The Lord of the Feelings

Can you imagine Sean Astin, Elijah Wood, or Liv Tyler’s faces without tears on them? In the 20 years since The Fellowship of the Ring, The Two Towers, and The Return of the King were released in back-to-back holiday seasons, no major franchise has come close to putting its actors through as much gorgeously shot, evocatively lit, and soul-shatteringly funereal pain and tears as Peter Jackson’s adaptations of J.R.R. Tolkien’s seminal works. Oh, the Avengers films snapped half of humanity out of existence? Not as devastating as Frodo ultimately keeping the One Ring for himself, Pippin being forced to sing during Denethor’s disgusting breakfast, or Éowyn realizing that Aragorn already had a girlfriend. Whether in the golden haze of Rivendell, murky gloom of Moria, or apocalyptic fires of Mount Doom, crying has never looked so good.

Key to LOTR’s enduring appeal is its all-in approach to its characters’ feelings: Amid the tumult of widespread war, Jackson and cinematographer Andrew Lesnie honor how all this danger, destruction, and death is affecting the worlds of hobbits, elves, and men. In other words, everyone cries. Every single on-the-side-of-good character gets their own moment of sorrow, regret, or heartache as they ponder the impact of Sauron’s ascendance and his unquenchable desire for the One Ring. An initial count of crying scenes over the three films’ extended editions led to nearly 200 individual instances, which is — even for 11 hours and 36 minutes of movies — a lot! So we’ve curated a premium collection of the weepiest 39 moments when someone in Lord of the Rings breaks down, dissolves into sobs, or lets just one tear slide meaningfully down their face, listed here in chronological order. You shall not pass the Kleenex; you’re going to need the whole box for yourself.

Hugo Weaving is excellent at playing contempt (remember how he sneers “Mr. Anderson” at Keanu in The Matrix?), and Fellowship goes hard on his hatred of humans. This scene contextualizes that disgust quite well, though, with the tears we see glimmering in his eyes when Isildur keeps the One Ring for himself instead of destroying it in the fires of Mount Doom. They just won a war, and this jerk is undoing all their work immediately? No wonder Elrond spent the next few hundred years of his life loathing men.

The owner of the Prancing Pony cowering while hiding from the Nazgûl when they attack Bree is both an effective continuation of how fearsome these once-kings-of-men are — so scary that even insects ran away from them back in the Shire — and just really relatable. Simply trying to disappear is the only option when an occurrence this horrifying is happening in the place you call home.

Bros were big mad when Jackson changed this scene from Tolkien’s original, in which Elrond sent formidable Elf-lord Glorfindel to save Frodo and bring him to Rivendell to treat his wound from the Witch-king of Angmar’s Morgul-knife. But it’s a great introduction to Liv Tyler’s soft yet steely take on the character and to what an expressive crier she is; get ready for a lot of single-tear moments from Arwen as the trilogy progresses.

Poor Bilbo. This is right after we see the corrupting effect the Ring has had on him after decades, and he’s as shocked at his own transformation into a goblinlike figure as Frodo and we are. This moment is up there with Elrond’s in terms of melancholy — these two intimately know what the One Ring can do, and they’re wrecked by the knowledge of what’s to come. Ian Holm, RIP.

Jackson loves Ian McKellen’s face, and why shouldn’t he? The actor can communicate so much with so little. It takes him just a few seconds here to go from weary and burdened when he hears Frodo volunteering to take the One Ring to Mordor to putting a gentle smile on his face when he turns around to face Frodo. That brief blink to reabsorb his tears imparts a sense of his concern for the hobbit he cares about so much and is trusting with such an enormous task.

The dwarf is probably the least emotive character in the whole trilogy; a lot of his character development is just bantering with Legolas about their respective races. But this moment in Moria when he discovers that his cousin Balin died defending his home from orcs is heartbreaking for the wail of grief that John Rhys-Davies lets out. We’ve never met Balin (and won’t until Jackson’s less-said-about-the-better The Hobbit trilogy), but we immediately understand how much he meant to Gimli. When Gimli rests his head on the marble top of Balin’s tomb? Whew.

Presented without comment. A gut punch if there ever was one. “Fly, you fools” — yes, the tears are flying out of my face. 😭😭😭

Fellowship accumulates people falling prey to the One Ring: Bilbo tries to sneak it past Gandalf, Galadriel is tempted, and Boromir breaks his vow to protect Frodo by trying to take the One Ring from him. A wet-eyed Aragorn refusing the One Ring when Frodo offers it is visually moving — his hand closing over Frodo’s! — and also tells us that Aragorn is good in a way almost no one else is.

On the one hand, Boromir betrays Frodo. On the other hand, he uses that shame as motivation to protect Merry and Pippin from the Uruk-hai and their leader Lurtz, his final stand is courageous and brutal, and he inspires the hobbits to take up arms through tears. It’s fruitless, and Merry and Pippin will stay missing throughout The Two Towers. Boromir’s last act of bravery, though, is what pushes the hobbits into increased involvement in this war, and their truncated good-bye is crushing.

