Most depressing movies ever made

Mmm. Yeah HOSAF fucked me up. Ms. Shoreh Aghdashloo… and who wins Oscar that year? Renée for her skipper hillbilly dyke minstrel show. And she has TWO, lol.

Wit with Emma Thompson. The nurse lovingly putting lotions on her hands, the mentor reading her The Runaway Bunny? Fuck. I sobbed.

Mamma Mia.

Breaking the Waves

Snowpiercer

Naked (1993)

In the Bedroom (2001)

Amour (2012)

Lilya 4 Ever

Blue Valentine. Critics loved it. It just seemed like a dreary homage to heterosexual breeder misery.

-‘Love Liza’ -‘Dancer in the Dark’ -‘We Need to Talk about Kevin’

What’s eating Gilbert grape?

Precious

House of sand and fog

Irreversible

Bambi

On The Beach, Testament, The Road…

Come and See is in a class of its own. Soul wrenching. I had a friend who told me she was shown the film yearly in school back in the USSR

Precious is a comedy

"When the wind blows" from 1986. An animated film depicting an adorable but tragically naive and goverment trusting elderly couple in the countryside of England enduring a nuclear attack then unknowingly and slowly dying of radiation poisoning. The story only shows them, no one else. It is the most harrowing disturbing things I ever watched, the cutesy animation only making it more so. It does have a kick ass soundtrack with both Roger Waters and Savid Bowie writing music for it, but even that can't make it any less depressing. Sadly it was removed from youtube but here's a trailer

Yeah, Blue Valentine was miserable. The Florida Project. Southpaw.

Fellini's Nights of Cabiria traumatized me

For white collar men, "Up In The Air" is by far the most depressing movie ever.

The layoff scenes, the random hotel scenes and the coming back to his apartment and it feeling like a hotel room.

And then of course the plot twist at the end.

Against the advice of friends, I watched it alone one night in a hotel room and was not able to fall asleep after.

They Shoot Horses Don’t They

Lilya 4-Ever

R19 I love that movie though. It is depressing.

I didn’t feel bad for Jane Fonda. She was done with everything.

But the “Jean Harlow”. I loved her the most. She was completely torn down.

Manchester by the Sea

Testament. Jesus Christ, you want to throw yourself off a cliff after watching that movie.

City Lights

Mommie Dearest

A Robert Bresson triple bill: DIARY OF A COUNTRY PRIEST (50); MOUCHETTE (67); and THE DEVIL PROBABLY (77).

Rosetta. A Belgian film about a young woman caught in an endless battle against poverty. It’s really well acted, but grimly demanding of the viewer.

[quote]Fellini's Nights of Cabiria traumatized me

It sure ain't Sweet Charity, is it? La Strada is even worse.

r15, I'll see your When the Wind Blows and raise you Threads (1984.)

Melancholia by Lars Von Trier,

Epic existential sadness

Both versions of ON THE BEACH are morose and diabolically sad. It’s like the film is trying to destroy its viewers. But TESTAMENT had better acting.

Was just going to mention Threads. Bleak, bleak, bleak.

Elem Klimov's Come and See (1985)

A fantastic anti-war film but so depressing and eerie. I saw it for the first time when I was way too young, I couldn't get it out of my head for months.

[quote]The invasion of a village in Byelorussia by German forces sends young Florya into the forest to join the weary Resistance fighters, against his family’s wishes. There he meets a girl, Glasha, who accompanies him back to his village. On returning home, Florya finds his family and fellow peasants massacred. His continued survival amidst the brutal debris of war becomes increasingly nightmarish, a battle between despair and hope.

Requiem for a Dream

The Father

The English Patient

Leaving Las Vegas

Dying Young

The Anniversary Party

The Ice Storm

Brokeback Mountain

Requiem for a Dream

The Father

The English Patient

Leaving Las Vegas

Dying Young

The Anniversary Party

The Ice Storm

Brokeback Mountain

Mishima: A Life in Four Chapters

Cries and Whispers

The Ice Storm

"West Side Story (2021)"

Jesus Camp

Crumb

Shame, even though you see Fassbender's big bits in the beginning, is pretty fucking depressing.

Werkmeister Harmonies (here in full, because it is impossible to find in physical or legal streaming means)

R41 in Shame was well acted and intense. Also incredibly bleak.

Since we agree on Nights of Cabiria, we should at least mention Smithereens - that final seen is pretty ominous

Johnny Got His Gun (1971).

The biggest problem with Shame is there is no resolution. It's clear at the end that he's just going to keep going like he's going until he totally ruins his life and probably offs himself. There's no redemption, no growth. Perhaps this is realistic, but it's hella bleak.

