tearjerker

• tear-jerker, tear jerker

tear +‎ jerker

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tearjerker (plural tearjerkers)

1. (informal) An emotionally charged film, novel, song, opera, television episode, etc., usually with one or more sad passages or ending, so termed because it suggests one is likely to cry during its performance.

   Synonyms: cryfest, sobfest

   • 2003, Steven Pinker, How the Mind Works‎, Penguin, →ISBN:

     The psychologist Paul Rozin lumps tearjerkers with other examples of benign masochism like smoking, riding on roller coasters, eating hot chili peppers, and sitting in saunas.

   • 2019 January 26, Kitty Empire [pseudonym], “The Streets review – the agony and ecstasy of a great everyman”, in Katharine Viner, editor, The Guardian‎, London: Guardian News & Media, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 8 April 2019:

     The many tear-jerkers deal with finality, with death and the end of love, with a stoicism pregnant with feeling.

• tearjerking