Best movies like Eli & Ben
Last updated March 2024
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Plot Summary:
The life of the Yassif family becomes almost impossible when the father who is the city architect, is charged with taking bribes.
IMDB Rating: 7.3
IMDB Votes: 136
Genere: Drama, Family
Country: Israel
Duration: 91 min
Plot tags: sentimental, touching, serious, realistic
Best tv shows and movies like Eli & Ben (2008):
Similar in 84%
The Letter Writer (2011)
Plot Summary:
When a teenager receives a mysterious letter in the mail, she sets out to find the author. It's a journey that will change her life forever.
IMDB Rating: 6.9
IMDB Votes: 1000
Genere: Drama, Family
Country: USA
Duration: 85 min
Plot tags: touching, humorous, realistic, semi serious, inspirational, road movie
Similar in 82%
Youth (2012)
Plot Summary:
Juliette, twenty, falls in love. At the same time her father is diagnosed with a fatal disease.
IMDB Rating: 6.5
IMDB Votes: 40
Genere: Drama, Family
Country: France
Duration: 75 min
Plot tags: sentimental, sincere, touching, serious, emotional, realistic, crying
Similar in 86%
The Red Pony (1973)
Plot Summary:
A young farmboy who can't seem to communicate with his father develops an attachment to a young red pony.
IMDB Rating: 6.4
IMDB Votes: 287
Genere: Drama, Family, Western
Country: USA
Duration: 101 min
Plot tags: sentimental, touching, serious, realistic
Similar in 84%
Viktoria (2014)
Plot Summary:
Dreaming of the West, Boryana is determined not to have a child in communist Bulgaria. Nonetheless, her daughter Viktoria enters the world in 1979, curiously missing a belly button, and is declared the country’s Baby of the Decade. Pampered by her mother state until the age of nine, Viktoria’s decade of notoriety comes crashing down with the rest of European communism. But can political collapse and the hardship of new times finally bring Viktoria and her reluctant mother closer together.
IMDB Rating: 6.4
IMDB Votes: 473
Genere: Drama, Family
Country: Bulgaria, Romania
Duration: 155 min
Plot tags: serious, realistic, sincere, touching, bleak, gloomy
Similar in 88%
Furious (2011)
Plot Summary:
Sven (15) will be director and has been busy filming. He films his friends, especially those to do free running and put the videos on YouTube. He asks Roosmarijn to work on his first feature film. They may not know that he gets a thrashing at home regularly. He manages his bruises for anyone to hide until he one day so badly that he absconds with his grandmother. Thus he misses his birthday. Roosmarijn thinks he likes her anymore and his friends are angry with him. He decides to once and for all to deal with his father until he discovered why his father beats him.
IMDB Rating: 5.7
IMDB Votes: 1000
Genere: Drama
Country: Netherlands
Duration: 93 min
Plot tags: touching, serious, tense, suspense, realistic, gloomy
Similar in 86%
The Orheim Company (2012)
Plot Summary:
A strong, human tale about a boy growing up with an alcoholic father, but also an energetic story about teenage lust, pain and passion – about liberation and redemption.
IMDB Rating: 7.0
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Drama
Country: Norway
Duration: 104 min
Plot tags: realistic, touching, serious, emotional, captivating, sincere, stylized
Similar in 87%
The Other Son (2012)
Plot Summary:
Two men discover they were accidentally switched at birth.
IMDB Rating: 7.3
IMDB Votes: 4000
Genere: Drama
Country: France
Duration: 105 min
Plot tags: touching, sentimental, serious, emotional, realistic
Similar in 90%
Pope Dreams (2006)
Plot Summary:
In the vein of Good Will Hunting and Garden State, POPE DREAMS is a coming of age tale about a young man at a crossroads in life. Filled with heart, music, life, and loss. And a set of drums. Oh, and the Pope. POPE DREAMS is about a directionless nineteen-year old boy, Andy Venable, who works for his hard-case dad in a store warehouse during the day and plays drums in a loud heavy-metal band at night. His only clear goal at the moment is to get his sick mother, a devout Catholic, to meet the Pope before she dies. While he's busy with that, he falls for a girl who's totally out of his league and gets discovered by two Broadway producers for a musical talent that just might be his true calling. Andy's a dreamer. But dreaming is easy. It's reality that's hard.