#dataloungethreadsowhite

Philadelphia

Night, Mother

Wendy and Lucy

Horses...

Atonement

Leaving Las Vegas

Manchester by the Sea

Pan's Labyrinth

Don't Look Now

None of the movies on the list holds candle to what’s been established as the saddest movie ever made, which just so happens to be an anime. Grave of the Fireflies. What makes it tragic are the beautiful moments within the film.

What Dreams May Come

I doubt anyone would agree with me, but...Bad Santa. I kept wanting to shut it off, but kept watching to make sure the kid was okay.

Three of the numbingly saddest movies ever (though not necessarily most depressing, per se) -- Make Way for Tomorrow, Splendor in the Grass and A Tree Grows in Brooklyn.

I actually find Nights of Cabiria to be a very life affirming movie - the last scene where Cabiria decides to live, walking surrounded by young people happy, alive, and singing......Masina's look to the camera with a tearful smile is one of my favorite movie endings. You know despite everything, she's going to keep on going.

Dancer in the Dark is most depressing movie I've ever watched. Come and See is a close second.

Roger Ebert talked about Grave of the Fireflies, and he encapsulated main points of what makes the movie so hauntingly tragic and beautiful. It was based on a real story of a Japanese child WW2 survivor. I’ve since used this movie as a litmus test to see if a person is a psychopath or not. One of my friend’s BF, an ex-army guy who did 4 tours in Afghanistan, cried like a baby when he watched the movie. OTOH, I had a now former friend watch it and she said she didn’t even have urge to cry one bit. Turned out later (after I dropped her as friend) it came to light she was charged with elder abuse of her grandmother.

I'm sorry mama, I'm sorry!!!

"Making Love" is a soapy mess, but that last shot of Kate Jackson standing in her driveway as the true love of her life drives away is soul crushing.

The ending of the original West Side Story is heartbreaking and sobering. Still brings a tear to my eye.

You bitches are slipping.

The Bonfire of the Vanities.

It had so much potential: a great novel, an amazing cast (Hanks, Willis, Cattrall, Griffin, Abraham, Rubinek, Moffat, Dunn, Stephens, and Freeman), and a top-notch director.

But it was shit.

Depressing and horrific aren't the same, r61.

First cow ,what a ridiculous stupid movie

Like Dancer in the Dark, for a similar reason, episode 5 of Kieślowski's Dekalog (Thou shalt not kill) was shattering for me. Just filled me with despair and sadness. Nuclear holocaust movies also did the same, with the added attraction of terror/intense dread. I could only watch part of the first part of Threads when someone posted it here in the last couple of years.

Two Women/La ciociara - it earned Sophia Loren an Academy Award.

It's so depressing.

R62 Bonfire of the Vanities had zero potential with that cast, in those parts. Tom Hanks, as Master of the Universe, are you kidding? Did any of the production team even read the book? That was the clearest case of miscasting ever.

Typically I can watch films like Cries & Whispers all day and feel more moved than depressed, but Mamma Roma depressed me. Documentaries about genocide and the AIDS crisis leave me in a funk for weeks even though it's necessary viewing.

Longtime Companion. Relentlessly tragic from beginning to end.

Wendy & Lucy

Irreversible

Dancer in the Dark

Buried

I will never watch these film again, once was enough.

Single All the Way (2021)

The garden of the Finzi Continis

WINTER LIGHT (63) makes CRIES AND WHISPERS seem like a light comedy.

There IS No God!

We are at the point where DLers are picking out obscure movies to show off their sophisticated taste in film, rather than movies they actually found depressing.

Eden Lake - most depressing ending ever.

I saw a double feature of Leaving Las Vegas/ Dead Man Walking during Oscar time.

I'm surprised they didn't pass out free razor blades at the Box office

Caught this on AMC ages ago when they still showed classic movies. So sad.

Precious was funny. White guild makes people depressed.

I saw it with a mostly black audience in the theater and it was LOUD. I imagine they know someone like the characters in the film.

Come on, the part where Precious was running away with the fried Chicken was funny

The Wicker Man (1973)

Breaking the Waves (original post, I second that)

Happiness, by Todd Solondz.

A brutal demolition of middle-class delusion and hypocrisy. What makes it truly depressing is that it's billed as a comedy.

Melancholia

The Ice Storm

Brokeback Mountain

The Plague Dogs. Even more depressing than Lilya 4 Ever. It starts depressing, everything in the middle is sad and depressing and then it ends even more depressing.

A French film called "I am Jonas."

Devastatingly tragic and sad.

Helen Lawson’s “STDs, moi?”

