In real life, there's a difference between someone who wants your empathy and someone who is trying to con you. In one case, the feelings are reciprocal, in the other, the feelings aren't.

We had to sit in the theater for a few minutes after the credits as I was still too misty to be seen in public

Me too. I like a tearjerker and all, but that one really had me worked up to the point where I thought I might have to leave or make a spectacle of myself.

I generally use the term "emotional manipulation" to refer to a moment in a movie/book/whatever where I feel tricked into feeling a certain way.

Stories--books, movies, comics, anything--should make you feel. I'm totally on board with that, and will happily watch movies at which I cry like a wee babe, IF I feel that the emotion is earned. It's when I don't feel that the emotion is earned that I call it manipulation. It's when I don't give a damn about the characters, but suddenly the strings swell in the background and Character X's hand falls limply to the ground as tears run down Character Y's face and then I start crying too, that I get mad; it's when neither the script, nor the acting, nor the story has earned those tears that I call it "emotional manipulation". If the emotion has been earned, then--to me--it's an emotional connection, NOT manipulation.

edit: hugely x-posty, of course.

Having an emotional response is (generally - Brecht aside) desirable

Oh, absolutely. I don't mean to suggest that if the audience feels any emotional response, it's a bad thing. I do see how my post read that way; I was focusing on the "unnecessary" part. When someone thinks the story isn't going to get the audience involved on its own merits, and so they throw in a child-in-peril or a dying pet or whatever.

And the Zombie Dogs battle the Atomic Dogs. Obviously.

The Atomic Dogs win, right?

The Space Dogs beat them both! Goooo, Laika!

Don't discount the Snow Dogs, now.

Laika would take Balto out in a second. If she were alive, and not floating in outer space.

But the Snow Dogs have Cuba Gooding, Jr. on their side, Kathy. HE HAS AN OSCAR!!!

He was also in Boat Trip. He lacks judgment and leadership abilities, and is possibly mentally deficient if he thought that that film would enhance his career.

Laika had Soviet space engineers on her side, as well as zero gravity. She wins!!