IMDB Rating: 6.7
IMDB Votes: 285
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 105 min
Plot tags: realistic, touching, psychological, sentimental, independent film, serious
Similar in 89%
All the Wilderness (2014)
Plot Summary:
Keeping to himself in the wake his father's death, James Charm finds refuge in solitary walks and creating morbid sketches — until a charismatic new friend and a quirky young woman begin to draw him out of his shell.
IMDB Rating: 5.8
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 85 min
Plot tags: sentimental, touching, serious, realistic, independent film, teen, stylized, interesting
Similar in 84%
Off the Black (2006)
Plot Summary:
An aging, disillusioned alcoholic (Nick Nolte) gets a younger friend (Trevor Morgan) and wants him to pose as his son at a school reunion.
IMDB Rating: 6.5
IMDB Votes: 1000
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 90 min
Plot tags: sentimental, serious, touching, realistic
Similar in 82%
Walking Thunder (1995)
Plot Summary:
In the 1850's, a young boy and his family on their way West become stranded in the Rockies. With the help of a local mountain man, a Sioux medicine man, and a legendary bear knows as "Walking Thunder," the boy learns to become a man, and his family's survival is secured.
IMDB Rating: 5.8
IMDB Votes: 274
Genere: Drama, Family
Country: USA
Duration: 95 min
Plot tags: independent film, exciting, serious, realistic
Similar in 81%
Ways to Live Forever (2010)
Plot Summary:
Sam loves facts. He wants to know about UFOs and horror movies and airships and ghosts and scientists, and how it feels to kiss a girl. And because he has leukemia he wants to know the facts about dying. Sam needs answers to the questions nobody will answer.
IMDB Rating: 6.9
IMDB Votes: 1000
Genere: Drama, Family
Country: UK, Spain
Duration: 90 min
Plot tags: sincere, emotional, touching, serious, realistic, sad
Similar in 77%
Taliesin Jones (2000)
Plot Summary:
Not quite a religious film, not quite a coming-of-age story, not quite a kiddie flick, and not quite a supernatural horror movie, Taliesin Jones's identity crisis nonetheless reveals a sweet examination of one child and his thoughts on God.
IMDB Rating: 6.6
IMDB Votes: 263
Genere: Drama, Family
Country: USA, UK
Duration: 93 min
Plot tags: touching, sentimental, serious, realistic, independent film
Similar in 85%
The Sound of the Spirit (2012)
Plot Summary:
Beautiful and precocious Rivka is a twelve-year-old Jewish girl who believes in Jesus. She and her father attend a Messianic Jewish congregation in their community. But when her father suddenly dies, Rivka's life changes forever. She ends up moving in with her traditional Jewish relatives and attending their synagogue. From her stormy relationship with her uncle, to a meeting with the synagogue’s senior rabbi, to the attention of the cutest boy in the synagogue, Rivka learns life lessons that stir her faith to new levels, touching the hearts of those whose lives she has reluctantly impacted. "The Sound of the Spirit" is the never-before-told story of a young girl caught in the crossfire of strong feelings between two faith communities. It’s told with humor, compassion, and grace.
IMDB Rating: 5.7
IMDB Votes: 158
Genere: Drama, Family
Country: USA
Duration: 129 min
Plot tags: serious, touching, realistic, emotional, christian film, independent film
Similar in 79%
Timboektoe (2007)
Plot Summary:
De ouders van Isa en haar oudere broer Kars gooien het roer om en beginnen een camping in Frankrijk. Isa en Kars hebben het gevoel naar Timboektoe te verhuizen en alles te verliezen. Lang klagen ze gelukkig niet, want al snel maken ze nieuwe vrienden. Maar terwijl nieuwe vriendschappen opbloeien, komt camping Timboektoe in de problemen. Niet ver bij hen vandaan is een andere camping geopend en de onsympathieke eigenaar probeert camping Timboektoe aan alle kanten te beschadigen. Het ziet er zelfs naar uit dat de camping moet sluiten…. Zal het Isa en Kars lukken om Timboektoe open te houden?.