Larry Clark's 'Kids'. Seeing it 1 time was enough

The House Of Mirth. Based on the Edith Wharton novel, it follows the social decline and eventual disgrace of socialite Lily Bart. She is a poor relation tolerated by wealthy relatives, and is expected to follow a narrow path to an acceptable marriage, but she is not prepared to sell herself. Much of it was filmed in the West End of Glasgow, with our gorgeous Victorian townhouses as an effective stand in for New York City. ,

I'd forgotten about The House of Mirth. Total bummer of a film, though Gillian Anderson and Laura Linney were quite good in it.

If you are familiar with the novel, the film version of The House of Mirth is a travesty. Gillian Anderson is horribly misdirected; in place of Lily Bart's gallantry, she is teeth-grindingly arch; where Lily goes through her decline without a murmur, Anderson is a damp mess from middle to end.

Lars Von Trier films only depress me because somehow that fucking mysoyginistic back-stabbing full-of-himself gasbag blob has a career.

Ditto that sad-face cunt Todd Solondz. "Oh, I never ever smile. I'm so depressed. Life sucks so much." Yes, Todd, it does. Here's a map to all the local bridges. Knock yourself out.

Depressing films are effective when they show that people destroy their own chances at happiness, not when naked circumstance is dropped upon you from above anvil-style.

Fuck these two glum pumpkins and their "depressing" movies. As manipulative as a Hallmark holiday special turned inside out.

The Father, yes! My god.

My grandmother died of Alzheimer's and it was heartbreaking to see a vigorous, sassy, intelligent woman reduced to nothing.

So that's a hard pass from me on The Father.

[quote] "House of Sand and Fog (2003)"

Absolutely depressing, but so atmospheric, R1. It's one of my favorites. After seeing it in the cinema, I immediately bought Horner's score. It's still my favorite Horner work.

It definitely reminds me of other favorites: Elfman's score for "Dolores Claiborne", & Newman's work for "Little Children".

Nomadland

Shoah

Old Yeller

Julianne Moore's final monologue in The Hours tore me apart.

R15, I remember seeing that back in the day. I haven’t seen many of the others listed here so can’t comment but ‘When the Wind Blows’ gets my vote as one of the most depressing I have ever seen. I suppose there are lots of Ken Loach films that would be fairly high up the list too in that there is no hope to be found in any of them.

A sad film requires a deft hand who can bring a sense of rightness and catharsis to the tragic events. You can't just have shitty things happen for no reason.

The absolute bleakest film I can think of is "Negatives," in which a man whose father is dying tries to escape into creepy sexual fantasies.

"Shame" was relentlessly sad from start to finish.

I like Shame, but I would have liked it more if he had one honest and healing conversation with his sister. It's clear they were both abused as children and probably had an incestuous relationship at one point, and giving them a hopeful moment in the hospital would have transformed the ending. We don't have to think they're going to solve their problems overnight, but would it have been so terrible to suggest that salvation is at least possible?

"Wolf Creek" was too much for me. I love horror, but don't like extended, unrelenting, graphic depictions of physical torture. I was disgusted, and completely depressed afterward.

Of course, this sort of thing happens all the time in real life, and as a horror fan, it made me question my relationship to the genre. So, it was definitely effective.

R101 That's what made the film even more tragic. They couldn't break through their own shame and forgive themselves.

Another vote for Manchester By the Sea

Another vote for Brokeback Mountain

Lust, Caution (same director as Brokeback AND The ice Storm)

Old Yeller

The grapes of wrath - various heartbreaking moments

Another vote for ‘night Mother with Spacek and Bancroft. That’s a heavy movie from beginning to end.

Also the Japanese film The Blue Light is another one.

The grimness of the House of Sand and Fog cannot be easily matched. I remember when I read the book thinking, this guy wrote this like he's hoping it's going to be turned into a film. Voila.

Another horribly depressing film is the one with the kids whose organs are harvested. Keira Knightley is in it and I can't remember the title.

Purr, purr Francine at R92.

21 Grams

The Rapture - Mimi Rogers was never better, before or since

The Vanishing (1988) - NOT the American remake directed by the same guy which altered the original bleak ending for a garbage one.

The films of Michael Haneke - take your pic but Funny Games, the original and its American remake, stand out.

Magnolia

Smilla's Sense of Snow

Little Children

Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me, the Twin Peaks pilot too

Seven - all of it but especially that ending.

Before the Devil Knows You're Dead

Million Dollar Baby

Never Let Me Go. Yeesh, that one was rough.

To Live and Die in L.A.

Un Homme Qui Crie, a French language movie from Tchad made in 2010 about a man who is forced to confront his mortality when he is forced to give up his job to his son.

No one on DL has seen it but me and it is far more obscure than any film mentioned thus far.

I win.

