Best movies like Greendale
Last updated March 2024
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Plot Summary:
Neil Young's "musical novel", telling the story of a family, the murder of a cop and the evolution of a young girl named Sun Green. This is not a concert film. YOung himself shot actors on locations on his native Northern California home turf to craete his Greendale, a rural town that is a microcosm of a world in crisis. There is lots of music featured by Young and Crazy Horse. Special bonus features include "Making of" with brand new interviews with Neil and the cast; also 3 live performances of "Greendale" songs, more.
IMDB Rating: 6.2
IMDB Votes: 446
Genere: Musical, Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 87 min
Plot tags: serious, realistic, experimental, captivating, independent film, offbeat, biting, suspense
Best tv shows and movies like Greendale (2003):
Similar in 81%
A Memory in My Heart (1999)
Plot Summary:
Jane Seymour stars in this made-for-TV drama as Rebecca Blake, a bookstore employee who lives contently in San Pedro, California with her construction-worker husband Joe (A Martinez). A chance meeting with a woman named Lynn Wyman (Cathy Lee Crosby), coupled with her recent nightmares and searing headaches (one of which has prompted a spectacular collapse at her local grocery store), lead Lynn to the inescapable conclusion that she is an amnesiac--and that she might be Abbie Stewart, who has another family in Fillmore County. Journeying to Abbie's hometown to learn the truth, our heroine is put off somewhat by the curiously mixed reaction of the man who might be her "other" husband, school principal Chase Stewart (Bruce Davison). The key to mystery may not be the surrealistic dreams experienced by Rebecca/Abbie, but instead that painful-looking gash in her head.
IMDB Rating: 6.0
IMDB Votes: 451
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 120 min
Plot tags: serious, emotional, realistic, suspenseful
Similar in 90%
Lost in the Stars (1974)
Plot Summary:
Musical from the American Film Theatre series, based on the play Cry The Beloved Country.
IMDB Rating: 6.3
IMDB Votes: 136
Genere: Drama, Musical
Country: USA
Duration: 97 min
Plot tags: serious, realistic
Similar in 79%
Blue Valley Songbird (1999)
Plot Summary:
Country singer Leana Taylor (Dolly Parton) struggles to escape from her controlling manager/boyfriend Hank (John Terry) as well as her troubled past. After turning to her guitarist (Billy Dean), Leanna finally faces her past, including her estranged mother and the death of her father. Through flashbacks, Leana deals with her past as she attempts to move her life forward and begin a recording career.
IMDB Rating: 5.9
IMDB Votes: 346
Genere: Drama, Musical
Country: USA
Duration: 92 min
Plot tags: touching, serious, realistic, entertaining
Similar in 86%
Ring the Bell (2013)
Plot Summary:
When high-powered sports agent Rob Decker arrives looking for his next major league prospect, he finds more than he bargained for at the Cooke Boys Ranch. As he works to secure Shawn Hart, the top high school baseball prospect in the country, he encounters a cast of characters who value happiness and common sense over dollars and cents.
IMDB Rating: 6.3
IMDB Votes: 463
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 97 min
Plot tags: serious, realistic, christian film, inspirational
Similar in 78%
The American Standards (2008)
Plot Summary:
At a crossroads in his life, Doc Jennings goes home to celebrate his mother's birthday and uncovers dramatic family secrets. Lies, affairs and afflictions bubble to the surface of his seemingly perfect family. Can they come back together or is it too late?.
IMDB Rating: 4.1
IMDB Votes: 654
Genere: Drama, Romance
Country: USA
Duration: 94 min
Plot tags: realistic, serious, psychological, captivating
Similar in 77%
Milwaukee, Minnesota (2003)
Plot Summary:
Having lived his entire life under the watchful eye of his overbearing mother, Albert must fend for himself when an unidentified automobile suddenly kills her. Free for the first time, Albert quickly responds to the bait dangling in front of him, putting his aggressors against one another in a race for his trust. Using his skills that make him a gifted fisherman, Albert turns the tables on his seemingly doomed fate, capturing the heart of the woman most eager to deceive him, and fooling the man most intent on destroying him.
IMDB Rating: 6.1
IMDB Votes: 714
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 95 min
Plot tags: serious, realistic, offbeat, suspense, dark comedy
Similar in 84%
The Bed You Sleep In (1993)
Plot Summary:
Times are hard for Northwestern lumber-mill operators like Ray and his wife Jean. Ray and Jean's lives are thrown into chaos when their daughter writes home from college.