IMDB Rating: 5.3
IMDB Votes: 1000
Genere: Drama, Family, Romance
Country: Netherlands
Duration: 110 min
Plot tags: sentimental, serious, realistic, touching, humorous, melancholic
Similar in 75%
We Can Be Heroes! (2002)
Plot Summary:
Two kids - about 11 years old - Marcello and Fatima, meet and like each other very much. Both have dreams and problems. Marcello wants to fly but feels like an absolutely useless human being, Fatima wants to play soccer - which is not acceptable for her Muslim family. But then they start to support each other in a very delicate and subtle manner.
IMDB Rating: 5.4
IMDB Votes: 999
Genere: Drama, Family
Country: Sweden
Duration: 89 min
Plot tags: touching, realistic, serious, captivating, contemplative
Similar in 80%
Spin (2003)
Plot Summary:
"Spin" tells the story of a boy who loses his parents in a plane crash, is taken in by his uncle (Tucci), who then leaves him for ten years in the care of his Hispanic ranch hand (Blades) and his wife (Delany). Once in high school, Eddie (Merriman) reconnects with a girl from his past (Garces), and their growing interracial relationship teaches the sometimes-sullen Eddie to think of others before himself.
IMDB Rating: 6.3
IMDB Votes: 537
Genere: Drama, Family
Country: USA
Duration: 107 min
Plot tags: sentimental, touching, serious, emotional, realistic, independent film
Similar in 85%
Storm (2009)
Plot Summary:
Drengen Freddie elsker hunde og hader hundemishandlere. Så da han ser en mand på gaden være rigtig modbydelig mod sin hund, tager han affære og kidnapper hunden, som han giver navnet Storm. Freddie gemmer Storm på sit værelse, for hans far vil sikkert ikke synes om få en ekstra beboer i huset. Men så begynder Storm at vise ualmindeligt stort talent på væddeløbsbanen.
IMDB Rating: 5.6
IMDB Votes: 206
Genere: Drama, Family
Country: Denmark
Duration: 82 min
Plot tags: touching, feel good, serious, humorous, realistic, crying
Similar in 88%
My Sweet Orange Tree (2012)
Plot Summary:
Zezé is an 8 year old boy who, although a naughty boy, has a good heart. He leads a very modest life, due to the fact that his father has been unemployed for a long time, and has the habit of having long conversations with a sweet orange tree which is in his backyard. Until one day he meets Portuga, a man who begins to help him and soon becomes his best friend.
IMDB Rating: 7.1
IMDB Votes: 1000
Genere: Drama, Family
Country: Brazil
Duration: 99 min
Plot tags: sentimental, touching, atmospheric, captivating, serious, realistic
Similar in 85%
Eskil & Trinidad (2013)
Plot Summary:
Eskil moves from town to town with his father in Northern Sweden. He misses his mother and sucks at playing hockey, the main activity among the boys his age. Things changes when he meets Trinidad, a mysterious woman who lives outside society spending her time building a great ship that perhaps could take Eskil to his mother.
IMDB Rating: 5.8
IMDB Votes: 185
Genere: Drama, Family
Country: Sweden
Duration: 104 min
Plot tags: touching, serious, realistic, feel good, sentimental, light, sincere, captivating, exciting, tense
Similar in 90%
Virginia's Run (2002)
Plot Summary:
A teenage girl, trying to come to grips with the death of her mother in a horse-riding accident, nurtures the foal of her mother's horse.
IMDB Rating: 6.2
IMDB Votes: 796
Genere: Drama, Family
Country: USA, Canada
Duration: 103 min
Plot tags: sentimental, touching, serious, realistic, independent film
Similar in 85%
Paper Planes (2014)
Plot Summary:
The film tells the story of 11-year-old Dylan (Ed Oxenbould), who is brought up by his father (Sam Worthington) in a remote town in the country of Australia. Dylan’s life is changed forever when he wins a place in the regional Paper Plane Championships in Sydney. The heart warming journey of a young boy and his father reconnecting after a family’s struggle will have us cheering them all the way to the world championships of paper plane flying in Japan.
IMDB Rating: 6.2
IMDB Votes: 5000
Genere: Drama, Family
Country: Australia, Japan
Duration: 96 min
Plot tags: sentimental, touching, feel good, serious, realistic
Similar in 88%
Valley (2014)
Plot Summary:
This is the story of three sensitive teens who are forced to deal with violence at home, violence at school. It is a story of friendship, of love and hate, where the adolescents world is revealed as cruel and beautiful, a world where the desire to die or kill and the will to live are very confused but finally define the fate of the three heroes.
