Best movies like East/West
Last updated March 2024
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Plot Summary:
June 1946: Stalin invites Russian emigres to return to the motherland. It's a trap: when a ship-load from France arrives in Odessa, only a physician and his family are spared execution or prison. He and his French wife (her passport ripped up) are sent to Kiev. She wants to return to France immediately; he knows that they are captives and must watch every step.
IMDB Rating: 7.4
IMDB Votes: 5000
Genere: Adventure, Drama, History, Romance
Country: Russia, Ukraine, Bulgaria, France, Spain
Duration: 121 min
Plot tags: touching, heartbreaking, realistic, harsh, sentimental, suspenseful, emotional, sincere, serious, gloomy
Best tv shows and movies like East/West (1999):
Similar in 78%
Max Embarrassing 2 (2013)
Plot Summary:
1979: Cousins Carole and Jérôme go on an organized trip to Odessa, behind the Iron Curtain. During the day, posing as tourists celebrating their engagement, they visit monuments and museums. In the evening they slip away from the group and meet “refuseniks”, Jews persecuted by the Soviet regime for wanting to leave the country. While Carole is motivated by political commitment and a taste for risk, Jérôme’s motivation is Carole.
IMDB Rating: 5.9
IMDB Votes: 151
Genere: Adventure, Drama, History, Romance
Country: France, Canada, Russia, Germany
Duration: 101 min
Plot tags: serious, suspenseful, tense, captivating, realistic
Similar in 88%
Golden Door (2006)
Plot Summary:
The story is set at the beginning of the 20th century in Sicily. Salvatore, a very poor farmer, and a widower, decides to emigrate to the US with all his family, including his old mother. Before they embark, they meet Lucy. She is supposed to be a British lady and wants to come back to the States. Lucy, or Luce as Salvatore calls her, for unknown reasons wants to marry someone before to arrive to Ellis Island in New York. Salvatore accepts the proposal. Once they arrive in Ellis Island they spend the quarantine period trying to pass the examinations to be admitted to the States. Tests are not so simple for poor farmers coming from Sicily. Their destiny is in the hands of the custom officers.
IMDB Rating: 6.8
IMDB Votes: 5000
Genere: Drama, History, Romance
Country: Italy, France
Duration: 118 min
Plot tags: touching, emotional, sincere, serious, captivating, colorful, realistic, gloomy, weird, period drama
Similar in 78%
Changing Times (2004)
Plot Summary:
In Tangiers where he traveled for his work, a man finds the woman he loved, and attempts to revive their romance though it ended some 30 years earlier.
IMDB Rating: 6.1
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Drama, Romance
Country: France
Duration: 94 min
Plot tags: psychological, touching, serious, emotional, realistic, gloomy
Similar in 82%
The Light (2004)
Plot Summary:
Camille arrives in Ouessant, the island of her birth off the Brittany coast, to sell the family home. She spends a last night in the house during which she discovers a secret. In 1963 a man came to work with her father, who was the Jument lighthouse operator. He only stayed two months, but his presence proved to be a disturbing catalyst.
IMDB Rating: 7.0
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Drama, Romance
Country: France
Duration: 105 min
Plot tags: sentimental, touching, serious, realistic, sexual, sexy
Similar in 86%
The Edge (2010)
Plot Summary:
The action takes place shortly after the end of the Second World War in the Siberian hinterland, among Russians and Germans with damaged personal stories and a strange transformation: the victors seem to be crawling into the skins of the defeated, and vice versa. Ignat, is the embodiment of the larger-than-life image of the Soviet victorious warrior who, in fact, proves to be shell-shocked, sick and broken, although not completely destroyed. Trains become fetish for the heroes of the film, and speed becomes a mania; they virtually become one with their steam engines, while the machines take on human names. The heroes set up an almost fatal race in the Siberian forest, risking their own lives and those of others.
IMDB Rating: 6.5
IMDB Votes: 3000
Genere: Adventure, Drama, History, Romance
Country: Russia
Duration: 124 min
Plot tags: realistic, bleak, captivating, tense, exciting, rough, serious, suspenseful
Similar in 76%
Nearest to Heaven (2002)
Plot Summary:
People and life can be cruel, and in their face, Fannette is cool: toward an old acquaintance, to her daughter, to colleagues. Beneath the surface, she roils with passion for a lost love, Philippe. She watches "An Affair to Remember" again and again, and when she receives a letter from Philippe asking her to meet him atop the Empire State Building, she swoons. She's writing a book on an aged painter, so she organizes a trip to New York ostensibly to secure photographs of some of his pieces. The publisher assigns her a photographer, Matt, on the surface spontaneous and flip, but also aggressive about his attraction to her. Will she be with the one she loves? Will she smile? Written by.
