Tearjerker Moments in 2023 Cinema

Next week will mark one year since my mother suddenly and unexpectedly passed away. Unsurprisingly, my emotions are a little bit raw right now. However, I do tend to lean into that, so I’ve been trying to channel that into something productive. Lo and behold, this list has been on my mind. I know I cried more often in theaters this past year than ever before. Usually, it’s just animals in danger that wreck me. 2023, however, marked a time where almost anything involving parents, and especially mothers, really hit a nerve. So, I decided to share some of these films and moments with you today. I’ve previously looked at Marvel moments that brought tears to my eyes (here), but for this piece, I’m extending it to all 2023 releases. Here goes nothing.

Below, I have six movies that contain moments that made me cry last year, ranging from some obvious choices to perhaps one or two that may surprise you. As always with a highly personal and subjective thing like this, I’ll just remind everyone that there’s no right or wrong here. What made me sob isn’t what will make you bawl, and that’s okay, just like the inverse can be true. Especially for me, a lot of this is very much tied into recent life events. So, that’s always going to impact how something hits me. Anyway, now, on to the explanations…

Here now is my rundown of my own personal tearjerker moments in 2023 film:

*Potential Spoilers Ahead*

Air – I may well be the only one to roll a tear during Air, but when I realized in the third act that it was a secret mom movie, I lost it. When Viola Davis tells Matt Damon exactly what her son was going to do during his NBA career, the sheer fact of a mother believing so much in her son that she can essentially foretell the future, it brought tears to my eyes. See below.

All of Us Strangers – Now, different people are devastated by All of Us Strangers for different reasons. For me, it obviously was watching a character get to talk to their deceased parents, with the added twist of the parents knowing that they’re back from the dead to see their grown up son. Yeah, that was tough for me. There’s a moment where Andrew Scott asks Jamie Bell and Claire Foy to stay a bit longer, and her remark that no amount of extra time would ever be enough, well…people at Telluride were wondering if I was alright. No, I wasn’t, but it’s cinema speaking something very profound and very true.

Barbie – The America Ferrera speech about how impossible it is to be a woman chokes me up, but it’s mom stuff again here. When Margot Robbie meets her “mother” in a sense in Rhea Perlman, leading into her wish and the strings of “What Was I Made For?” playing, it’s impossible for me not to sob. It’s mothers being proud of their daughters (hey, I have a sister), the mortality of humans, and then just the music mixing with those images. Barbie is my favorite film of the year for a reason. The sequence in question is below:

The Flash – I will confess to feeling dumb for openly weeping towards the end of The Flash. It’s not a film that necessarily earns those tears, but it was, after all, a movie about a boy trying to change the past so his mother isn’t dead. What do you expect from me? That he gets to say goodbye to his mom towards the end, in a way that hit me like a ton of bricks? Well, I can’t fight the reaction that I had. Here’s what happens:

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 – Here’s one that’s not mom related, but grandfather related. Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 really sticks the landing, but I was not expecting Chris Pratt to end up getting to say “hey grandpa” in the final moments. I miss my grandfather terribly, as he’s a huge reason why I do what I do here, so James Gunn found a way to make me crumble. This quiet moment is so emotional for me:

The Iron Claw – Finally, we have a good old fashioned guy cry flick. The final two scenes, which I won’t spoil, involve the brothers, as well as ending on Zac Efron with his sons. It leads into the credits, which gives us a postscript that I felt was hugely emotional. I’ll remain a bit vague about The Iron Claw, while it’s still freshly in theaters, but it shot up so high on to my year end top ten list for a reason. Sean Durkin very much hit me in the feels.

What films or moments last year made you cry? Let us know!