The War Zone

Eldorado, road movie set in bleak wallonia (french-speaking Belgium). Also Waltz with Bashir (about Israeli invasion of Lebanon). Both films 2008.

Dancer in the Dark. Devastating

Raise the Red Lantern.

I also once watched The Ice Storm and Boogie Nights on the same weekend, and felt so depressed afterward that I could hardly get out of my chair.

again lilja 4-ever

One Hour Photo. I found his loneliness very depressing. The way he ate dinner alone at that off-brand Chuck E Cheese and the waitress knew his name.

Brb- crossing all these films off my "to watch" list.

PU-239...and my husband loves it.

Then, there's this which I hated more than I could express...

The Comfort of Strangers - great cast Rupert Everett, Helen Mirren, Christopher Walken, Natasha Richardson, beautiful Venice background. But the sadness builds and builds. Don't want to watch it again.

R107 Never Let Me Go (2010) Also stars a pre-twink Andrew Garfield and that prune-face Carey Mulligan

Kubrick's Barry Lyndon is a grim piece of work.

The Seven Samurai is a masterpiece but the ending is very bleak.

Jude

Dancer In The Dark starring Bjork The Icelandic Loon.

And Central Station- That last scene with Fernanda Montenegro is a killer.

And I sobbed during the film about the guy who lived in a van in the wilderness with the Eddie Vedder theme song... Sobbed for an hour. I had never had a film make me sob.

SATC 2.

Sophie’s Choice

Looking for Mr. Goodbar. That ending…ugh.

I found Her with Joaquin Phoenix in love with his operating system unexpectedly depressing. That is not what I thought that film was going to be.

There’s Something Wrong With Aunt Diane

An American Crime

The Ice Storm has a sad ending that I’m not sure was necessary, but overall it didn’t leave me as morbidly depressed as the above two. Brokeback Mountain is also pervasively sad and not representative of gay life; I loved it but felt it was manipulative for no good reason.

I have never wanted to see Dancer In The Dark. Heard about it. What’s the point?

I can’t think of any other movies that left me feeling depressed for an entire WEEK like the Aunt Diane documentary and An American Crime (a dramatization of a really horrific true crime case). I can’t even articulate why they both hit me so hard.

Honestly, Dancer In The Dark (I chose Bee-gork above) is a good film.

But my god the last hour is just a killer- Heaps of bad circumstances on this poor woman. It really got me.

She did an amazing job.

You were right Selma, listen to your heart.. and the eyeglasses... Oh my god.

Very bleak. Very rough.

I forgot to add “Melancholia”. Maybe some saw the ending as a resolution of peace but I found it horrifying. Maybe because I would be more like Charlotte’s character than Kirsten’s character. I’d be freaking the fuck out.

And it’s depressing that could happen one day to humans. I hope I’m dead before it does.

Since someone already be mentioned Irreversible I'll also add another Noe flick:

I Stand Alone

You'll need to take several showers after watching it. I'd even call it even more repulsive than Irreversible.

I found Melancholia kind of beautiful. It got me, but it did not depress me.

Interesting how both Dancer In The Dark and Melancholia were both directed by Von Trier.

R135 Well I think that’s the whole thing about Melancholia. Some people are Kristen and some people are Charlotte. You must be more of a Kristen if you found that ending beautiful lol.

I was totally bummed out at the end. I knew it was coming but the suffocation and hopelessness Charlotte felt at the end.

The Sweet Hereafter La Strada Belle de Jour The Virgin suicides The Road Welcome to the dollhouse The Conformist Come and See Melancholia

And my all time favourite movie which is perhaps the saddest of them all: Army of Shadows

I can’t believe I forgot the Sweet Hereafter. I love that film.

"The Days Of Wine And Roses" definitely qualifies, as well. Remick was nominated, but Bancroft won in 1963.

Sophie's Choice

Biutiful

R107 Is Love Actually the Knightley film you're thinking of?

R129 idk if I found iit depressing per se but the ending for LFMG was one of the creepiest I have ever seen. I was scard to go home with anyone years after seeing it..

Probably this one:

'night, Mother (1986)

Is it possible no one has mentioned the Jane Alexander nuclear bomb movie Testament yet? When I want to be completely destroyed and have a good cry that’s my go to movie.

The Sweet Hereafter was based on a Russell Banks novel, as was the extremely depressing (but excellent) film adaptation of Affliction.

Jude by Michael Winterbottom. (based on the Hardy novel.)

Also I think a really good Andrew Garfield tragedy porn double feature would be "Boy A" and "Never Let me Go."

All three are devastating.

Our Mother’s House (1967)

Dancing at Loughnasa (1998)

R146, try looking upthread. It’s been mentioned more than once. And it is a devastating film.

