Movie warnings...post the movies that blindsided you.

Deb,

I would keep  "WIT" off your list if you don't want to see a movie about someone who dies from cancer.

This is a very raw, wrenching and emotional movie about a woman dying from cervical cancer.

The movie, if nothing else should be viewed by every Oncologist, every person who works in the cancer field to teach them how not to treat a cancer patient!

Deb, that was me.  The movie we rented (which I compared to "Ordinary People" because the family was so dysfunctional) was "The Family Stone":

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0356680/

Diane Keaton is the matriarch of the family.  She's a real bitch (can I say that if I'm not posting in Traci's thread?), but the real surprise was when it turned out she'd had a mastectomy and was dying of BC.  I think I gasped when the camera showed her husband slipping his hand under her nightshirt, and there was that red scar running across the right side of her chest.  I'm sure my dh was thinking, "Oh, shit," when that scene came on.  The movie had been his idea--he thought it would be a comedy.

Another one that surprised me was "Lucky 7": 

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0370904/ 

It sounded cute and funny.  Then, they showed the mom sitting in a lounge chair in her robe, looking sick.  She gives her young daughter some worldly advice, and then ... is gone.  The father raises his daughter alone, and that's very sad.  The daughter spends her whole young life trying to live up to what her mother thought she should do--and that turns out to be the funny part.

OTOH, I am really super-sensitive right now, and I really don't like watching movies in which somebody dies of anything and leaves family members behind.  I hope I eventually get over this.  In the meantime, thanks for starting this thread so I can pre-screen my dh's selections.

otter

The Pursuit of Happyness is a movie with Will Smith and his son, about a father and son who are homeless while the father tries to make it and get a good job.  I cried the entire time, but it was more about being a single parent of a son the same age as the boy in the movie.  No one has cancer or dies.

The movie "Muriel's Wedding" was supposed to be funny but I just thought it was sad.  Her friend gets really sick.  Also, there is some movie I saw years ago with Drew Barrymore and the woman who played Diane in Cheers.  It started out as this fun, empowering women roadtrip movie, and someone ends up wasting away with AIDS.

I've always found funny-sad movies to be just sad, but like Otter, I'm especially sensitive now. 

I just watched "Two Weeks" on on demand on Sunday.  It stars Sally Field.  Cried my eyes out.  It is the last 2 weeks of her life, dying from cancer.

The day after surgery #1, I had people over to watch movies.  Here's how I described it at the time.

"So while I'm showering, Jarrett and Eileen are moving furniture around, getting the TV and DVD out of the bedroom and generally preparing for us to hunker down and watch "Man Push Cart." The DVD box featured glowing reviews, "Best NYC independent film ever!" and "Powerful!" and described it as being about a Pakistani rock star who found himself selling coffee from a cart in NYC who is given the "shadow of a glimmer of the possibility of hope" or some such. The latter should have tipped us off that this movie was a capital D Downer. How big of a Downer? (Spoiler alert)

His wife dies.
He doesn't get his kid back.
He likes a girl and she moves away.
His friend screws him over.
He falls down in the middle of traffic.
His cart is stolen.
His kitten dies, ferheavenssake.

After we finished watching this relentlessly depressing movie, we watched the trailer. The trailer reminded us of what we realized were the movie's high points, e.g., remember when he sold a cup of coffee to a woman who smiled at him? Remember when he kissed a girl in a bathroom (before she left him)? Remember the good old days when he was pulling his cart and he didn't fall down in traffic? Sheesh. Breast cancer seems like a laff-fest after this movie.

We flipped over to Channel 13 in hopes of finding something to lift our spirits. Charlie Rose was interviewing some unbelievable bore intoning such banalities as "You see . . . history . . . is . . . in . . . the . . . past. . ." But the kicker? Charlie Rose was sporting a shiner and a cut over his eye! It was the funniest-looking thing! Apparently, he tripped in a pothole and in saving his MacBook, fell flat on his face. Crazy night.

My sweet husband and I watched Shadow Land.  It's about how CS Lewis met his wife - their love story.  Well I didn't know she died.  It got to that part and I bawled.  I mean sobbed and sobbed.  It was sooooooo sad.  Then he goes to talk to her son and I started up again!  I yelled at my husband that it wasn't fair to make me watch that without telling me.  Thankfully this was LONG before my BC.

Oh, yeah--Deb, don't rent "Eight Below" if you don't want to be sad about animals dying.  It's not syrupy or PETA-ish.  It's just very matter-of-fact.  Storm coming--gotta leave the dogs; they probably won't make it.  It goes downhill from there. The end is uplifting but not enough to help much.

Edited to add:  OMG, I forgot all about Stepmom:

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0120686/

You know things are going to be bad when this is what they give as the plot:  "A terminally-ill mother has to settle on the new woman in her ex-husband's life, who will be their new stepmother."  Julia Roberts, Susan Sarandon, Ed Harris.

Ironically, as sad as it is, it really is a good flick with a "happy" ending. (I say that with the subject of this thread in mind.  There is nothing "happy" about a mom dying and leaving her kids behind, but in this flick, the two women finally understand each other and what's important in life.  yada yada yada.)

Don't get me started on the movies about old people with Alzheimer's, or elderly parents who can no longer care for themselves.  My dh lost his father to Alzheimer's a few years ago, and my dad was dx'd with it last year.  We have 3 movies in our Netflix queue that I refuse to watch because of that.

otter 

and.....8 below was based on a true story!! So sad.

Let's not forget the classics....Terms of Endearment and Beaches.

Dying Young was a tear jerker.

I didn't like American Pie. (I'm pretty sure that's the name.) It could have been a funny movie but...a 15 yr old seduces ..crap....oh yea Kevin Spacey.  RUINED the movie for me. That's all my teen nieces need to be watching. And, Love Actually. That all could have been a movie for all to see but no....................they had to throw in two actors doing it doggie style. Naked. What a bunch of crap. Can't they make a movie anymore without boobs being in it???

Great thread Deb cuz I don't want to be watching these either!

Hugs, Traci

AlaskaDeb:  Perhaps "Blades of Glory" is in order?

"Stepmom" and "The Family Stone" did me in, too. But so did "Pay it Forward" (had no idea the kid dies in the end) "Feast of Love" (another young person gets struck down in their prime) and "Away From Her" (altzheimer flick that was totally, totally depressing). I still can't watch "Bambi" or "Terms of Endearment."

Edited to add: OMG, Rock the Bald! That pic of Charlie Rosse had me spitting orange juice at the computer screen! As I love my MacBook, too and have almost fallen down stairs to save it, it's nice to know I'm not the only one, lol

Revkat,

Other funny, funny TV series (we own the disc sets) are Arrested Development and Malcolm in the Middle.

PS I love you? I hear the DH had a brain tumor and died.

 October Sky (teacher has C)

I don't mind watching it if I know what happens.

Sleepless in Seatle (the previous mom died of c)

safe from the big C

 JUNO

Knocked up

Napoleon Dynamite

Star Dust

Who dies in House?

Sex and the City is good, even when Sam gets BC, not too bad.

Who dies in House?

Sex and the City is good, even when Sam gets BC, not too bad.