It's All Junk: Difference between revisions

* ''[[Saw]] III'' has a brutal ''forced'' example of this trope. Protagonist Jeff has lost a son; Jigsaw wants to help him move on. Being a psychopath, he does this through agonizing tests, one of which requires Jeff to destroy all his son's toys (which he's been keeping in pristine condition).

* ''[[Up (animation)|Up]]'' uses this as a central narrative device where Carl associates his house and its contents as his link to his late beloved Ellie. While it's cool how he has it take to the air in the beginning, it eventually becomes obvious that it has become a millstone. When he realizes that Russel and Kevin are more important and need his help, he does not hesitate to throw everything out as so much ballast to enable the house to fly again - although he did (inadvertently) place his and his wife's chairs together in exactly the same position, and although he snatched all the pictures off the walls he put them in a box. At the climax at the villain's defeat, the house is lost in the process, but Carl's loved ones are saved and that's all that matters to him. Of course, it helps he has traded up for a magnificent [[Cool Airship|Dirigible]] in the process.

* ''[[Citizen Kane]]'' uses this as a central theme, of Charles Foster Kane, a man who devotes his life to gaining objects, which moves to treating people like objects and in the end, mere objects is all he has. This is epitomized by the climactic scene after his second wife walks out on him, Kane totally trashes her room like a mindlessly destructive machine rebelling against the superficial materialism that has helped ruin having any real meaning in his life.

* In ''[[Inception]]'' {{spoiler|Cobb no longer cares for the totem top when he is back with his kids.}}

** There's a darker interpretation to that. {{spoiler|After he spins the top the final time, he doesn't wait to see if it falls. Cobb no longer cares if he's still in a dream or not.}}

* If you substitute a zealously pursued goal for a sentimental item, Danny's refusal of the band award at the end of ''[[Brassed Off]]'' fits the trope pretty well.

* See scene from film version of ''[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1P2N8x8d-aQ Cat On A Hot Tin Roof]'', in which Brick furiously destroys most of his family's (and his father's) treasured possessions and keepsakes, in a desperate plea for his father to understand the value of love as opposed to possessions or personal wealth.

* Done in ''[[Taxi Driver]]''. After Betsy rejects Travis for taking her to a porno for their date, Travis buys her a bouquet of flowers. She sends them back and he keeps them in his apartment just as they were. They eventually die. When he {{spoiler|finally goes off the deep end he's shown burning the flowers in the sink, driving the symbolism home.}}