Paths of Glory The Boy in the Striped Pajamas Rochelle Rochelle : A young girls journey from Milan to Minsk Town Without Pity The Sorrow and the Pity

Speaking of depressing (and semi-related), does anyone know of a film career as dismal as House of Sand and Fog’s Vadim Perelman’s? An outstanding debut and then it’s apparently over? At least Camino had Heaven’s Gate and a couple others before self-immolation.

Gone With the Wind - series of nightmare events, public and private. What Ever Happened to Baby Jane - camp layers aside, it is horrific and grim, and SAD.

I just watched the original "NIghtmare Alley" with Tyrone Power and Joan Blondell on TCM. Not the most depressing film I've seen, but it has a surprisingly sad and hopeless ending, unusual for a major studio film of the time.

Threads, The War Game, The Day After - so depressing though I think Testament (which has been mentioned above is the best of the nuclear disaster genre). Jane Alexander should have won an Oscar.

Buck would have mentioned Ordinary People

Last Tango In Paris

R155 I was surprised to see she was nominated. I thought it was a PBS thing. That’s where I first saw it as a kid.

The documentary The Bridge

Also, Blood Sucking Freaks

What's depressing about that one is that there's an audience for that type of film

Pan's Labyrinth - the ending made me ball.

Eden Lake

R142 No, the movie is Never Let Me Go, based on a novel by Kazuo Ishiguro.

He also wrote Remains of the Day, another depressing novel/movie.

R161, anyone in particular?

STAR WARS

THE SWEET HEREAFTER by Atom Egoyan. What a fucking dismal thing it is. A Egoyan died, to me, as I sat and squirmed through this mawkish crapfest about a busload of schoolchildren who die in a ridiculous accident. It SHOULD have been made as a comedy, and might then have been really good.

DANCER IN THE DARK (Lars von Trier & Bjorkie): a true masterpiece by the Danish 'genius' . I wanted to get up and walk home long before the movie ended, but I was stranded there since I hadn't driven and it was too far to walk. My reward: getting to see Bjork put to death in the electric chair at the very end. Too bad they didn't execute the director, too. Now THAT'S entertainment...

You think Night Mother was depressing? You should have seen the play with Kathy Bates and Anne Pitoniak! I don't know how they did it 8 times a week without wanting to slit their throats. But I guess that's what professional acting is about. You separate yourself from your character and go home without them.

Au Hazard Balthazar is both depressing and infinitely sad.

Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?

Who's Afraid of Vadge Woolf IS depressing but it is brilliantly funny a lot of the time. It is mostly just exhausting, when it's over YOU feel like you've stayed up all night, just like the characters. THE LION IN WINTER is another LONG, drawn-out bitchfest that leaves the viewer worn out when it's over. And both, I think, were originally stage plays (??).

Old Yeller

R161 The ending made you horny?

[quote]You should have seen the play with Kathy Bates and Anne Pitoniak!

r167 I would have loved to have seen that

This Mike Leigh film Naked where a woman gets raped in the afternoon by her roommate's visiting ex-boyfriend and then raped for a second time later that evening by their landlord.

The Platform -- read about it here on DL. Horrible movie!

WAoVW is more sad than depressing and the ending is actually hopefull. Sad but hopefull. The focus on their hands holding with the sun rising behind them is for sure meant to signal hope. I always cry like a bitch at that part

Muscle gods are such terrible lovers. It doesn't feel physically good to have sex with them. They are hard all over, hard and mechanical just like their exercise rituals.

Nil By Mouth. Kathy Burke is one hell of an actress.

The Elephant Man

Can you people please stop revealing the endings of these movies you’re mentioning?

Can’t believe it doesn’t occur to you that some of these are on our “watch lists” and we might not want to have them spoiled.

R158 it had some sort of limited theatrical release so it could qualify for the Oscars.

Being the Ricardos

Au Revoir Les Enfants

I can’t remember the name but it’s a British film and I think Tim Roth stars and possibly directs or wrote the screenplay.

About a family where the father is repeatedly raping the daughter. Sickening, I’ll never watch again.

Old Yeller

The Last Picture Shoe

Show^

Eyes Without A Face

Le Grande Illusion

Children of Paradise

Schindler's List

Requiem for a Dream and Grave of the Fireflies are my two. I won't watch House of Sand and Fog because I know it's bleak. Pan's Labyrinth was also a hard watch, but more painful than depressing, per se

Dancer in the Dark annoys me, but I actually really like Melancholia, which I find an interesting portrayal of depression and how overwhelming it is. Von trier said it was partly about depressed people being able to cope with things other people can't. There's also the storytelling-as-coping aspect.

