What Dreams May Come always makes me cry. If you haven't seen it, you need to. Based on a Richard Matheson story (the same guy who wrote "I Am Legend," "The Shrinking Man," and "A Stir of Echoes") the film stars Robin Williams as a man whose love for his wife transcends Heaven and Hell and who turns his back on paradise to save her. It is in my top ten films of all times, a list which includes tear-jerkers like
Moulin Rouge and
Top Gun.
In fact, as I reflect on my favorite movies, I realize that many of them contain moments of extreme pathos, moments when heroes fail, beloved characters die, or when someone makes a difficult decision which necessarily ends in tragedy. Often the movie ends with success, but the journey is an emotional roller-coaster that makes the ending earned. Earning the punchline is the hallmark of any good joke, and in film, stories, or any kind of narrative, the conclusion must be earned. Otherwise the movie feels like a waste of time, regardless of the money poured into its special effects.
On that note, I've given some thought to what generates pathos -- what gives a story emotional depth and generates sorrow, pity, sympathy, or tenderness toward a character.
The first, and most vital ingredient, is a goal. A concrete, identifiable goal is what defines a protagonist. Think about Luke Skywalker: He wants to join the Rebellion
to destroy the empire. First, he has to leave his home, but his Aunt and Uncle won't let him. After he receives his call to action by Obi-Wan, he departs on a mission to find the rebellion and deliver R2-D2 to them. Once he's accomplished that mission, and found the rebellion, his initial goal is achieved. But he still has to destroy the empire, symbolized in Episode IV by the Death Star. Spoilers! He accomplishes his goal. But in the process he loses something important to him -- his mentor and friend, Obi-Wan Kenobi.
Just as important, Obi-Wan is killed while attempting to accomplish his own goals -- a goal he has in fact
almost completed. After disabling the tractor beam so that the Millennium Falcon can escape, he interposes himself between Darth Vader and Luke, enabling everyone to escape. His sacrifice is what accomplishes that goal and we feel Luke's sorrow by being sad ourselves.
Writers sometimes talk about try-fail cycles. In a traditional three-act structure, you see that nice arc that plunges at the end of the second act, and is completed in the third. The protagonists concrete, identifiable goal is important because at the end of the second act, the protagonist should be as far as possible from accomplishing that goal. In Star Wars the second act ends with Obi-Wan's death because he is Leia's "only hope." With him gone, hope is gone, until we realize that now Luke has the Force and can destroy the Death Star, which, remember, was Luke's goal all along (even if he'd yet to discover it).
But for a reader or viewer to feel as though something has been accomplished, the characters cannot win every time. In fact, each time they attempt something they should fail somehow. When Luke goes in search of R2-D2, he's attacked and needs to be rescued. Trying to feel Tatooine, Luke and Obi-Wan are interdicted by imperial Star Destroyers, they escape but when they reach Alderaan they are capture by the Death Star and so and so on. They try, fail, have some success that enables them to try something else, they fail at that, try something else, and so on until the movie ends in victory.
Or consider
Top Gun. Maverick has only one goal: To be the best. In the movie, this is symbolized in the concrete, identifiable goal of winning the Top Gun trophy. We see him fail constantly in the classroom, in the air, and he is farthest from his goal just after Goose dies and he threatens to quit the program entirely. Though he does not accomplish his goal of winning the trophy, we're offered a proxy goal of winning Ice Man's respect in the final battle with Soviet MiGs.
We as viewers feel these moments as deeply sorrowful because they advance both the plot and interfere with the protagonist's ability to achieve his concrete, identifiable goals.
The other form of pathos inducing action is the Noble Sacrifice in which a beloved character (usually other than the protagonist) sacrifices himself to save the protagonist, or our band of plucky heroes. (Noble Sacrifices for abstract ideas or populations are much less noble because the viewer has difficulty developing affinity with abstract ideas or populations -- consider
Armageddon in which Bruce Willis sacrifices himself for Ben Affleck: Though you could argue that he sacrifices himself to save the planet, it is clear that he does so in order to ensure his future son-in-law will survive to marry his daughter. Or think about Neo choosing Trinity over humanity.) In such cases it helps if the threat is external and has a definite end-point. The classic is a ticking time bomb (such as the Genesis Device in
Wrath of Khan, or someone diving on a grenade).
The final example I can think of is one of inevitability. The protagonist cannot win. Death is inevitable. These cases, like British Officers on the Black Watch, teach us how to die. In
Deep Impact, facing the end, Tea Leoni's character stands with her father at the edge of the world and meets death with restraint and stoic courage. The choice is what matters and we feel a profound sorrow in the realization that death is inevitable and that one day we may have to choose how to meet it.
In
The Mist, Thomas Jane's character and his son finally escape the general store where they and most of the town have holed up; they've survived monsters in the mist and monsters of the human soul; but they've run out of gas and they can hear the monsters nearing. With only enough bullets for his son, he makes the decision to spare his son a terrifying and gruesome death and shoots him in the head. Death seemed inevitable and we're forced to make the same moral calculus as Thomas Jane's character. Movies like this allow us to experience our own Kobiashi Maru every time we watch them, to challenge our own moral courage and our own values.
