I posed this question on Instagram a few months ago, and as of today I’ve received a hilariously overwhelming 18,773 comments:

Do share!! 🎥🍿🎬
What’s your favorite movie that features death as a theme? (Like a heartfelt theme, not like a murdery-organs-splayed-across-the-bathroom-floor kind of theme?)
I’m writing an article on this topic and need your input! Thanks, morbid movie buff! 🍿🍿🍿

It appears as though people are pretty passionate about movies, death, and the part of the Venn diagram that combines those two things together. (For a “discuss amongst yourselves” point of comparison, I asked the same question on Instagram about favorite death-themed books, and only received 36 comments. Hmmmm.)

Movies have a great way of exposing us to themes and situations we’re morbidly curious about but would rather not experience in our real lives. Death isn’t an appetizing endeavor… but as a theme in a movie? That’s worth watching. Exploring fictional characters’ deaths… that’s emotionally instructive. Witnessing protagonists’ experiences of grief… that’s riveting. Watching Ryan Gosling and Rachel McAdams in The Notebook (#26 on the list below)… that’s just a good way to spend an evening, again and again and again.

So if you’re in the mood for a movie with a nice dose of memento mori (a reminder that life is fleeting and so therefore you might want to get on with it), here are the top 35 movies that emerged from the unwieldy amount of Instagram comments…

1. What Dreams May Come
2. Meet Joe Black
3. The Sixth Sense
4. Terms of Endearment
5. My Girl
6. Big Fish
7. Beaches
8. Harold and Maude
9. Steel Magnolias
10. Ghost
11. Death Becomes Her
12. Stepmom
13. Coco
14. Me Before You
15. The Big Chill
16. Beetlejuice
17. The Lovely Bones
18. Up
19. Donnie Darko
20. Defending Your Life
21. City of Angels
22. The Crow
23. A Walk to Remember
24. The Fountain
25. This is Where I Leave You
26. The Notebook
27. Melancholia
28. Fried Green Tomatoes
29. My Sister’s Keeper
30. The Others
31. Ordinary People
32. Flatliners
33. Field of Dreams
34. About Time
35. Life as a House

I’ve seen 23 of these movies, and if I’m being honest, I’m at the age where I barely remember watching most of them the first time. Looks like I’ve got a cozy season of all 35 Death Flicks ready to go (again)! Can’t wait to wallow in fictional grief and existential angst, then get up off the couch and live a little wider and deeper. What movie do you want to watch first? I’ll get the popcorn popping.