Step Mom

The Spy Who Came in From the Cold

Call Me By Your Name & Young Adult, with Charlize Theron and Patton Oswald. Bleak.

Melancholia fucked me up days later.

Se7en fucked me up for 3 months!

Never Let me Go not only fucked me up while watching it, I was queasy & on the edge of puking the entire time (because of the plot, not food poisoning). I loved the film & the performances but it was excruciating to view.

Any movies where animals die or are suffering.

I completely agree with R193. I refused to see Bambi as a child and still haven't watched it. Another movie I refuse to see is the Cove about killing dolphins in Japan. Old Yeller destroyed me.

Bent

The Damned

it can happen here

George Washington. No, not about the president. About a group of young African American kids in North Carolina. Heartbreaking.

I, Daniel Blake

Porky's Revenge

The Last Emperor

Reds

TESTAMENT!!! OH MY GOD- YES! It makes The Day After look like Legally Blonde Part 5!

++++And let me add- Dear Zachary- the documentary-

Holy fuck. DO NOT RESEARCH the case before seeing this documentary.

Its a gut punch. But there is some real beauty in it- namely The Bagbys. Two truly wonderful people-

But what a documentary.

R166 What an idiotic response. The Sweet Hereafter is one of the finest films ever made.

R183 The War Zone

I remember Amores Perros breaking my heart repeatedly as I watched it. It was so traumatizing I think I’ve blocked out certain things.

Disagree that Wit with Emma Thompson was depressing. yes she was in a cancer ward, terminal, but the scenes with her old professor and the nurse were tender. It was surprisingly uplifting, given the subject matter.

Not a movie but the documentary Tiger king was a depressing and ugly drag. Not that mysterious or interesting just trashy.The only likeable character was the one armed lesbian.

Umberto D

R179 I won't talk about Passion of the Christ.

Sarah, Plain and Tall.

Because she's so much plainer than anyone would ever imagine.

Nebraska.

Another vote for Old Yeller

"Seven Pounds," 2008, starring Will Smith. Truly a boring, depressing movie. It was the Christmas release for Columbia Pictures, where at the end of the movie, the lead star (spoiler alert!!!!!): well I won't tell you. Go watch the damn thing!

R166, Janet Maslin, writing about "The Sweet Hereafter" for The New York Times, said "this fusion of Mr. Banks's and Mr. Egoyan's sensibilities stands as a particularly inspired mix," with Sarah Polley and Bruce Greenwood "particularly good here.

That means you're wrong.

The documentary Dying at Grace (2003) a documentary which explores the deaths of five people of cancer. Of fuck it is grim and as the film progresses it gets more explicit.

Tokyo Story.

I thought Bowling for Columbine was incredibly sad when I first saw it. I don't think it would have the same impact if I re-watched it because we've had years of worse shootings than Columbine.

Another vote for Au Revoir Les Enfants - Louis Malle based this on events from his life when he was attending a Catholic boarding school during WWII.

A film which definitely lures you in with a false sense of security...

Empire of the Sun (1987)

Die Konsequenz (aka The Consequence)

City of Angels

Marvin's Room

Back to House of Sand and Fog. Has Jennifer Connelly ever been in a film that wasn't depressing?

I love depressing movies. I second Testament and Last Picture Show. I love Empire of the Sun (Christian Bale gives the best performance ever by a child actor), but I don't think of it as depressing.

I'll add to the list my favorite move ever, Fearless, starring Jeff Bridges, Isabella Rossellini, and Rosie Perez in her best performance ever. You will sob uncontrollably for the last 20 minutes and then for a while after it is over.

The elephant man

Just watched "Fearless." Not impressed. Surely you can do better than that!

All mine have already been listed here, so I'm looking for more.

Dancer in the Dark

They Shoot Horses, Don't They

Requiem for a Dream

Testament

House of Sand and Fog

Happiness

Any more??

The War Zone R183 - I've seen it as well and it is harrowing. It was apparently based on Tim Roth's own experience of being raped by his grandfather as a young child, which makes it even more heartbreaking.

Another one of my favorite depressing movies just came to mind: Gummo. I know the movie is divisive but I find to be a masterpiece. I never want to see it after the first time. I felt physically ill watching it - which was 100% Korine's intention with the camerawork placing the viewer as the passive observer to all the mundane horror going on.

Several people have mentioned Happiness as being depressing. I found it laugh out loud funny! Lara Flynn Boyle in particular.

The Good Son

Orphan

Any Rob Zombie flick

The Basket Case films

Dying of Grace and movies that document dying and hospice I find usefully educational more than depressing. HOSAF is depressing. Cloris Leachman in Last Picture Show is depressing. Emotionally affecting as opposed to intellectually thought provoking.