Boromir is the only member of the Fellowship to perish, but man, does it hurt. His redemption is complete with his wrenching apology to Aragorn, but my favorite little moment is Legolas walking into this scene with that “Wait, humans die?!” look on his face. Sad!

How are Elijah Wood’s eyes real? Honestly, they’re like a storm gathering over an ocean here. I cannot look away.

Depending on whom you ask, Frodo and Sam are either best friends or partners. Whichever kind of relationship you assign them, Sam refusing to let Frodo leave him behind to go to Mount Doom on his own is a poignant expression of faith and devotion. Sam is going to cry a lot during these movies, but it’s always in service of Frodo, whom he’s sworn to protect and whom he won’t (willingly) let out of his sight. That’s love, romantic or not.

Gollum is such a little brat, but his first keening yowl is also pathetic, pitiful, and unforgettable. One of many Andy Serkis performances that should have been nominated for an Oscar. He doesn’t have one. That injustice is going to make me cry, too.

Éowyn is grieving her dying cousin Théodred, and Gríma Wormtongue’s slimy ass is really trying to neg her into a relationship over his dead body. Of the series’ female characters, Miranda Otto doesn’t do the single tear as often as Tyler’s Arwen; she’s more of an angry crier, and her fury is essential here. Sadly, she does not kill Wormtongue and make her way into the “Good for Her” cinematic universe.

King of Rohan Théoden is similar to Elrond in that he’s emotionally closed off, and he spent a number of years being low-key possessed by Saruman the White. When he’s introduced in The Two Towers, he’s not really willing to put himself out there around all the subjects who just realized that he wasn’t a monster this whole time or around Gandalf, Aragorn, Legolas, and Gimli, who show up and demand he get involved in the war against Sauron. It’s a lot to ask! Yet his weeping at his son Théodred’s grave is a human moment that demonstrates the depth of his regrets, and I personally am very affected when rugged father figures do that thing where they cry into their fist to make less noise.

Faramir finding his older brother, mentor, and protector Boromir’s body — that just sucks! Look at Faramir doing his own teary-eyed version of the Michael Mann gaze when we cut back to the present day after that desaturated flashback. He’s so conflicted about what to do with Frodo, Sam, and Gollum, and while he’ll eventually make the right choice and let them go, things are really worrisome there for a bit.

Théoden is kind of a jerk when it seems like Aragorn has fallen over a cliff to his death after fighting the warg riders, right? An elf showing extreme emotion is a rare thing, and Théoden basically shrugs off Legolas’s grief. Legolas gets a cheeky moment when Aragorn later walks into Helm’s Deep and Legolas greets him with, “You’re late. You look terrible,” but for first-time watchers of the film, this scene is genuinely fraught. We’ve seen Boromir die, so Aragorn dying doesn’t seem totally out of the question.

This moment is an accumulation of its parts — the zoom-out, Tyler’s lip quiver, those tears just beginning to fall as she sees a vision of herself as a widow for years grieving Aragorn’s death. Hang it in the Louvre.

Look at this idiot regretting all the help he gave Sauron to destroy the world of men. You’re a man, dude! How much longer do you think they’re going to let you hang around? Setting all that sarcasm aside, a great shocked face from Brad Dourif here — a horror icon, and one of the best parts of Deadwood.

The sprawl of this story, the magnitude of the losses, the suggestion that “whatever end” is waiting for the men and boys being forced to fight at Helm’s Deep for the survival of Rohan — this scene’s operatic grandeur captures all that through Bernard Hill’s exhausted line delivery. Every line in the lament for the Rohirrim is wistful, but “The days have gone down in the West, behind the hills, into shadow” is really something else. Watch the whole thing for full wounding impact.

The Two Towers is the turning point for many characters in this series as they realize that the war will change all of them, and that the side of good needs as much help as it can get. Merry and Pippin realize this later than everyone else because they’re just little scamps who spend a lot of their time in Fangorn Forest drinking Ent-draughts and boasting to each other about getting taller, but Dominic Monaghan furiously exclaiming, “But you’re part of this world! Aren’t you?” to Treebeard is a real slap-in-the-face moment for the Ents. This is radicalization, and it works!

Role-reversal time: Frodo goes from holding a sword to Gollum’s throat in the beginning of The Two Towers to putting Sam in the same position by the film’s end, and it’s a bummer. Astin really hits his stride in this film and The Return of the King, and how his voice breaks here as he begins to understand what the One Ring is doing to Frodo is a perfectly harrowing touch.

It’s the speech. You know the speech, and you can’t not cry at the speech.

I too would weep if the nuclear-hot man I’ve been lusting after for the past few weeks stayed committed to his elf girlfriend and left me behind to convince an army of ghosts to redeem themselves by joining our war.

That toddler from the future is breaking the space-time continuum to let Arwen know that she and Aragorn are fated to one day have a child, but all I can focus on is how that slate-blue velvet of Arwen’s robe so perfectly complements her eyes as they fill with tears.

