A Glean movie guide
The Ultimate Cry List
Keep the tissues close.
From quiet heartbreaks to devastating tragedies, these films are guaranteed to move you.
Handpicked for this guide
The movie list
- 01
Manchester by the Sea
A raw and unflinching look at a man paralyzed by the weight of an unthinkable past.
After his older brother passes away, Lee Chandler is forced to return home to care for his 16-year-old nephew. There he is compelled to deal with a tragic past that separated him from his family and the community where he was born and raised.
- 02
Grave of the Fireflies
A devastatingly beautiful animation about two siblings struggling to survive in war-torn Japan.
In the final months of World War II, 14-year-old Seita and his sister Setsuko are orphaned when their mother is killed during an air raid in Kobe, Japan. After a falling out with their aunt, they move into an abandoned bomb shelter. With no surviving relatives and their emergency rations depleted, Seita and Setsuko struggle to survive.
- 03
Aftersun
A shimmering, nostalgic portrait of a daughter’s final holiday with her troubled father.
Sophie reflects on the shared joy and private melancholy of a holiday she took with her father twenty years earlier. Memories fill the gaps between camcorder footages as she tries to reconcile the father she knew with the troubled man she didn't.
- 04
Hachi: A Dog's Tale
A simple, heart-wrenching true story about the unbreakable bond between a professor and his dog.
Professor Wilson discovers a lost Akita puppy on his way home. Despite objections from his wife, Hachi endears himself to the family and grows to be Parker's loyal companion. As their bond grows deeper, a beautiful relationship unfolds.
- 05
The Notebook
An enduring romance that captures the beauty and pain of a love that survives the fading of memory.
An epic love story centered around an older man who reads aloud to a woman with Alzheimer's. From a faded notebook, the old man's words bring to life the story about a couple who is separated by World War II, and is then passionately reunited, seven years later, after they have taken different paths.
- 06
Coco
A vibrant celebration of family and remembrance that hits an incredibly poignant emotional peak.
Despite his family’s baffling generations-old ban on music, Miguel dreams of becoming an accomplished musician like his idol, Ernesto de la Cruz. Desperate to prove his talent, Miguel finds himself in the stunning and colorful Land of the Dead following a mysterious chain of events. Along the way, he meets charming trickster Hector, and together, they set off on an extraordinary journey to unlock the real story behind Miguel's family history.
- 07
Blue Valentine
A brutally honest autopsy of a marriage, contrasting early sparks with eventual exhaustion.
Dean and Cindy live a quiet life in a modest neighborhood. They appear to have the world at their feet at the outset of the relationship. However, his lack of ambition and her retreat into self-absorption cause potentially irreversible cracks in their marriage.
- 08
Past Lives
A quiet, masterful exploration of the 'what-ifs' and the bittersweet ache of moving on.
After decades apart, childhood friends Nora and Hae Sung are reunited in New York for one fateful weekend as they confront notions of destiny, love, and the choices that make a life.
- 09
The Fault in Our Stars
A poignant teen romance that finds humor and deep feeling in the face of terminal illness.
Despite the tumor-shrinking medical miracle that has bought her a few years, Hazel has never been anything but terminal, her final chapter inscribed upon diagnosis. But when a patient named Augustus Waters suddenly appears at Cancer Kid Support Group, Hazel's story is about to be completely rewritten.
- 10
Schindler's List
A monumental historical drama that finds profound humanity within the horrors of the Holocaust.
The true story of how businessman Oskar Schindler saved over a thousand Jewish lives from the Nazis while they worked as slaves in his factory during World War II.