Crying at the Movies: A Film Memoir

by Madelon Sprengnether

"For years, I cried, not over my own losses, but at the movies. When bad things happened to me in real life, I didn't react. I seemed cool or indifferent. Yet in the dark and relative safety of the movie theater, I would weep over fictional tragedies, over someone else's tragedy." At age nine, Madelon Sprengnether watched her father drown in the Mississippi River. Her mother swallowed the family's grief whole and no one spoke of the tragedy thereafter. Only years later did Sprengnether react, and in a most unlikely in the theater watching the film Pather Panchal i, by Satyajit Ray. In the fascinating memoir Crying at the Movies , Sprengnether looks at the sublime connections between happenings in the present, troubling events from the past, and the imagined world of movies. By examining the films she had intense emotional reactions to throughout her adult life-- House of Cards , Solaris , Fearless , The Cement Garden , Shadowlands , and Blue --Sprengnether finds a way to work through her own losses, mistakes, and pain.

Genres: Memoir

252 pages, Paperback

First published November 1, 2001

Reviews

[Betty Loven · Rating 2 out of 5]

I wanted to like this a lot more than I did but it just wasn't in the cards. It's interesting enough and I found myself relating to some of the content but I found it to be repetitive.

[Robin Klaus · Rating 4 out of 5]

It was suggested by a creative writing professor that I read this book. That was 12 years ago and life, as it does, got in the way. I finally ordered it and read it. It was a fabulous read that brings together those parts of our daily lives that seem routine, (personal interactions, things we read, movies we see) together with the essence of who we are and where we have been. Through the movies she sees, the author is able to come to terms with her losses and how she's become the woman she is. And through her writing, I was able to understand a little more fully who I am and how I've come to be where I am. Not only did I enjoy Sprengnether's memoir, her writing has left me with a new list of movies to watch.

[Walter · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book turned me on to the memoir genre.

[Indu · Rating 3 out of 5]

Intense in a very real way.

[Katharine Holden · Rating 1 out of 5]

Uninteresting. Repetitive, flat writing. Full of the kinds of self-revelation that should be kept to diaries and therapist sessions.

[Samantha Chapnick · Rating 5 out of 5]

Film Criticism meets personal psychology. Anyone who has ever found themselves seeking understanding of their own personal loses through film will enjoy and relate to this unique analysis of several famous films. She goes deep and that leave the reader with a perspective on these films you won't be exposed to anywhere else.