The opening starts with D-Day and it destroyed my emotions. I was ricocheting from terror to grief back to terror and being drowned in sensory overload. Twenty minutes of cinema around the horror of war and the mass infliction of death was unbearable. I cried for an hour afterwards and I can never bring myself to watch it again. The movie was definitely a masterpiece, and it’s a story that should be told, but it is brutal.
That part honestly wasn’t what got me. It was a little past that when done guy gets shot or maybe hit with a grenade (I forgot) and he’s bleeding out. The skirmish was over and everyone else was fine so they’re all gathered around their friend while he’s living out his last moments, and he knows it, and they know it but they’re still trying to encourage him to think positively. All he wants is his mother, but the best they can do is hold his hand and try to give him a cigarette.
That scene was just so realistic. There’s no closure for anyone. They have a mission to do and they’re behind enemy lines so they just have to leave his body there. There’s no dignity, and the war goes on with hardly anyone caring about the guy in the grand scheme of things, but that situation is likely replaying every few seconds across France. Many of them don’t even get those last few seconds to think back on their life, their accomplishments, and their regrets; they just get their leg blown off and can’t think of anything but how painful it is and then die.
When scenes are that realistic, I can’t help but put myself in their shoes and imagine that’s exactly how I would act in that situation and it is terrifying. I got light headed and nauseous, turned off the TV, and never tried finishing the movie.
That was also realistically powerful. I am glad I made it through the picture, if only to be reminded of the horror of sending young men to kill each other. Saving Private Brian is a masterpiece, but most of us aren’t capable of more than a single viewing.
German movie ‘Der goldene Handschuh’ which tells the true story of 70’s serial killer Fritz Honka. When a friend proposed to watch it, I seriously thought it to be a sports movie (the german ‘Handschuh’ translates to glove and my association instantly was a goal keeper’s glove…). Well, I was wrong. The dense and depressing atmosphere of Honka’s childhood and life, together with the derogatory, very hard and profane language and of course depiction of sexuality and violence towards women was simply too much for me. It sucked away all positivity at that moment. I finished it later and the director hit me once more, because in the end credits real pictures of the true locations where shown, proving the film’s sets where simply identical. That ripped away the last imagination that what I’ve just seen was just a very dark fantasy and too bad to be real. Brilliant movie and actors (the main actor in his role is simply not recognizable any more from his real life appearance, just like Charlize Theron in ‘Monster’), but too hard to for me to take.
I haven’t seen Der Goldene Handschuh yet but your description reminds me a bit of Der Freie Wille from 2006. Also very hard to watch but brilliantly acted by Jürgen Vogel. Content warning: It’s about rape.
I have a friend who regularly shares the latest news that brings him mental anguish, followed by messages along the lines of “the world is doomed, society is trash, how can anyone sleep soundly at night knowing the terrors that are happening this very second”. I don’t know why he still follows them. It’s not like he takes action against these things, and most often he can’t do anything against them even if he wanted to, and this feeling of powerlessness, helplessness, hopelessness, is weighing him down so much.
There was a news station I saw while vacationing in the Smokies. They called it “news with a heart”. They did all the same news stories, bit didn’t dwell on the death toll or show video of the carnage. It was the first time I didn’t become enraged by the news.
We have a drinking game for the NBC Nightly News. Drink any time they say “breaking news”, “disaster”, “epidemic” or show people crying. You won’t make it through the news.
Uhg. I watched an episode of The Curse when my wife found it. I am convinced that the curse is actually the entire show - they’re cursing the audience.
Breaking Bad. I made it to the end of season 4 after trying once and stopping after just a couple episodes because the tension was so intense. I just couldn’t push further than season 4, it was taking a toll on my nerves. Brilliant writing
I think it’s a show that (very much unlike Arrested Development) is worse when binged for the exact reason you stopped watching. It’s too much. You really need a week between episodes once you get that far in to give yourself time to process and chill.
Season 5 does not make it easier btw. If you go back and try again, go slowly.
I stopped for a while after Walter walked into the room and walked right out. If you get my gist… Also the penultimate part was a bit too numbing to get through.
Edit: I was too cryptic but Jesse and his girlfriend were lying on the bed after shooting up heroin. What followed makes you mad at Walter as a despicable human.
Walter watches Jesse’s girlfriend Jane choke on her own puke as she’s overdosing and does nothing to help her.
He was sneaking around in their home and did not want to risk getting caught, so he almost intervened, but then decides against it, and regrets doing nothing as she dies in front of him.
He later reveals this to Jesse during a conflict.
From Jesse’s perspective, he had just woken up and she was dead, choked on her own vomit.
Walter tells him he watched it happen and essentially admits that he could have helped.
Watched Our Planet, season 2 episode 2, and just started weeping uncontrollably when I saw the baby Albatross dying from being fed plastics and other toxic waste. I had to tap out.
I didn’t stop it, because I was in a theater, but when Les Mis the movie came out I was at my peak with it as a special interest, so I was very in tune with the film. When Anne Hathaway sang I Dreamed A Dream it was so raw and devastating that I sobbed straight through the next two scenes. This was in a packed theater mind you, and I was sitting next to strangers.
