Best movies like Farewell My Concubine
Last updated March 2024
Looking for movies related to Farewell My Concubine? Contribute your knowledge to steer others toward tv shows and films you've already seen that might similarly enthrall them. Aid in enlarging the circle of people referring videos amongst each other. We encourage your engagement!
Plot Summary:
Abandoned by his prostitute mother in 1920, Douzi was raised by a theater troupe. There he meets Shitou and over the following years the two develop an act entitled, "Farewell My Concubine," that brings them fame and fortune. When Shitou marries Juxian, Doutzi becomes jealous, the beginnings of the acting duo's explosive breakup and tragic fall take root.
IMDB Rating: 8.1
IMDB Votes: 32000
Genere: Drama, Music, Romance
Country: China, Hong Kong
Duration: 171 min
Plot tags: visual, epic, visually stunning, atmospheric, emotional, realistic, stylized, depressing, controversial, retro
Best tv shows and movies like Farewell My Concubine (1992):
Similar in 78%
The Hanging Garden (1997)
Plot Summary:
William, a once obese and troubled teen, goes back to his family's home after being gone, without word, for ten years and finds it (and his family) haunted with his past. He had moved to the city and become a fit, well-adjusted gay man, but during his visit home, he becomes unhinged as the newly remembered reasons for his miserable adolescence come to life in each of their presents.
IMDB Rating: 6.9
IMDB Votes: 3000
Genere: Drama, Romance
Country: Canada, UK
Duration: 91 min
Plot tags: independent film, stylized, sincere, atmospheric, touching, serious, captivating, emotional, realistic, gloomy
Similar in 76%
Madame Satã (2002)
Plot Summary:
A story inspired by the life of one of the most remarkable figures in Brazilian popular culture, João Francisco dos Santos (1900-1976). In turn, bandit, transvestite, street fighter, brothel cook, convict and father to seven adopted children, dos Santos – better known as Madame Satã – was also a notorious gay performer who pushed social boundaries in a volatile time.
IMDB Rating: 7.0
IMDB Votes: 3000
Genere: Biography, Crime, Drama, Music, Romance
Country: Brazil, France
Duration: 105 min
Plot tags: rough, serious, emotional, lgbt cinema, bleak, realistic, entertaining, queer cinema
Similar in 80%
Food of Love (2002)
Plot Summary:
Young aspiring pianist attracts attention of famous musicians. Chance encounters bring them together but expectations must be managed by all.
IMDB Rating: 6.1
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Drama, Music, Romance
Country: Spain, Germany
Duration: 112 min
Plot tags: sentimental, touching, serious, emotional, realistic, erotic, queer cinema
Similar in 84%
Rouge (1987)
Plot Summary:
Fleur is the blue angel in one of Hong Kong's "flower houses" - bordellos and night clubs of the 1930's. A detached and beautiful performer, she falls in love with Twelfth Master Chan, heir to a chain of pharmacies. They agree to a suicide pact. Jump ahead 50 years to modern Hong Kong: Fleur's ghost appears in Yuen's newspaper office, wanting to place an ad to find Chan, who never arrived in the afterlife. Yuen, and his equally bewildered girlfriend, An Chor, are captivated by Fleur and her story.
IMDB Rating: 7.3
IMDB Votes: 3000
Genere: Drama, Fantasy, Music, Mystery, Romance
Country: Hong Kong
Duration: 96 min
Plot tags: realistic, surreal, visual, cult classic, sentimental, atmospheric, serious, stylized
Similar in 84%
When Love Comes Along (1998)
Plot Summary:
Between getting trashed, tripping, blowing guys off and writing songs, Mark falls for Stephen. Fig and Sally put perform Marks songs between casual sex with anyone and everyone. Katie is a few-hit wonder who hit rock-bottom in L.A and returns to New Zealand to patch her life back together. Stephen, Mark and Katie branch out for a slumber party at a beach house of their better days. Fig and Sally arrive, and not long after Eddie arrives also (Katies American guy). Mark stops running away from Stephens love, Katie and Eddie get engaged and Fig and Sally ... have sex?.
IMDB Rating: 5.9
IMDB Votes: 360
Genere: Drama, Music, Romance
Country: New Zealand
Duration: 94 min
Plot tags: independent film, emotional, sentimental, touching, offbeat, realistic, contemplative, semi serious
Similar in 80%
Coming Home (2014)
Plot Summary:
Lu and Feng are a devoted couple forced to separate when Lu is arrested and sent to a labor camp as a political prisoner during the Cultural Revolution. He finally returns home only to find that his beloved wife no longer remembers him.
