fern," the ending is a really sad one for the dog -- and Travis is involved in it in a way that's likely to make kids gasp and run for your loving arms.

For the Kid Who's Threatening to Run Away

My kids threaten to run away all the time. Last year, they even had bags perpetually packed, and kept whispering to each other about "the runaway."

They're mostly kidding about this, but in case they seriously think life on the lam would be better than the largely functional existence I provide them with, I have "E.T.: the Extra-Terrestrial" lined up and ready to go.

"E.T." isn't, on its face, a runaway story. But it does call to mind the power of home. E.T., the big-eyed alien, gets stranded on Earth. A lonely 10-year-old boy named Elliott finds him in the woods, and the two become friends. Their bond unites them in unexpected ways until one unexpectedly dies. When I first saw this as an 11-year-old in the theater, I thought my eyeballs were melting.

It does end more happily, though, paying homage to home and heart better than any other movie since "The Wizard of Oz."

For the Kid Who's Crying Over Friends

"Bridge to Terabithia" tells the story of poor country boy Jess and his new neighbor Leslie. Jess spends all summer practicing to be the fastest runner in school, only to be beaten by the new kid -- a girl! -- on the first day.

He could have been mad, but instead the two become fast friends. They grow to appreciate each other for their individual strengths, erasing feelings of competition (except for one tragic moment toward the end of the movie, when Jess doesn't invite Leslie along on a field trip). There are also a couple of nice scenes depicting bullying, and how it can be handled by kids.

These elements make the movie, based on the Newbery Award-winning book by Katherine Paterson, just the thing to watch for a kid who feels lonely, abused or jealous of a friend.

For Tweens Crying Over Broken Hearts

The older kids get, the more opportunities they have to feel legitimate misery (just wait till they're parents, though).

Hormones are largely to blame here, and I like to think that a good cry can wash some of those awful things right out of your system. For tweens, I have two favorite weepies.

The first is James Cameron's "Titanic," a truly cheesy love story in which a girl named Rose meets a young artist named Jack, poses for her first nude portrait, ditches her fiancé and steams up the back seat of a car (not necessarily in that order). That steamy car scene is the last time she's warm in the movie. From there on out, it's only a matter of time until everyone is belly-up on an ice floe or worse.

For teens crying over unrequited love, this is a good reminder that the jerky ex-fiance lived. Sometimes, being the spurned party has its benefits.

And then there is "West Side Story," what "High School Musical" would be if it aspired to excellence and the unwise use of weapons. Once again, the moral of the story could very well be "true love is highly overrated when you're still in high school."

If only kids would believe us. They could put off a lot of weeping till they had kids of their own.

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Martha Brockenbrough is Cinemama for the Parents' Movie Guide on MSN. She is also the author of "It Could Happen to You: Diary of a Pregnancy and Beyond" and the founder of SPOGG, the Society for the Promotion of Good Grammar. She writes a fun-with-kids column for Cranium.com, as well as an educational humor column for Encarta. Check out her Web site.

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