IMDB Rating: 7.3
IMDB Votes: 285
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 117 min
Plot tags: independent film, atmospheric, bleak, serious, realistic, experimental, disturbing, contemplative, stylized, gloomy
Similar in 80%
Jewel (2001)
Plot Summary:
In the 1940s a 40-year-old woman with five healthy children gives birth to a girl with Down's syndrome.
IMDB Rating: 6.4
IMDB Votes: 387
Genere: Drama
Country: Canada, UK, USA
Duration: 120 min
Plot tags: touching, serious, emotional, realistic
Similar in 88%
No One Writes to the Colonel (1999)
Plot Summary:
Every Friday, the Colonel puts on his only suit and goes to the dock to await a letter announcing the arrival of his pension. But the townsfolk all know that this pension will never come. His wife also knows it, and even he knows it. But he is still waiting, living with the pain of the death of his son.
IMDB Rating: 6.6
IMDB Votes: 1000
Genere: Drama
Country: Mexico, France, Spain
Duration: 122 min
Plot tags: sincere, serious, atmospheric, realistic, psychological, contemplative, gloomy
Similar in 81%
On the Edge (2009)
Plot Summary:
Alfredo and Susanna are two well-off fifty-year-olds who lead a stimulating cultural life. He is an architect and she is a psychologist; they live in Rome but spend their weekends at their country home in Umbria, where they love to spend their days walking in the forests or relaxing poolside with a good book. One day, as she goes into town, Susanna sees a girl prostituting herself in the bushes on the side of the road and decides to save her from her unhappy existence, despite the enormous differences that separate their ways of life.
IMDB Rating: 6.6
IMDB Votes: 580
Genere: Drama
Country: Italy
Duration: 98 min
Plot tags: tense, serious, emotional, realistic, erotic
Similar in 87%
Go for It! (2011)
Plot Summary:
Carmen is a good student with a bad attitude who lives for dancing in the underground clubs of Chicago. She yearns to be 'somebody' but is afraid to believe in herself. Her immigrant Mexican, working-class parents want her to stay in school and get an education, so she attends junior college while working at a grocery store. Carmen's professor catches her performing one day in the neighborhood and challenges her to audition to a formal dance school in California. She gets into a fight with her chaotic family and runs away to her best friend Gina's place only to find out Gina's been getting beat up by her boyfriend. Meanwhile, Carmen's boyfriend, Jared wants her to commit and move in with him. Pulled apart in every direction, her dream of dancing fades. Can Carmen overcome her fears and take the biggest chance of her life, or will she succumb to her self-doubt?.
IMDB Rating: 3.7
IMDB Votes: 1000
Genere: Drama, Musical
Country: USA
Duration: 105 min
Plot tags: touching, realistic, uplifting, serious, captivating, emotional, teen, independent film
Similar in 89%
Ocean of Pearls (2008)
Plot Summary:
As a Sikh man with a full beard and turban, AMRIT SINGH is often the target of racial profiling. But when he sees his dreams of becoming Chief of Surgery at a state-of-the-art transplant center dwindle because of his appearance, Amrit goes against a tradition he's maintained his whole life and cuts his hair. Hiding this decision from his girlfriend and family in Toronto is only the start of a series of compromises Amrit finds himself making as he deals with hospital politics and health care injustices. When his compromises result in the death of a patient, Amrit begins to reexamine the value of the religious traditions he'd turned his back on.
IMDB Rating: 7.0
IMDB Votes: 313
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 97 min
Plot tags: realistic, contemplative, psychological, atmospheric, captivating, spiritual, independent film, sentimental, sincere, uplifting
Similar in 78%
Blood Done Sign My Name (2010)
Plot Summary:
A drama based on the true story in which a black Vietnam-era veteran is allegedly murdered by a local white businessman who is later exonerated. The plot focuses on the role of a local high school teacher and the civil unrest that followed the acquittal.
IMDB Rating: 6.5
IMDB Votes: 635
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 128 min
Plot tags: disturbing, serious, captivating, realistic, thought provoking, tense, bleak, contemplative, entertaining
Similar in 81%
Alex of Venice (2014)
Plot Summary:
After her stay-at-home husband leaves her, a workaholic lawyer finds that she is not completely up to the tasks of caring for her young son, ailing father and household all by herself.
