One thing that happens in movies that I wish would happen more in real life is when someone's laughter turns to tears. One moment a character is laughing uproariously and then suddenly it's like a switch is flipped and their eyes and mouth turn downward and they're sobbing, with no transition or segue. Tears becoming laughter happens from time to time, we've all experienced that one, either in ourselves or as an emotional eruption occurring in a friend or loved one whom we are clumsily attempting to comfort. It's too common to be very interesting, although I do treasure such laughter from the throes of weeping, that's laughter you can really get behind. Because of its origins, its obvious source in that throbbing miasma of primal emotion deep inside where joy and despair are colliding and transmogrifying like free electrons to the point where they are basically synonymous, these throaty peals carry a satisfying note of either world weary resignation or a tinge of hysteria. Adult laughter usually has some such complicated harmonics, you just need to listen for it. Smoking cigarettes certainly helps to bring such melancholy associations forward, adding a sort of emotional chiaroscuro to the proceedings. I like seeing someone laugh lustily while at the same time noting the tiredness in his or her eyes, that aura of exhausted futility. This shouldn't be the dominant impression, just a hint or a suggestion will do, a coloration.

But I would like to see more weeping arising from laughter that's turned on a dime. I've never encountered it in real life, but like I said it happens in movies sometimes, usually melodramas. It may have happened in Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? Such sudden weeping is shocking and makes us feel anew the emotional wallop that tears can evoke. Crying has become so commonplace, don't you think? Everywhere you look someone is bursting into tears. I blame the media and the overall cheapening of sentiment on a global scale. We need more unexpected crying and more novelty crying, to freshen up the whole crying genre. Another one I favor is the walking-down-the-street-while-silently-weeping one. You know, someone is going about his or her business, maybe doing a little shopping, and everything is fine except for the tears streaming down. That one carries a whiff of mental instability or incipient nervous breakdown.