IMDB Rating: 5.3
IMDB Votes: 574
Genere: Drama, Romance
Country: France, Spain, Canada
Duration: 96 min
Plot tags: sentimental, touching, feel good, realistic, serious
Similar in 85%
Silver City (1984)
Plot Summary:
After World War II, 4,000 Polish families came to Australia. They were Jews, Fascists, anti-Communists, and others dispossessed. In a large hostel, where even married men and women were housed in separate barracks, the adults lived for two years while they worked off the government's payment of their passage. Even though he is married to Anna and has a son, Julian falls in love with Nina and she with him. As they and others face the new situations and prejudices that await immigrants and as they take on aspects of Australian culture, old-country values reassert themselves. Julian decides what to do about love and family, and Nina must find a way to move on.
IMDB Rating: 6.4
IMDB Votes: 100
Genere: Drama, History, Romance
Country: Australia
Duration: 101 min
Plot tags: independent film, serious, realistic
Similar in 81%
The Promise (1994)
Plot Summary:
East-Berlin, 1961, shortly after the erection of the Wall. Konrad, Sophie and three of their friends plan a daring escape to Western Germany. The attempt is successful, except for Konrad, who remains behind. From then on, and for the next 28 years, Konrad and Sophie will attempt to meet again, in spite of the Iron Curtain. Konrad, who has become a reputed Astrophysicist, tries to take advantage of scientific congresses outside Eastern Germany to arrange encounters with Sophie. But in a country where the political police, the Stasi, monitors the moves of all suspicious people (such as Konrad's sister Barbara and her husband Harald), preserving one's privacy, ideals and self-respect becomes an exhausting fight, even as the Eastern block begins its long process of disintegration.
IMDB Rating: 6.8
IMDB Votes: 849
Genere: Drama, Romance
Country: Germany, France, Switzerland
Duration: 115 min
Plot tags: realistic, sentimental, sincere, touching, serious, emotional, inspirational, romantic, sexy, enigmatic
Similar in 90%
The Barber of Siberia (1998)
Plot Summary:
Douglas is a foreign entrepreneur, who ventures to Russia in 1885 with dreams of selling a new, experimental steam-driven timber harvester in the wilds of Siberia. Jane is his assistant. On her travels, she meets two men who would change her life forever: a handsome young cadet Andrej Tolstoy with whom she shares a fondness for opera, and the powerful General Radlov who is entranced by her beauty and wants to marry her.
IMDB Rating: 7.7
IMDB Votes: 13000
Genere: Comedy, Drama, History, Romance
Country: Russia, France, Italy, Czech Republic
Duration: 180 min
Plot tags: romantic, sentimental, touching, emotional, harsh, realistic, epic, feel good, smart, clever
Similar in 87%
The Last Metro (1980)
Plot Summary:
In occupied Paris, an actress married to a Jewish theater owner must keep him hidden from the Nazis while doing both of their jobs.
IMDB Rating: 7.3
IMDB Votes: 15000
Genere: Drama, Romance, War
Country: France
Duration: 131 min
Plot tags: sincere, art house, thought provoking, manga, anthology, touching, serious, realistic, contemplative, gloomy
Similar in 75%
A French Woman (1995)
Plot Summary:
Wed just as war breaks out, Jeanne hardly gets to know her military husband, Louis, before the debacle of 1940. While waiting for his return from a POW camp, Jeanne journeys through countless affairs with Louis' comrades- in-arms. Hoping to forget these wartime betrayls, Louis takes his wife and the infant twins he didn't father to Berlin, where she falls for Matthais, a sensitive German industrialist. When the Indochinese war sends Louis to Vietnam, Matthais follows Jeanne back to France. A subsequent move to Damascus where Louis is posted as military attache, fails to break their bond.