IMDB Rating: 5.8
IMDB Votes: 3000
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 86 min
Plot tags: sincere, touching, serious, realistic, romantic drama, independent film
Similar in 76%
Battlefield America (2012)
Plot Summary:
A young businessman hires an instructor to turn a group of misfit kids into a team on the underground dance competition circuit.
IMDB Rating: 2.6
IMDB Votes: 1000
Genere: Drama, Musical
Country: USA
Duration: 106 min
Plot tags: realistic, inspirational, psychological, captivating, exciting, serious
Similar in 84%
Banaras: A Mystic Love Story (2006)
Plot Summary:
Banaras: A Mystic Love Story is the name of an Indian Bollywood film directed by Pankaj Parashar released in 2006. The film takes place in the Hindu holy city of Varanasi (the city, once known as Banaras, serves as a destination for the pilgrimage of millions of Hindu worshippers annually) and is centered around the relationship of a young woman with her parents and her lover. The storyline also has a strong religious dimension. Most of the film was shot in Varanasi, with some scenes shot in Mauritius.
IMDB Rating: 6.1
IMDB Votes: 355
Genere: Musical, Drama
Country: India
Duration: 122 min
Plot tags: serious, realistic, sincere, touching
Similar in 80%
A Mother's Prayer (2009)
Plot Summary:
A Mother's Prayer, starring Robin Givens (Tyler Perry's The Family That Preys), Johnny Gill (legendary R&B singer), Shirley Murdock (Man of Her Dreams) and Jermaine Crawford (HBO's The Wire), tells the compelling, heartwarming tale of family members torn apart by their individual struggles. The only thing that can truly bring the family back together is a mother's dying wishes. With a lot of love, this family is about to learn the true meaning of the saying: the family that prays together stays together. Come along on an emotional journey through song, laughter and triumph.
IMDB Rating: 5.1
IMDB Votes: 53
Genere: Drama, Musical
Country: USA
Duration: 104 min
Plot tags: uplifting, touching, serious, emotional, realistic, captivating
Similar in 88%
Back to School Mom (2015)
Plot Summary:
Mary Thomas, a free-spirited musician, has spent the past two decades traveling the world, but at age 41 she decides to go back to college and finish her degree so that, for once, she can finally finish something she started. Back at her old university, she becomes close friends with her popular and charming "peer tutor" -- only to learn that he is actually the son she gave up 20 years earlier.
IMDB Rating: 6.2
IMDB Votes: 162
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 88 min
Plot tags: sentimental, serious, realistic, touching, sincere, captivating
Similar in 89%
The New Year Parade (2008)
Plot Summary:
When Mike and Lisa separate, their children suffer quietly in the middle of the annual Mummer's Parade.
IMDB Rating: 6.2
IMDB Votes: 126
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 85 min
Plot tags: sentimental, realistic, psychological, contemplative, captivating, sincere, serious, emotional, gloomy, independent film
Similar in 75%
The Californians (2005)
Plot Summary:
When real estate mogul Gavin Ransom announces his plan to cover California's northern coast with scores of mini-mansions, his environmentalist sister, Olive, launches a protest to stop him. But there's trouble ahead when Gavin begins falling for the pretty folk singer who's helping Olive's cause.
IMDB Rating: 4.8
IMDB Votes: 445
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 87 min
Plot tags: humorous, semi serious, realistic, witty
Similar in 83%
Mending Fences (2009)
Plot Summary:
When big-city TV journalist Kelly Faraday (Laura Leighton) gets fired, she moves back to her Nevada hometown, where a severe drought may force her aging mother, Ruth (Angie Dickinson), to sell the family farm to a casino developer. As Kelly and Ruth sort out old differences, the erstwhile reporter and her ex-beau Walt (David Lee Smith) begin to suspect the casino of manipulating the town's water supply. Stephen Bridgewater directs this drama.
IMDB Rating: 6.4
IMDB Votes: 231
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 88 min
Plot tags: realistic, sentimental, psychological, captivating, touching, serious
Similar in 78%
Virgin (2003)
Plot Summary:
When a teenager finds herself pregnant, with no memory of having had sex, she determines that she is carrying the child of God.