IMDB Rating: 7.2
IMDB Votes: 7000
Genere: Drama, Romance
Country: China
Duration: 109 min
Plot tags: serious, emotional, atmospheric, touching, realistic, social
Similar in 77%
The Phantom Lover (1995)
Plot Summary:
In 1936 China, a nearly bankrupt drama troupe starts performing in a burned-out theater where the great actor Song Danping was killed. One of the actors, Wei Qing, starts seeing strange apparitions that could revive his troupe and deliver him to the same fate as Song Danping.
IMDB Rating: 6.6
IMDB Votes: 879
Genere: Drama, Music, Romance
Country: Hong Kong, Singapore
Duration: 100 min
Plot tags: sentimental, serious, realistic, stylized, sexual, sexy
Similar in 81%
House of Boys (2009)
Plot Summary:
A glamorous, colourful coming-of-age story that follows the dramatic journey of Frank, a high school kid in 1984 through an exciting world of sex and music, when his deep new passion is suddenly turned into a struggle for courage, facing a new disease - the "gay cancer" and becomes deep, true love in the expectancy of his friend's horrible death and beyond.
IMDB Rating: 6.5
IMDB Votes: 1000
Genere: Drama, Music, Romance
Country: Luxembourg, Germany
Duration: 117 min
Plot tags: touching, serious, sentimental, sincere, avant garde, realistic, lgbt cinema, sexual, homoerotic, independent film
Similar in 75%
Temptress Moon (1996)
Plot Summary:
Set in the decadent 1920s, Temptress Moon tells the very complicated story of a wealthy family living on the outskirts of Shanghai. Their youngest daughter, Ruyi, is brought up as a servant to her opium-addicted father and brother. Meanwhile, her brother-in-law Zhongliang has a successful, if illegal, career seducing and blackmailing married women in the city. When he comes to Ruyi's home the two fall in love, and trouble ensues.
IMDB Rating: 6.7
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Drama, Romance
Country: China, Hong Kong
Duration: 130 min
Plot tags: stylized, serious, captivating, realistic, suspenseful, gloomy, epic, erotic, atmospheric, sexy
Similar in 90%
Cabaret (1972)
Plot Summary:
Inside the Kit Kat Club of 1931 Berlin, starry-eyed singer Sally Bowles and an impish emcee sound the clarion call to decadent fun, while outside a certain political party grows into a brutal force.
IMDB Rating: 7.8
IMDB Votes: 58000
Genere: Drama, Music, Musical, Romance
Country: USA
Duration: 124 min
Plot tags: satirical, stylized, atmospheric, sentimental, serious, period piece, inspirational, spiritual, neo noir, entertaining
Similar in 82%
Yellow Earth (1984)
Plot Summary:
Yellow earth focuses on the story of a Communist soldier who is sent to the countryside to collect folk songs for the Communist Revolution. There he stays with a peasant family and learns that the happy songs he was sent to collect do not exist; the songs he finds are about hardship and suffering. He returns to the Army, but promises to come back for the young girl, Cuiqiao, who has been spellbound by his talk of the freedom women have under Communist rule and who wants to join the Communist Army.
IMDB Rating: 7.1
IMDB Votes: 3000
Genere: Drama, History, Music, Romance
Country: China
Duration: 86 min
Plot tags: political, sentimental, atmospheric, thought provoking, serious, realistic, stylized, gloomy, independent film, interesting
Similar in 79%
Fögi Is a Bastard (1998)
Plot Summary:
A 15 year old boy (Beni) falls in love with Fögi, a singer in a Rock band. As Fögi seduces him, he is only willing to follow him where ever Fögi wants to. But Fögi is a drug addict and pulls Beni deeper and deeper into the hell of drug addiction.
IMDB Rating: 6.6
IMDB Votes: 3000
Genere: Drama, Music, Romance
Country: Switzerland, France, Germany
Duration: 91 min
Plot tags: sexual, serious, realistic, disturbing, gloomy, sexy, queer cinema
Similar in 87%
Days of Being Wild (1990)
Plot Summary:
The movie is set in Hong Kong and the Philippines in 1960. Yuddy, or 'York' in English, is a playboy in Hong Kong and is well-known for stealing girls' hearts and breaking them. His first victim is Li Zhen who suffered emotional and mental depression as a result of Yuddy's wayward attitude. Li Zhen eventually seeks much-needed solace from a sympathetic policeman named Tide.