IMDB Rating: 6.2
IMDB Votes: 1000
Genere: Drama, Romance
Country: UK, France, Germany
Duration: 100 min
Plot tags: sentimental, sincere, serious, realistic, gloomy, sexual, semi autobiographical, sexy
Similar in 84%
To Our Loves (1983)
Plot Summary:
A portrait of youth in bloom; a tale of one family's dissolution; a reflection upon the danger and the mystery in living. Sandrine Bonnaire plays Suzanne, a free spirit and the vessel for an almost Brontëan choler. She's 16, and men exist — diverse lovers, an overbearing brother, and the father portrayed by director Maurice Pialat himself in an unforgettable turn that displays the full magnitude of the cinema giant's tenderness, force-of-will, and presence of being.
IMDB Rating: 7.1
IMDB Votes: 7000
Genere: Drama, Romance
Country: France
Duration: 99 min
Plot tags: erotic, retro, anthology, art house, sensual, crying, psychological, serious, realistic, gloomy
Similar in 76%
The Weeping Meadow (2004)
Plot Summary:
This is the first film of Theo Angelopoulos' trilogy. The story starts in 1919 with some greek refugees from Odessa arriving somewhere near Thessaloniki. Among these people are two small kids, Alexis and Eleni. Eleni is an orphan and she is also taken care by Alexis' family. The refugees build a small village somewhere near a river and we watch as the kids grow up and fall in love. But difficult times of dictatorship and war are coming.
IMDB Rating: 7.9
IMDB Votes: 5000
Genere: Drama, History, Romance
Country: Greece, France, Italy, Germany
Duration: 170 min
Plot tags: sentimental, sincere, touching, captivating, philosophical, breathtaking, contemplative, art house, slow cinema, poetic
Similar in 83%
In the Crosswind (2014)
Plot Summary:
June 14, 1941, 3 a.m. Over 40000 people from Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania are deported by Soviets to Siberia. Among them is a philosophy student Erna, a happily married mother of a little girl. Separated from her husband Erna and her daughter are dispatched together with other women and children to remote Siberian territories. Despite hunger, fear and brutal humiliation Erna never in next fifteen years loses her sense of freedom and hope of returning to homeland. The story is inspired by real events.
IMDB Rating: 7.5
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Drama, History
Country: Estonia
Duration: 90 min
Plot tags: realistic, atmospheric, serious, bleak, black and white, emotional, stylized
Similar in 76%
Mayerling (1968)
Plot Summary:
Crown Prince Rudolf of Austria (Omar Sharif) clashes with his father, Emperor Franz Joseph I of Austria (James Mason), over implementing progressive policies for their country. Ava Gardner plays his mother Empress Elisabeth. Rudolf soon feels he is a man born at the wrong time in a country that does not realize the need for social reform. The Prince of Wales (James Robertson Justice), later to become Britain's King Edward VII, provides comic relief. Rudolf finds refuge from a loveless marriage with Princess Stéphanie (Andréa Parisy) by taking a mistress, Baroness Maria Vetsera (Catherine Deneuve). Their untimely demise at Mayerling, the imperial family's hunting lodge, is cloaked in mystery, but the film's ending suggests the two lovers made a suicide pact when they decided they could not live in a world without love or prospects for peace.
IMDB Rating: 6.1
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Drama, History, Romance
Country: UK, France
Duration: 140 min
Plot tags: sentimental, touching, serious, emotional, realistic, gloomy, independent film, costume drama, period drama
Similar in 83%
Burnt by the Sun 2: Exodus (2010)
Plot Summary:
Epic film about WWII, a sequel to Utomlyonnye solntsem (1994). Evil Stalin is terrorizing people of Russia while the Nazis are advancing. Russian officer Kotov, who miraculously survived the death sentence in Stalin's Purge, is now fighting in the front-lines. His daughter, Nadia, who survived a rape attempt by Nazi soldiers, is now a nurse risking her own life to save others. In the war-torn nation even former enemies are fighting together to defend their land. People stand up united for the sake of victory. Written by Steve Shelokhonov.
IMDB Rating: 4.3
IMDB Votes: 4000
Genere: Drama, History, War
Country: Russia
Duration: 181 min
Plot tags: atmospheric, stylized, serious, emotional, realistic, touching, epic, gloomy
Similar in 89%
The Widow of Saint-Pierre (2000)
Plot Summary:
In 1850, on the isolated French island of Saint-Pierre, a murder shocks the natives. Two fishermen are arrested. One of them, Louis Ollivier, dies in custody. The other, Neel Auguste, is sentenced to death by the guillotine. The island is so small that it has neither a guillotine nor an executioner. While those are sent for Auguste is placed under the supervision of army Captain.
