When they came across videos on TikTok of people crying after they watched “We Live in Time,” a new romantic drama starring Florence Pugh and Andrew Garfield, Carmen Wells and her five roommates decided to watch the film.
After the screening, “We were the last ones in the movie theater, sitting on the floor, sobbing,” said Ms. Wells, 19, a student at the University of North Carolina Wilmington.
Thinking that their reactions were amusing, and wanting to encourage others to see the movie, Ms. Wells made her own video.
“This is me before ‘We Live in Time,’” Ms. Well says in the video, looking composed and casual in a hoodie and glasses. A few seconds later, a shaky hand captures Ms. Wells walking on the street, sobbing as she cries out, “He loves her so much!” Another few seconds pass, and Ms. Wells is holding the camera again. She turns it toward herself. “This is me,” she says through tears.
The video, which she posted last week, joined a wave of “crying selfies” that fans of “We Live in Time” have created in response to the film’s heart-wrenching story about love and loss. Crying selfies, which have gained traction in recent years thanks to posts by celebrities like Justin Bieber and Bella Hadid, are photos or videos usually shot in response to overwhelming stress or to an emotional crisis like a breakup. But in this new iteration, the videos are endorsing an experience: Go see this movie if you want a good cry.
The TikTok call has been heard: Eighty-five percent of the people who saw “We Live in Time” were under 35 years old, according to Deadline. A24, the film’s production company, has leaned in, distributing branded tissue packs at select screenings on opening weekend.
The appeal of crying during a film might not be obvious to those who don’t regularly partake, but for some it is a reliable and comfortable way to regulate or explore emotions.
“Crying is like a hot bath for the soul,” said Christina Cala, 32, who recently saw “We Live in Time” with a friend and described her pleasure at being “emotionally devastated” by the film. “The thing with going to the movies or reading a book or watching a TV show that depicts something emotional is it’s a really safe environment to feel things. There’s a clear beginning, middle and end.”
“It’s not your life, it’s someone else’s,” she added, “but that doesn’t mean you can’t learn from it or process things in your own life through it.”
Chris Skurka, an assistant professor of media studies at Pennsylvania State University, explained that the desire to have meaningful, introspective and even somber experiences while watching a movie is defined by researchers as eudaimonic, or seeking enjoyment through a sense of fulfillment, in contrast with the more light and frivolous hedonic form. (Think of the experience of watching “The Matrix” versus “Transformers.”)
The eudaimonic form can inspire the need to share.
“When people have this emotional experience of feeling moved or touched, they want to connect with other people,” Dr. Skurka said. “Maybe they’re talking to their friends about it, but they’re also feeling the need to post about it to spread the word.”
For Brianna Kearney, 23, the story of “We Live in Time” tackled challenges she had experienced in high school, when her mother underwent various cancer treatments including chemotherapy and surgery. (She is now in remission, and Ms. Kearney went to see the movie with her.)
When Ms. Kearney went to the bathroom after the screening to compose herself, she recorded a video of her tears.
“It was kind of with the purpose of showing that seeing this evoked so much emotion and that it meant a lot seeing this story play out,” she said. “A lot of time social media can be really glamorized, and I think it’s important to see people and how they’re affected in their day-to-day life and to see the arc of emotions.”
Societally, there has been a broad increase in “how much we’re surveilling and are aware of one another,” said Kathryn Coduto, an assistant professor of media science at Boston University. “People have become really invested in one another, maybe on a superficial level, but they are invested and they want to know what’s going on. We underappreciate how much old-school forms of gossip inform our current social media behaviors.”
Camelia Garcia Marxuach, 25, went to see “We Live in Time” alone last weekend in New York City and said it had felt “amazing” to sit in the movie theater “without thinking about anything else in my life and letting the tears stream.”
Afterward, on the subway, Ms. Garcia Marxuach opened her phone camera, curious how she looked after crying for around two hours. She took a video of her puffy eyes, and though she normally posts fashion and beauty content, she said the movie inspired her so much that she wanted to share.
“Sometimes it’s really hard to show your vulnerability online, especially when you don’t know who it’s going to reach,” Ms. Garcia Marxuach said. “But people do really appreciate the realness and can relate to raw emotion.”
Her video has been viewed more than two million times and is flooded with comments. Some people complained that they didn’t get the cleansing cry they had seen her have, but many told her they felt similarly to how she did, Ms. Garcia Marxuach said.
“I think my video made them feel connected,” Ms. Garcia Marxuach said. “They had someone to relate to and talk to about all the emotions brought out by the movie.”
Crying selfies are increasingly popular among younger people, Dr. Coduto said.
“For older generations, crying so publicly is kind of weird and doesn’t meet expectations of how we present ourselves and want to be seen,” Dr. Coduto said.
In contrast, she added, people in their late teens and 20s spent years during the pandemic seeing themselves attending class on video calls. And their preferred social media platforms, like TikTok and Instagram, are video- or image-based, rather than text- or meme-heavy like Facebook.
“When you create and post a video, you have to look at it, and you have the opportunity to review and rewatch it,” Dr. Coduto said.
Like a self-portrait or a diary entry, the TikTok and Instagram posts have become a vivid rendering of an emotional state frozen in time.
“People are posting for designated audiences but also for themselves,” Dr. Coduto said. “People return to their feeds and look back through how they presented themselves. They’re often trying to figure out who they are as much as how they want to be seen.”
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