IMDB Rating: 7.1
IMDB Votes: 64
Genere: Drama
Country: Israel
Duration: 86 min
Plot tags: touching, serious, realistic, suspenseful, gloomy
Similar in 77%
Booky & the Secret Santa (2007)
Plot Summary:
Booky does everything she can to make an enjoyable Christmas, for her family, during the depression as her father is out of work.
IMDB Rating: 6.9
IMDB Votes: 311
Genere: Drama, Family
Country: Canada
Duration: 90 min
Plot tags: sentimental, touching, realistic, sincere, captivating, feel good, serious
Similar in 76%
The Little Traitor (2007)
Plot Summary:
Based on the novel "Panther in the Basement" by the world-renowned author, Amos Oz, the movie takes place in Palestine in 1947, just a few months before Israel becomes a state. Proffy Liebowitz, a militant yet sensitive eleven year old wants nothing more than for the occupying British to get the hell out of his land.
IMDB Rating: 6.9
IMDB Votes: 1000
Genere: Drama
Country: Israel, USA
Duration: 88 min
Plot tags: sentimental, thought provoking, touching, emotional, realistic, serious, contemplative
Similar in 83%
The Last Hammer Blow (2014)
Plot Summary:
When he first enters the Montpellier Opera House, Victor knows nothing about music. Nor does he know his father, Samuel Rovinski, who is there to conduct Mahler’s 6th symphony. To change the course of his suddenly uncertain future, for Nadia his mother, for Luna whom he has fallen in love with, Victor has decided to step out of the shadows. He’ll go as far as he needs to.
IMDB Rating: 6.6
IMDB Votes: 520
Genere: Drama
Country: France
Duration: 82 min
Plot tags: realistic, sentimental, touching, emotional, captivating, sincere, serious
Similar in 88%
Absence (2014)
Plot Summary:
A daily, familiar, sexual and emotional drama. Based on the character Serginho, the plot is based around various aspects of this "no longer a boy, not yet a man". We follow his day to day: the recently acquired role of man of the house, taking care of his mother and younger brother; is work at the market; his friendship with Mudinho and Silvinha; and his confusing relationship, between sex and affection, with professor Ney. The film is a tapestry of the life moments of a boy in transition.
IMDB Rating: 6.2
IMDB Votes: 177
Genere: Drama
Country: Brazil, Chile, France
Duration: 87 min
Plot tags: touching, serious, emotional, realistic, bleak
Similar in 80%
My Father My Lord (2007)
Plot Summary:
"My Father My Lord" is an intimate and deeply disturbing story of the conflict between a father's love and his deep devotion to religion. A respected Orthodox Rabbi dotes on his only son but his religious strictures leave an emotional gap between the impish child and the stern father. When the father's all-consuming obsession with observing religious ritual inadvertently leads to tragedy, his previously subservient wife rages against both her husband and God. A dramatic retelling of the story of Abraham.
IMDB Rating: 6.7
IMDB Votes: 492
Genere: Drama
Country: Israel
Duration: 72 min
Plot tags: sentimental, sincere, touching, emotional, captivating, sad, thought provoking, serious, realistic, contemplative
Similar in 79%
We Shall Overcome (2006)
Plot Summary:
A drama about a boy who's inspired by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and challenges repressive school authority in 1969 Denmark.
IMDB Rating: 7.2
IMDB Votes: 3000
Genere: Drama, Family
Country: Denmark
Duration: 109 min
Plot tags: sentimental, touching, serious, captivating, realistic, uplifting
Similar in 77%
Finn (2013)
Plot Summary:
Nine year old Finn lives with his father in a small town. Together with his best friend Erik he plays football, but he prefers to play music. His dad wants him to play football, just like every other kid his age. Finn does not understand why, but his father doesn't want to talk about it. When Finn meets a mysterious old man, who plays the violin beautifully, he decides to learn how to play the violin as well. The old man teaches him, while Finn's dad thinks he is playing football... Is Finn the only one who sees the magic of music? What does his father hide?.
IMDB Rating: 6.6
IMDB Votes: 356
Genere: Drama, Family
Country: Netherlands
Duration: 90 min
Plot tags: sentimental, touching, serious, realistic, twisted