IMDB Rating: 7.2
IMDB Votes: 6000
Genere: Drama, History, Romance
Country: France, Canada
Duration: 112 min
Plot tags: emotional, compassionate, atmospheric, sincere, touching, intense, bleak, serious, realistic, contemplative
Similar in 76%
Nuts for Love (2000)
Plot Summary:
En 1975, unos meses antes del comienzo de la dictadura militar argentina, Alicia y Marcelo se conocen en un concierto de Sui Géneris. El amor surge inmediatamente entre ellos, pero el retorno del novio de Alicia provoca la separación. En 1982, en Madrid, sus caminos vuelven a cruzarse. Tras el encuentro, se dan cuenta de que, a pesar de que el amor sigue latente, sus destinos discurren por rumbos separados. Años después, en 1990, tras otro encuentro casual, Marcelo decide hacer frente a sus sentimientos por Alicia: ambos quieren hacer realidad su sueño postergado desde la adolescencia.
IMDB Rating: 6.6
IMDB Votes: 466
Genere: Drama, Romance
Country: Argentina, Spain
Duration: 103 min
Plot tags: touching, sincere, serious, emotional, sentimental, realistic, contemplative, talky, gloomy
Similar in 84%
Falling in Love (1984)
Plot Summary:
During shopping for Christmas, Frank and Molly run into each other. This fleeting short moment will start to change their lives, when they recognize each other months later in the train home and have a good time together. Although both are married and Frank has two little kids, they meet more and more often, their friendship becoming the most precious thing in their lives.
IMDB Rating: 6.5
IMDB Votes: 15000
Genere: Drama, Romance
Country: USA
Duration: 106 min
Plot tags: romantic, sentimental, light, sweet, melancholic, emotional, touching, sincere, realistic, semi serious
Similar in 78%
Autumn in New York (2000)
Plot Summary:
Autumn in New York follows the sexual exploits of Will Keane - New York restaurateur, infamous verging-on-50 playboy, master of the no-commitment seduction - until he runs into an unexpected dead end when he meets Charlotte Fielding. Charlotte is half Will's age and twice his match, a 21 year-old free spirit yearning to get out and taste the excitement of adult life.
IMDB Rating: 5.6
IMDB Votes: 28000
Genere: Drama, Romance
Country: USA
Duration: 103 min
Plot tags: romantic, sentimental, emotional, touching, heartbreaking, sad, sexy, intense, contemplative, romantic drama
Similar in 78%
The Painted Veil (2006)
Plot Summary:
A British medical doctor fights a cholera outbreak in a small Chinese village, while also being trapped at home in a loveless marriage to an unfaithful wife.
IMDB Rating: 7.4
IMDB Votes: 95000
Genere: Drama, Romance
Country: China, Canada, USA
Duration: 125 min
Plot tags: touching, emotional, scenic, captivating, heartbreaking, melancholic, costume drama, romantic, period piece, atmospheric
Similar in 90%
Message in a Bottle (1999)
Plot Summary:
A woman finds a romantic letter in a bottle washed ashore and tracks down the author, a widowed shipbuilder whose wife died tragically early. As a deep and mutual attraction blossoms, the man struggles to make peace with his past so that he can move on and find happiness.
IMDB Rating: 6.2
IMDB Votes: 40000
Genere: Drama, Romance
Country: USA
Duration: 126 min
Plot tags: touching, romantic, emotional, sincere, sentimental, bad ending, sweet, scenic, semi serious, realistic
Similar in 76%
Nights in Rodanthe (2008)
Plot Summary:
Two unhappy people's lives become entwined when they have a life changing romance. Adrienne is a woman who's trying to decide whether to stay in her unhappy marriage or not. Her life changes when Paul, a doctor who is traveling to reconcile with his estranged son, checks into an inn in a North Carolina beach town where she is staying.