One of many moments in The Return of the King when Sam deserves a hug. In this scene, it feels like everything Sam has worked for is falling apart: Gollum is wily and clever enough that he’s able to frame Sam for eating more lembas bread than his share, Frodo is obsessed with the ring and has become so paranoid that he’s believing Gollum’s lies. When Frodo tells Sam that he’s leaving him behind and progressing to Mount Doom with Gollum, it’s a monumental blow. Sam picks himself up off this cave floor and keeps following Frodo to save him because he’s better than all of us, but before then, Astin’s fetal-position weeping is just intolerably sad.

Jackson is busting out the split diopter, baby! This juxtaposition of the dead Boromir at the height of his strength and Faramir in the depths of despair as Sauron’s forces press forward on the White City is heartbreaking. And although Denethor is a jerk who deserves the fiery death Gandalf eventually gives him, John Noble exudes real gravitas as the Steward of Gondor experiences this vision. There are many reasons to hate Denethor in The Return of the King, but this is just distressing.

“This is just distressing,” part two. The Return of the King is Billy Boyd’s shining moment as he gets a number of big scenes — the torture he experiences when looking into the palantír, his fear when seeing the Witch-king flying, his life-saving defense of Gandalf during the invasion of the White City — and becomes more of his own character after separating from Merry and traveling to Gondor with Gandalf. Denethor’s gross eating is a nice little callback to Jackson’s early days in horror, but the power of this scene is all Boyd, whose crystalline singing voice makes “Edge of Night” innocent and plaintive at the same time.

It’s rare for Aragorn to fall into despair; he holds strong in Fellowship and only has one wavering moment in The Two Towers when he, Legolas, and Gimli think that Merry and Pippin have been killed. He’s normally composed or courageous, the leader that the world of men may not deserve but is lucky to have. Knowing all of that is what makes this moment — when he falls to his knees after seeing Sauron’s orc army, the Haradrim, and the Corsairs of Umbar advancing upon Gondor — so upsetting. Aragorn is convinced that he’s failed, and his doubt in himself is almost too much to bear. Thank you to the Dead Men of Dunharrow for coming through!

“This is just distressing,” part three. Boyd’s tear-stained face really communicates the PTSD everyone in Middle-earth must be feeling at this point.

She is no man, but she defended her uncle and her king better than any man could. Théoden knowing her face one final time is a dramatic callback, too.

Karl Urban’s Rider of Rohan is imposing, formidable, and also a complete mess when he finds what he thinks is his sister Éowyn’s dead body. She lives — but like when Aragorn careened over that cliff, LOTR newbies don’t know that Éowyn is going to recover and find love with Faramir, so Éomer’s frantic hopelessness feels urgent and irreversible. The wig looks great, though.

Serkis does a fantastic job in The Two Towers bouncing back and forth between the aggressive and conniving Gollum and the needy and sniveling Smeagol as the creature grows close to Frodo but is also increasingly drawn to the One Ring. In Return of the King, the performance turns more uniformly sneaky as Gollum’s identity takes over, but this brief moment in the film’s third act, after Gollum leads Frodo into the monstrous spider Shelob’s lair, is a glimpse into the internal conflict that defines the character. Those Furby-huge eyes glimmering with tears might be Smeagol’s last moment of life before the One Ring snuffs it out.

Sam is Ripley, Frodo is Newt, Shelob is the Alien Queen. You get it, I’m sure.

Sam is covered in dirt, grime, orc blood, spider blood, sweat, and who knows what else. He hasn’t eaten anything but Elvish bread in weeks, and then Gollum threw the remaining bread over a cliff. He’s endured Frodo abandoning him, Gollum trying to kill him, and more monstrous stuff than his vocabulary probably had words for before he and Frodo left on this journey. But when Frodo can’t keep going, Sam steps up. Those tears are probably acidic from how dehydrated Sam is, but they’re tears of effort and resolve, and of Sam believing in a world worth fighting for.

Sam and Frodo together in this scene is like a Renaissance painting: all golden light, sfumato effect, yearning bodies, and expressive faces. They’re triumphant yet forever changed, and they each definitely need a vacation. (The eagles are still kind of a loophole, though.)

He’s crying, she’s crying, Elrond’s crying. Romance, baby, it lives in Middle-earth still.

Aragorn essentially said, “Solidarity forever,” and we love him for that.

Four years after Sauron is defeated, it makes sense that the drastically aged Bilbo is leaving. It makes sense that Gandalf is leaving. But Frodo is leaving too? The revelation that the last ring-bearer is heading to the Undying Lands alongside our two favorite oldies is a final heartbreaker, even though, again, it makes sense for Frodo’s trauma and pain to isolate him from Sam, Merry, and Pippin and to inspire him to leave Middle-earth. Rationality doesn’t make Frodo’s farewell hurt any less, but it’s circularly lovely that Return of the King ends with a hug between Sam and Frodo in which the Shire’s most loyal gardener is finally able to, with a sense that Frodo will be okay, let him go. Annie Lennox, lead us into the West — and toward some tissues, please!

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