14 July 2008

top 5's

Sob-fests and children's books ...

Today, from thewhyfive ...

Top 5 Sad Movies:

1. The Joy Luck Club - It's all about relationships, the generation gap, hopes and dreams fulfilled and dashed. The ending with the sisters' uniting always makes me cry.
2. Moulin Rouge - Not a "sad" movie, per se, but the ending is MISERABLE. Again with the crying.
3. Finding Neverland - The mother is dying from the moment the audience sees her. You know she's going to die, but the ending is still a bawl-fest when she "sees" Barrie's imaginary world come to life.
4. Pan's Labyrinth - Again, not exactly a sad movie, but Javier Navarrete's score pulls at the heart-strings.
5. The Last Samurai - Beautiful and sad, it's about the destruction of a terribly graceful way of life.

Honourable mention: The Fox and the Hound. This made me cry as a child. It probably still would.

Dishonourable mention: Atonement - Because it's sad, and did make me cry, but definitely went above and beyond the call of duty to wrench out the viewer's heart and stomp on it for good measure. Definitely a bitter "oh, fuck you, movie-makers" kind of cry.

Top 5 Favorite Children's Books:

1. Where the Sidewalk Ends and other Shel Silverstein books -- gently grim poetry for youngsters.
2. Where the Wild Things Are by Maurice Sendak -- You have to love monsters you can play with.
3. Strega Nona by Tomie dePaola -- because who doesn't want a Magic Pasta Pot?
4. The Woodland Folk in Dragonland by Tony Wolf -- I would spend hours looking at the illustrations in this book--beautiful and riddled with short episodes about the woodland folk's interactions with dragons (good and bad but mostly bad).
5. Anything by Dr. Seuss -- fun pictures and [usually] good messages (Hop On Pop was probably not a good message).

Honourable mention: Harry Potter by J.K. Rowling, as I was not a child when it was published.

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