A guy-cry film is a film that generally addresses a male audience, but has strong emotional material. Sports films are important to the guy-cry genre, but sports action is not necessarily essential to qualify a film as a genuine guy-cry. War movies and biographical films of a male character tend to also be guy-cry films. Some notable films that could be defined as guy-cry would be Field of Dreams, Rudy, Brian's Song, The Best Years of Our Lives, Furious 7, and The Wrestler.
Guy-cry is a neologism applied to a pre-existing type of film. This is mainly due to the financial and often critical successes of films that fall within this genre.
Early popular guy-cry films date back to the early 1970s with films such as Five Easy Pieces and One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest. Important themes to the guy-cry genre are concepts of brotherhood, sacrifice, loyalty, and family.
The Oregonian compiled a list of "films that make men cry", that includes Saving Private Ryan, Schindler's List, and The Passion of the Christ, among many others.
Although guy-cry films are typically live action films, some animated films such as Snoopy, Come Home and Toy Story 3 have been described as such.
Popular guy-cry films
In 2005, Entertainment Weekly ran a reader poll of the top guy-cry films. Their choices were as follows:
- The Shawshank Redemption
- Armageddon
- (3-way tie—"Chick Flicks") Terms of Endearment; Love Story; Steel Magnolias
- Field of Dreams
- (5 way tie—"Movies with Dogs") My Dog Skip; Snoopy, Come Home; Old Yeller; Where the Red Fern Grows, Marley and Me
- Good Will Hunting
- Brian's Song
- Act of Valor
- Backdraft
- Hoosiers
- Saving Private Ryan
- Dead Poets Society
- Hotel Rwanda
- The Green Mile