IMDB Rating: 5.6
IMDB Votes: 601
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 116 min
Plot tags: realistic, touching, psychological, captivating, erotic, sincere, serious, contemplative, independent film
Similar in 85%
Game of Life (2007)
Plot Summary:
In Game of LIfe, a children's soccer team is the common link for a multi-layered story giving a candid look into the intersecting lives of five families living in Los Angeles. Game of LIfe examines the complexities of racial and class divisions, and reveals that despite the fragile volatility of human relationships, family is what holds us together and unites us all.
IMDB Rating: 5.0
IMDB Votes: 223
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 100 min
Plot tags: sentimental, sincere, touching, serious, realistic, independent film
Similar in 88%
God's Army (2000)
Plot Summary:
Life as a Mormon missionary isn't what 19-year-old Brandon Allen expected: so many rules and so few successes. Los Angeles is as unrepentant as Sodom and Gomorrah. He's forced to share a small apartment with five young prank-loving missionaries and, to top it off, his first companion, 29-year-old Marcus Dalton, proves to be a harsh mentor. After only one day as a missionary, Allen is ready to hang up his necktie and go home. Allen becomes a part of the drama occurring under the everyday surface of missionary life. After only a few intense days, Allen finds faith he didn't know he had, and courage he didn't know he lacked. He learns that the time has come to put away childish things, and to become more than just a man--to become a man of God.
IMDB Rating: 6.2
IMDB Votes: 1000
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 108 min
Plot tags: sincere, touching, realistic, psychological, uplifting, serious, emotional, independent film, contemplative, christian film
Similar in 75%
Lebanon, Pa. (2010)
Plot Summary:
Will, a charming 35-year-old Philadelphia ad man, heads to Lebanon, Pa. to bury his recently deceased father. He forms an unexpected friendship with CJ, his bright, newly pregnant 17-year-old cousin. As Will becomes interested in CJ's married teacher and CJ confronts her conflicted father, both struggle with formidable decisions about the path their lives will take. Can we vault our differences and meet in the middle? This bittersweet comic drama tenderly explores the cultural divide in America through the lives of one extended family.
IMDB Rating: 6.2
IMDB Votes: 584
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 100 min
Plot tags: realistic, sentimental, psychological, captivating, sincere, clever, touching, serious, independent film
Similar in 80%
Mothers (2010)
Plot Summary:
Two nine-year-old girls report a flasher to the police even though they never saw him. Three filmmakers meet the only residents of a deserted village - an elderly brother and sister who have not spoken to each other in 16 years. Retired cleaning women are found raped and strangled in a small town. The fiction slowly turns into a documentary.
IMDB Rating: 7.3
IMDB Votes: 804
Genere: Drama
Country: France, Bulgaria
Duration: 123 min
Plot tags: captivating, realistic, disturbing, psychological, thought provoking, serious, anthology, emotional, contemplative, entertaining
Similar in 79%
Soda Springs (2012)
Plot Summary:
The story of a man's struggle to claim his future by confronting his past. The road is not an easy one as old demons resurface to threaten everything Eden has fought to overcome.
IMDB Rating: 6.2
IMDB Votes: 470
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 115 min
Plot tags: sentimental, touching, serious, realistic, independent film
Similar in 83%
A Thousand Years of Good Prayers (2007)
Plot Summary:
The film follows Mr. Shi, a retired widower from Beijing. When his only daughter, Yilan, who lives in Spokane, Washington and works as a librarian, gets divorced, he decides to visit her to help her heal. However, Yilan is not interested. She tries keeping an emotional distance but when this finally fails she begins physically avoiding her father. He confronts her about an affair with a married Russian man and she, in turn, lets loose about all the gossip she'd heard as a young girl about his alleged affair with a female colleague back in China.
IMDB Rating: 6.7
IMDB Votes: 1000
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 83 min
Plot tags: serious, thought provoking, touching, realistic, emotional, contemplative
Similar in 81%
The Rising Place (2001)
Plot Summary:
The close friendship of two young women, each of a different race, and their struggle to find purpose in their lives during this time of social injustice and world war.
IMDB Rating: 6.4
IMDB Votes: 208
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 93 min
Plot tags: sentimental, sincere, touching, serious, realistic
Similar in 75%
Of Boys and Men (2008)
Plot Summary:
Robert Townsend stars as the patriarch of a family devastated when his wife is killed in a senseless auto accident. Reeling with grief, each family member must find courage and vision to carry on, ultimately eager to do the mother proud.
IMDB Rating: 6.4
IMDB Votes: 192
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 90 min
Plot tags: realistic, psychological, sentimental, captivating, touching, serious, independent film