IMDB Rating: 6.0
IMDB Votes: 26000
Genere: Drama, Romance
Country: USA, Australia
Duration: 97 min
Plot tags: touching, romantic, sentimental, melancholic, tear jerker, romantic drama, emotional, intense, heartbreaking, epic
Similar in 90%
A Moment to Remember (2004)
Plot Summary:
A young couple's love is tested when Sun-jin is diagnosed with a rare form of Alzheimer's disease.
IMDB Rating: 8.1
IMDB Votes: 25000
Genere: Drama, Romance
Country: South Korea
Duration: 117 min
Plot tags: touching, emotional, realistic, romantic, sincere, sad, serious, contemplative, heartbreaking, inspirational
Similar in 89%
The Vow (2012)
Plot Summary:
Happy young married couple Paige and Leo are, well, happy. Then a car accident puts Paige into a life-threatening coma. Upon awakening she has lost the previous five years of memories, including those of her beloved Leo, her wedding, a confusing relationship with her parents, or the ending of her relationship with her ex-fiance. Despite these complications, Leo endeavors to win her heart again and rebuild their marriage.
IMDB Rating: 6.8
IMDB Votes: 202000
Genere: Drama, Romance
Country: USA, Australia, France, Canada, Germany, Brazil, UK, China
Duration: 104 min
Plot tags: touching, romantic, sentimental, emotional, inspirational, melancholic, romantic drama, sweet, serious, exciting
Similar in 86%
A Walk in the Clouds (1995)
Plot Summary:
World War II vet Paul Sutton falls for a pregnant and unwed woman who persuades him -- during their first encounter -- to pose as her husband so she can face her family.
IMDB Rating: 6.7
IMDB Votes: 36000
Genere: Drama, Romance
Country: USA, Mexico
Duration: 102 min
Plot tags: romantic, touching, realistic, sentimental, uplifting, sweet, tear jerker, emotional, epic, cult classic
Similar in 82%
Anna and the King (1999)
Plot Summary:
The story of the romance between the King of Siam (now Thailand) and the widowed British school teacher Anna Leonowens during the 1860s. Anna teaches the children and becomes romanced by the King. She convinces him that a man can be loved by just one woman.
IMDB Rating: 6.7
IMDB Votes: 39000
Genere: Drama, History, Romance
Country: USA
Duration: 148 min
Plot tags: romantic, epic, serious, emotional, captivating, period piece, stylized, sentimental, factual, sweet
Similar in 84%
Dauria (1972)
Plot Summary:
A chronicle of life in a small village in the Baikal Region on the eve of World War I and at the time of the October Revolution. The age-old foundations are crumbling, the process of social stratification is underway and, as a result, some people go to defend the revolution, and others - to fight against it. The main hero is the young Cossack Roman Ulybin. At first, this carefree daredevil is preoccupied only with one problem: whether his sweetheart, Dashutka, is to marry him or a merchant’s son, Alyoshka. Roman is killing time fist-fighting with his rival. But little by little, the young man realizes that the world around him has changed, that people are fighting for equality and social justice, and, being a real Cossack, he can’t remain on the sidelines….
IMDB Rating: 6.9
IMDB Votes: 317
Genere: Adventure, Drama, History, Romance
Country: Soviet Union
Duration: 182 min
Plot tags: epic, sentimental, atmospheric, serious, captivating, realistic
Similar in 90%
Colonia (2015)
Plot Summary:
A young woman's desperate search for her abducted boyfriend that draws her into the infamous Colonia Dignidad, a sect nobody ever escaped from.
IMDB Rating: 7.0
IMDB Votes: 57000
Genere: Biography, Drama, History, Romance, Thriller
Country: Germany, France, Luxembourg, UK, USA
Duration: 110 min
Plot tags: suspense, psychological, harsh, political, exciting, atmospheric, tense, touching, emotional, enigmatic
Similar in 76%
The Way Back (2010)
Plot Summary:
Peter Weir's follow-up to Master & Commander (2003) is the stark & brilliant The Way Back, which takes on the theme of man's struggle for freedom. At the dawn of WWII, several men escape from a Russian gulag. The film details their perilous & uncertain journey to freedom, as they cross deserts, mountains, & several nations.
IMDB Rating: 7.3
IMDB Votes: 121000
Genere: Adventure, Drama, History
Country: USA, United Arab Emirates, Poland, India
Duration: 133 min
Plot tags: realistic, epic, inspirational, rough, serious, bleak, visually appealing, intense, road movie, dramatic