I left the theater and realized I’d had an experience and if I ever watched the movie again it wouldn’t be the same and would diminish the moment I’d just had. And despite my ex-wife trying to get me to watch it again with her I’ve not watched it and never will. That memory is precious and I have gone bit overboard with it 😅
I was really surprised by the book (I read it after watching the series). It is rare that I feel a TV adaptation of a story is more engaging than the the book, but that was certainly my takeaway in this instance.
Same. Was slightly disappointed, but I guess it just shows how well the show was produced. It departed significantly from the book (iirc) but made all the right choices in the process.
Specifically that song, it was my favourite song of theirs. I tuned in late to their last concert when it aired on CBC, I thought I must have missed them singing it because I was so late but it came on next. I was happy I didn’t miss it but I cried as they sang it.
I have heard parts of it in the years since then, I have probably heard the whole song a few times but it hurts to hear it.
I am very late to this, but the movie The Road written by Cormac McCarthy. I had watched this movie several times and what changed you ask? I have a little boy now. Can’t watch it. Just can’t
Specifically this was 2 episodes away from the end of the show but I just could not handle it. It was just so depressing. Family and friends being murdered, almost everything walt has worked for squandered, Skyler trying to kill him, having to steal the child and Skyler’s anguish. Man it was just too much to handle because EVERYTHING was just crumbling and collapsing in on itself.
What made it cut so deep is that Walter tried to provide for his family, so they could have a good life and for a time was extremely successful. After multiple missteps, some of his family is murderer or they hate him, trying desperately to remove him from their lives and resent his very existence. While Walter still loved them, he realized his and his family’s was utterly ruined. The second hand crushing and crippling guilt was too painful to bear.
Waler’s psychopathy and coldness was also building up at this point, killing, using and manipulating a lot of people. He began with good intentions but directly and indirectly ended and ruined countless people’s lives.
He didn’t want to die miserable with no respect from anyone.
He wanted to show the world he was great. He never was going to have “enough” that he would quit and die anonymously. He was going to keep going bigger and bigger until he was caught or killed.
I think you missed a good chunk of the point of that show. It was pretty clear after the first few seasons that Walt was not doing it to provide for his family. Walt loved his family but loved his job and power more. There were countless times that he could have washed his hands of it and walked away to go back to teaching. He chose to stay in even when it was pretty damn clear it was destroying his family and putting them in extreme danger.
I also quit in the last season - not sure what episode but it was towards then end. Enough time has past that I have no interest in finishing it. I don’t get so involved in series since then.
I understand and respect your decision to not continue, but I have to let you know that your feelings on it are totally justified and even vindicated in the final episodes that you didn’t watch. The misery and frustration is intentional. The arc of struggle, glory/success, and awful consequences are kinda the whole point of the show, and there’s almost some amount of cathartic redemption in seeing Walter realize just how badly he has fucked up and what he does with that knowledge. I’m being intentionally vague in case you or others decide to go back and finish, even though it’s pretty unlikely.
One of my favorite things about the show is that it’s very much a show that encourages discussion about morality in a very gradual way. Most people would agree that Walter starts off as a decent man, and he’s become an evil man somewhere along the way, but testimony differs from viewer to viewer about where exactly that line was along the way. So I’m curious, as somebody who didn’t finish specifically because of what a spectacular cautionary tale it was, where was the line for you? At what point did you stop rooting for Walter White?
I was gonna say “good” but settled on “decent”. He was certainly flawed like any of us, but he was a loving father and husband who was using his knowledge to teach the next generation. I think he was resentful of how his life panned out, and that’s why he so quickly decided to spend his remaining years proving that there was greatness within him to achieve something so much more, especially in spite of the whole Gray Matter thing.
I often had to pause during episodes of Violet Evergarden. My wife always knew when I was watching it because I would be a complete mess every single episode. I finished the show but some episodes I could not take in one go.
There’s a point where your characters brutally murder the only nice thing thing in the entire story while it’s begging for its life (your characters are pieces of shit, but the gameplay is good, so you can kind of ignore it). It happens to be the characters’ daughter’s favorite stuffed elephant.
Then your characters dance gleefully in their daughter’s tears and show no remorse at their daughter crying or any emotion other than woe is us, our brutal murder didn’t work.
Seriously, one of the most horrific things my husband and I have ever played through in a game. It made us feel sick. We stopped playing after that. The best thing I can do for that little girl is for her shitty ass parents to never waje up so she becomes an orphan. That’s honestly a better outcome for her than having to live with her shitty abusive parents another day. I only wish it had been earlier in the game so we could have gotten refunds.
I can’t believe they market that game to play with your kids and put that scene in it.
Funny, I stopped playing the game right after this scene but not really because of it. I just couldn’t stand the main characters from the very beginning.
The entire time I was doing the awkward sad chuckles asking my partner repeatedly if it was for real and no, no ,no while I dragged it around killing it. I judged the parents soooooo hard for it.
I absolutely hate the story of this game. The parents are horrible ego-centric people who do not deserve to be happy. My wife and I played it and we almost quit at the very end because we were convinced they shouldn’t end up back together. They don’t actually fix any relationship problems besides being reminded why they fell in love and nostalgia.
It drives me nuts how this game won GOTY when I hated it so much.