Closely Watched Trains (1966)

This film gave my depression a depression. And it's in Czech.

The Wrestler with Mickey Rourke

R224 good question. I like that about her. She’s a dark presence in film. I wish she had been utilised more.

The Anne Frank television movie that depicts what happened to her after she was discovered by the Nazis. All previous versions end on this false uplifting note which glosses over the Holocaust. Her diary was turned into frau bait so little white Christian girls could identify with her. In Anne Frank: The Whole Story, we get to see her Jewishness and the price that she paid for it. So we get an idea of how she suffered and it makes her story more realistic. And it’s not pretty. It’s graphic for a TV film too. You see her dehumanization in the camps, the filth and squalor that eventually killed her. I didn’t know how they applied the tattoos to prisoners at Auschwitz until I saw this film. I was appalled. And since they weren’t allowed to use words from Anne’s diary the producers had to rely solely upon the tragic aspects of the family’s travails. There was nothing uplifting about it. When Margot dies in Anne’s arms, it breaks me up inside. Right up until the end, when they roll the credits and they show Anne sitting on the train taking her to the concentration camp and she’s smiling at the camera. That kind of ruined it.

The Libertine The Grapes of Wrath A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (at least the stuff with the feckless but charming dad)

Capturing the Friedmans is one of the greatest documentaries ever made IMO. Fun fact: it was supposed to be in the running for the Oscars that year and probably would have one but the 'victims' petitioned the Academy so they pulled it out of the running.

Oooh! And "Rachel Getting Married"

On the Beach

Never Let Me Go (2010)

The Boy in the Striped Pajamas

Contagion (and we are all fucking living it)

R239 I forgot about On the Beach.

God, that was sad.

R240 wait isn’t contagion the one where goop dies?

Not the most depressing movie ever made but I wonder if any of the central characters in “Sunday Bloody Sunday” ended up happy.

Nekromantik (1987)

The Hunger (1983)

Ernest Saves Christmas

Another vote for 'Happiness'. R81 summed it up well:

[quote]A brutal demolition of middle-class delusion and hypocrisy. What makes it truly depressing is that it's billed as a comedy.

I laughed a lot, actually, mainly because the characters were so fucked up and the movie was incredibly bleak. It's the epitome of a black comedy.

I was weirdly uplifted by the thought that I was nowhere near as damaged as those characters.

The Butterfly Effect

Any Shirley Temple movie, because in none of them does she get violently killed at the end.

What's the name of the film about a trashy woman and her young daughter who live in a FL motel near Disneyworld?

R250 The Florida Project.

R251 Thank you. That was it.

What do you all think happens to Kirsten at the end of “days of wine and roses”? Think she got her act together eventually? I would say that film is in the running as one of the most depressing films.

R253 No, I think she's lost to alcoholism. When she walked away in the final scene, I got the feeling Jack Lemmon was watching her leave and realizing it was the last time he'd see her.

GlenGarry Glen Ross. Watching it made super anxious and depressed.

R245 yeah the ending to “the hunger” was certainly haunting.

R256 The saddest - and most horrifying part - of The Hunger was when David Bowie killed the little girl.

One flew over the cuckoo's nest Midnight cowboy Rust

Anything with Will Ferrell in it.

oasis by lee chang dong sounds hella depressing

Frances with Jessica Lange

MAKE WAY FOR TOMORROW. A 1937 film about a retired elderly couple forced to separate when their children cannot take care of them. The entire movie was on YouTube once. But here’s the trailer:

Anyone said Sophie's Choice yet?

A recent film that no one say called "Katie Says Goodbye".

The ending of "Two Women" is devastating I think but it's not a total despair fest, there is hope......

R126 Was that "Into The Wild?" If so . I knew the story beforehand, reading it in Vanity Fair a few yrs before the film.

Even though I knew the outcome, it made me cry, too. I wont watch it again.

INTO THE WILD frustrated me because MCCandless’ death was preventable. And what exactly was he running from anyway?

R264- YES- I sobbed for an hour- I have never had a film do that to me-

It

Meet Joe Black

Carnal Knowledge left me feeling depressed

R263 I saw Katie says Goodbye and thought it was hilarious.

The Mist

OK it is a TV limited series but Mare of Easttown was a real downer saved by its sheer brilliance.

R271 The ending was DEVASTATING.

Meet Joe Black

Even Stephen King said the ending to the Mist was better than the one he came up with in the original story.

I just watched Grave of the Fireflies. I knew I'd regret it, but my morbid curiosity got the better of me.

R59, Kate Jackson deserved an Oscar nomination for "Making Love." That last scene was heartbreaking. She was superb.

