Are there any great films that you'd never watch again because of how depressing/intense they are?

Hell, just the scenes Metallica used in their long form video for "One" is plenty for that one...

 

The Metallica video is actually what made me seek out the original movie in the first place!

 

Heh heh...I remember back in high school, a bunch of us hanging out at our dealer's house after school watching Much Music- might have even been the old "Pepsi Power Hour" (remember that one?) and they played the complete "One" video with Johnny Got His Gun clips galore. Well, we'd already smoked a couple by that point but when that video was over, everybody was just sorta staring at the TV, stoned, stunned and silent, like "What the hell did we just see?" It was pretty intense.

 

The first one to come to my mind is Polanski's The Tenant. I remember it as very good and impressive, but I've got no desire to see it ever again.

 

While Leaving Las Vegas with Nicholas Cage was quite good I have no desire to watch a guy literally drink himself to death again.

 

I'm surprised no one has mentioned A.I.

My desire to not revisit this one again stems not only from how mostly depressing the movie is but the time I originally saw it during it's theatrical run. It remains the only time I saw both men and women opening crying leaving the theater after it was over.

 

Tokyo Story moves at a snail's pace and so sad but some have voted it as the greatest film ever.

 

I didn’t find it particularly slow. Then again, I’m a big fan of classical Japanese cinema.

Naming any work of art as the “greatest ever” is a fool’s errand, but, for what it’s worth, Tokyo Story isn’t even my favourite Ozu. That distinction goes to Late Spring.

 

Balthsar..is that a Bresson film? I LOVE that film. Yes, it is depressing, but it makes me FEEL something, and understand something more about the human condition. Very moving. You should see it.

 

Yes it's Bresson.

I've had the DVD for a couple of years but have not yet been in a mood to watch it.

 

Never the film just your state of mind while watching it.

 

Hiroshima, mon Amour
Night and Fog

Of course one is a documentary (of sorts) and the other uses actual footage. It's the real bits that make them so hard.

And yet, to never watch them again is to hide from the painful truth.

 

Hostel - I thought it was disgusting, so much so, I was embarrassed to be seen coming out of the theater.

 

The Fly = Jeff Goldblum........ This movie made me uncomfortable too. .

 

Jacob's Ladder

Very good movie and a great performance by Tim Robbins (one of his best,) but I haven't watched this movie since I saw it when it was released and I have no desire to watch it again. It just messes with the mind in a devastating way, especially when the ending was revealed. (I wonder how it would've truly been watching it while under the influence because it sure felt that way sober.)


The following movie I've seen multiple times and will watch it if bored and I notice it playing on one of the movie channels, but Silence of The Lambs is a hard one to get through because of the intensity and subject matter. If it wasn't for the great performances by Anthony Hopkins, Jodie Foster, Scott Glenn, and Ted Levine (Buffalo Bill,) I doubt I would ever sit through it multiple times like I have.

 

I love plenty of depressing films, and watch the best of them many times. For example Bergman is my favorite director, and many consider his films overall to be depressing. But I tend to find something in even the more depressing of them, such as Winter Light, that redeem them in one way or another. Same for many other "depressing" films.

One exception - Schindler's List. When I saw it I was amazed how well done it was at the same time I was experiencing the film on a more direct level. But I have not gone back to see it again, because each time I consider doing so, I can't bring myself to go back into that horrifying world. It was as if the film was too real in showing its horrors. In fact that's the only film I can think of right now that fits as an answer here.

 

The Passion- Mel Gibson
I went with some friends from my church and walked out with a melted face.
I actually own it because my mom bought it for me and I did watch a second time.
My church friends saw it a bunch of times and I'm like, what? Maybe they think it's a type of mental penance but I don't want to watch my Savoir getting pummeled over and over. God probably never watched it again. That day broke his heart into a million peices.

 

I think it is more profound than depressing, if that makes any sense.

 

I've seen it only twice. I'm the kind of person who watches great films a couple times a year.
This one, 2x in what, 20 years?
Sometimes I do watch documentaries and I cry for days. That was one of the more exceptionally hideous wars. I guess also because it was the first to be videotaped relatively well.

 

I like Floating Weeds myself, both versions equally. It was interesting to compare the silent vs speaking films.

 

Two of the best movies ever made. I re-watch them every few years.

I tend to think he may have been poisoned by Ta Mok.

 

Yes, that certainly makes sense.

I fear that it'll upset me more than depress me.

 

Reds
Saw it on cable way back when.

 

Yeah but...you'll remember it for the rest of your life...and. for me anyway, it lets me remember that there is good and there is bad..and there is the in-between...and where do i put myself?.;.who am i?....what do i stand for, if anything?..how can i be a better human?.....works of immense-ness make me a stronger person..(if only that i can understand, be one-ness with the immense-ness)....and the film shows human characters....in all their human-ess.....

 

You're lucky.
I've been interested in watching this film for a while now as I've never seen it, but all I can find is a blurry version on Youtube.