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.
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.
I had to unsubscribe from NotJustBikes’s YouTube channel because I could no longer bear thinking about just how thoroughly and irreversably fucked the city planning is out here in the American midwest, and how there’s less than a gnat’s fart in the wind I can do about any of it.
Will be moving to Midwest from Italy soon. My heart hurts already. I lived in the Midwest for ten years and worked with urban planners there so I know the pain all too well.
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.
Don’t Look Up. As an environmental biologist, I feel they really nailed the constant feeling of crisis that everyone either chooses to ignore or use for greed. There came a point where I couldn’t stomach it anymore, I watch TV to escape reality not be reminded of it lol.
Not in the same league as most of the other responses but I cannot watch About a Boy. Yes the Hugh Grant film written by Richard Curtis. I’m not a big crier but that film is like a giant TEARS ON! Button for me.
I tried to watch it again last year as it’s one of my Wife’s faves and it was on already. I was in floods even before I’d sat down.
Something to do with the boy, his situation and the fact his only friends are adults kind of resonates with my childhood.
The first season was emotional but I’ve gotten through it multiple times as I’ve tried re-watching to get through season 2. I got a little farther the last time I tried, but man, it’s so visceral and constantly beating down the protagonist and everyone around her. That’s the point and it’s great, it’s just so depression-inducing when there’s just no uplifting points. IT does not let up in beating you down with the horribleness. I just can’t keep going when it goes on for so long.
Watching it makes seeing what’s happening in the US all the more terrifying when you realize a significant group of people want the world to be like that and are actively trying to make it so.
That was just so vividly depressing and anxiety inducing I couldn’t go more than a few pages a week, and eventually I just stopped and read the summery instead.
I didn’t see anyone else mention it, but the scene in King Kong where one of the guys is eaten alive by four or five giant worms, each one starting from a different limb (the last one swallowing his fucking head).
Doesn’t matter that they were setting him up for you to root for him to die, it’s still way too much for me.
Oh yeah. Creators did a great job at making that as dirty and greesy as possible for whatever reason. I don’t understand why, but there was much effort to drop that bomb onto the viewer out of nowhere.