Tweet The Saddest Movie in the World

Good news, University of California students! You no longer need to wonder where your tuition dollars are going.

After years of exhaustive research, clinical researchers at UC Berkeley have identified the saddest movie scene in history.

What is it that's even sadder than watching Bambi's mother get shot? The story's at Smithsonian.com:

http://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/The-Saddest-Movie-in-the-World.html

Good news, University of California students! You no longer need to wonder where your tuition dollars are going.

After years of exhaustive research, clinical researchers at UC Berkeley have identified the saddest movie scene in history.

What is it that's even sadder than watching Bambi's mother get shot? The story's at Smithsonian.com:

http://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/The-Saddest-Movie-in-the-World.html

As usual, scientists are clueless. The "Mom in the mad elephant cage" scene from DUMBO is far sadder than "Mom soon to become a hunters wall trophy" scene in BAMBI, which is more horrifying than sad. And the 1979 version of THE CHAMP works far more nausea than tears out of this fellow.

But if they have determined that the funniest scene in anything comes from WHEN HARRY MET SALLY, how is anyone to take this seriously?

RICHARD M ROBERTS

WOT??? The remake of The Champ blows! Give me the original any day...or the goodbye scene in Remains of the Day...or the scene in The Kid where they take the Kid away...or the "that's my sore ear" scene in It's A Wonderful Life...or the scene in Dumbo where he's taken from his mother.... I can keep going!

My pick is Leo McCarey's MAKE WAY FOR TOMORROW. Finally caught up with it thanks to it's recent release on DVD and I concur with Orson Welles. "It would make a stone cry."

Yes! McCarey's flick.....the moment when Thomas Mitchell has to tell his mom that this living arrangement isn't working out, only Beulah Bondi heads him off by telling him she would feel more comfortable living with those her own age and would like to move to the Old Folks Home. It's a devastating moment.

From the article, I got the impression that the clips in question are not being offered as evidence of the overall quality of the movies they're taken from. The author seems to be saying that these clips have been found to be the most effective in eliciting a single, particular emotion in the largest number of people being studied by psychologists in a laboratory setting. I would imagine that people studying, say, "sadness," would look for a reliable stimulus that will ping the sad meter of the biggest number of people, instead of the outliers who blubber at things like Rodan getting barbequed in a volcano.

Did they offer to shoot Ricky Schroeder's dog, the way Norman Taurog threatened his nephew?

Bob

[Mike Gebert]

Umberto D is the saddest movie ever, and I don't need no stinking scientist to prove it.

For me it would be Bresson's MOUCHETTE, but from earlier vintage I can't remember a picture that depressed me more than William K. Howard's BACK DOOR TO HEAVEN.

Hmm.... I found Hachi to be pretty sad. I've heard Grave of Fireflies is a tear jerker. The last couple of minutes of Forbidden Games is sad too.

Can't think of any others right now.

I've heard Grave of Fireflies is a tear jerker.

I didn't even want to mention that one, I think I'm still getting over it. To call it a `tear jerker' is like calling Mt Everest a speed bump.

The idea of judging the sadness of a film on the basis of a single scene is counter-intuitive. Certainly, there are scenes that you could watch immediately and judge as sad, but the films that pack the greatest punch are the ones where we gradually get to know and care about the characters over the course of the story.

This has to be the saddest article I ever read. It makes me cry to discover that people are really as stupid as I sometimes feel they are...

From the article, I got the impression that the clips in question are not being offered as evidence of the overall quality of the movies they're taken from. The author seems to be saying that these clips have been found to be the most effective in eliciting a single, particular emotion in the largest number of people being studied by psychologists in a laboratory setting. I would imagine that people studying, say, "sadness," would look for a reliable stimulus that will ping the sad meter of the biggest number of people, instead of the outliers who blubber at things like Rodan getting barbequed in a volcano.

That's what I got out of the article. Although I inevitably snivel when Rodan gets killed.

I agree re UMBERTO D. It's so sad I defy myself to watch it again. It helps to have a dog on my lap.

MAKE WAY FOR TOMORROW is extremely moving, including, well, everything.

I've heard Grave of Fireflies is a tear jerker.

Oh my God, Grave of the Fireflies is absolutely depressing! I cried throughout the majority of the running time.

None of this is sadder than W.C. Fields singing the title lament in THE FATAL GLASS OF BEER, about the country lad who goes to the big city, is introduced to the cursed drink by some college boys, and ends up cruelly breaking the Salvation Army girl's tambourine. Not even close. I get tears even thinking about it.