House of sand and fog

Still Alice

"Bara en mor" (1949 - "Only a Woman"). A Swedish movie on Youtube with English subtitles, starring Eva Dahlbeck and Max von Sydow. One wrong move throws a woman's entire life off-kilter.

Day of the Locust

Jeanne Diehlman

Blue Jasmine

PU-239.....just shoot me now.

"William & Catherine: A Royal Romance"

R29, yes, Melancholia, about depression and the end of Earth and the human race, literally.

Imitation of Life 1959: Lana Turner .

R263 Katie Says Goodbye. The film didn't work at all. An artless White Precious. I didn't give a SHIT about the little chippy it was so poorly done. Yikes.

Una Noche (2012). Some gay subtext. Horrible ending that knocked the wind out of me. Heartbreaking.

Cider House Rules

Not a movie, but even though I was expecting it, the death of Big in And Just Like That just knocked me over. I was actually sobbing and thought about it for days.

The Lost Weekend

The Boys in the Band

Even as a child, I thought the ending of The Wizard of Oz was tragic because Dorothy was returning and none of her problems had been overcome. Her dog had bitten an evil, determined woman who had expressed her intention to have it put down. People have said that Miss Gulch got killed in the tornado, but there is no evidence to suggest that.

Phantom of the Opera (the musical)

Manchester By The Sea

Frances

Silence

The Devils

A Nun's Story

Salò, or The 120 Days of Sodom

Come and See

The Piano Teacher

The Prize Winner of Defiance, Ohio.

For anyone who grew up with a stay at home mom in the 60’s or 70’s, it makes you realize how unfulfilled our mothers felt about their lives.

This thread begins and ends with The Enigma of Kaspar Hauser.

Sleepers(1996)

Beautiful film but so depressing.

The Snowton Murders stayed with me for awhile.

*Snowtown

Dear Zachary (Documentary) - DO NOT GOOGLE ANYTHING before seeing this. There are shocking twists and turns. This movie will break even the most jaded queen.

I’m Googling it, r298.

Thanks for the list of movies I won't see. Can't do depressing anymore as I age, aging is depressing enough.

I've seen the House Fog thing, meh, can barely remember it. Sweet Hereafter is too good to be labeled depressing, plus I thought the twist ending was hopeful.

On the Beach not as sad as I thought it would be--the author of the book Nevil Shute was reportedly furious that the film made the two main characters lovers and I can understand why. It was schmaltzy and distracted from the slow moving catastrophe.

Sophie's Choice was garbage, I was young so I teared up at the end and then felt pissed I was so completely and gratuitously manipulated. Same with Pan's Labyrinth and Devil's Backbone--Guillermo del Toro is a sadist. Not depressing, horrifying.

Any movie by English socialists by Mike Leigh, Terence Davies or Ken Loach.

So full of bitterness.

Lonely Are The Brave.

Cried and cried at the end. The Horse.😭 Kirk Douglas was amazing.

R172, I just came here to appreciate your proper grammar. Thank you.

— Bad grammar is my everyday most depressing movie

^ Proper grammar and a decent vocabulary is a rare phenomenon on Datalounge.

[quote]Proper grammar and a decent vocabulary is a rare phenomenon on Datalounge.

Oh, Dear! Yes, they [bold]are[/bold].

Nobody Knows - 2004. Mom is a Japanese hooker who just leaves her kids to fend for themselves.

"The Elephant Man".

R298- Agree 100%- That one broke me at the end..

I actually just read the book written by the parents..

I fucking hate that woman. (S.T.)

[quote] "House of Sand and Fog (2003)"

LOOOVE that film, OP. Love the book, and love the Horner score. Own them all.

G’s entire filmography.

Day of the Locust - Karen Black is trying for stardom in 1930's Hollywood. She's living with her dying father in a rundown apartment block, surrounded by a bunch of acting wannabees. She starts hanging out with strange loner Donald Sutherland and before you know it, there's a dead child and rioting at a movie premiere. I read the book and saw the movie and it is a bleak picture of the lives of people who flock to CA thinking of becoming famous.

Another one: Midnight Cowboy. So dark and soul crushing.

Telling Nicholas, a documentary about a little boy whose mother was in the WTC on Sept 11 and the journey to try to find her.

Independence day (1983) Dianne Wiest, Cliff De Young August: Osage County The Piano Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close

The Attic (1980) with Carrie Snodgrass and Ray Milland.

Highly recommend for bits of dark humor. Tragic and a tearjerker.

[quote] On the Beach

The narrator is very, very enthusiastic but absolutely everyone dies!

R264, R265 But he was such a foolish man.

I'm not going to waste my emotion over fools (to quote Shirley Bassey).