IMDB Rating: 7.4
IMDB Votes: 25000
Genere: Crime, Drama, Romance
Country: Hong Kong
Duration: 100 min
Plot tags: surreal, artsy, atmospheric, contemplative, mind bending, psychedelic, depressing, sad, sexual, aesthetic
Similar in 79%
Happy Together (1997)
Plot Summary:
A couple take a trip to Argentina in search of a new beginning, but instead find themselves drifting ever further apart.
IMDB Rating: 7.7
IMDB Votes: 33000
Genere: Drama, Romance
Country: Hong Kong, South Korea, Japan
Duration: 96 min
Plot tags: art house, emotional, depressing, visually appealing, independent film, visual, atmospheric, contemplative, stylized, scary
Similar in 79%
Zhou Yu's Train (2002)
Plot Summary:
Zhou Yu, a ceramic artisan in China's rural Northwest, has a deep rapport with Chen Qing, a shy sensitive poet. Taking a long train ride every weekend just to make mad passionate love with him, her longing seems insatiable. Until one day, she meets the hedonistic vet Zhang Qiang and begins a torrid affair, which takes her to another train station, and another level of lust. Driven by the locomotive of love and desire, she hustles through a dark tunnel of no return.
IMDB Rating: 6.4
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Drama, Romance
Country: China, Hong Kong
Duration: 97 min
Plot tags: sentimental, atmospheric, touching, serious, contemplative, realistic, surprise ending, non-linear
Similar in 80%
Red Sorghum (1988)
Plot Summary:
An old leper who owned a remote sorghum winery dies. Jiu'er, the wife bought by the leper, and her lover, identified only as "my Grandpa" by the narrator, take over the winery and set up an idealized quasi-matriarchal community headed by Jiu'er. When the Japanese invaders subject the area to their rule and cut down the sorghum to make way for a road, the community rises up and resists as the sorghum grows anew.
IMDB Rating: 7.3
IMDB Votes: 10000
Genere: Drama, History, Romance, War
Country: China
Duration: 91 min
Plot tags: tense, depressing, manga, independent film, costume drama, mind blowing, psychological, sincere, epic, serious
Similar in 77%
Brideshead Revisited (2008)
Plot Summary:
Based on Evelyn Waugh's 1945 classic British novel, Brideshead Revisited is a poignant story of forbidden love and the loss of innocence set in England prior to the Second World War.
IMDB Rating: 6.6
IMDB Votes: 14000
Genere: Drama, Romance
Country: UK, Italy, Morocco, USA
Duration: 134 min
Plot tags: sentimental, emotional, sincere, serious, period piece, touching, costume drama, intense, clever, epic
Similar in 80%
Lan Yu (2001)
Plot Summary:
A love story between a country boy in Beijing to study and a wealthy businessman set against the backdrop of the 1989 Tiananmen Square incident.
IMDB Rating: 7.1
IMDB Votes: 3000
Genere: Drama, Romance
Country: Hong Kong, China
Duration: 86 min
Plot tags: sentimental, sincere, touching, captivating, depressing, heartbreaking, lgbt cinema, poignant, crying, serious
Similar in 75%
Raise the Red Lantern (1991)
Plot Summary:
China in the 1920s. After her father's death, 19 year old Songlian is forced to marry the much older lord of a powerful family. With three wives already, each living in a separate house within the great castle, there is fierce competition for his attention and the privileges that are gained. This competition gets out of hand.
IMDB Rating: 8.1
IMDB Votes: 35000
Genere: Drama, Romance
Country: Hong Kong, China
Duration: 125 min
Plot tags: atmospheric, depressing, stylized, visually stunning, intense, serious, realistic, poignant, cerebral, independent film
Similar in 87%
The Emperor and the Assassin (1998)
Plot Summary:
In pre-unified China, the King of Qin sends his concubine to a rival kingdom to produce an assassin for a political plot, but as the king's cruelty mounts she finds her loyalty faltering.
IMDB Rating: 7.2
IMDB Votes: 6000
Genere: Drama, History, Romance
Country: China, France, Japan
Duration: 162 min
Plot tags: epic, thought provoking, heroic, serious, captivating, realistic, philosophical, atmospheric, sexy, clever
Similar in 75%
Curse of the Golden Flower (2006)
Plot Summary:
During China's Tang dynasty the emperor has taken the princess of a neighboring province as wife. She has borne him two sons and raised his eldest. Now his control over his dominion is complete, including the royal family itself.
IMDB Rating: 7.0
IMDB Votes: 46000
Genere: Action, Drama, Romance
Country: Hong Kong, China
Duration: 114 min
Plot tags: costume drama, visual, colorful, absurd, serious, captivating, visually stunning, stylized, action adventure, sexy
Similar in 83%
Chinese Box (1997)
Plot Summary:
The story of Hong Kong, from New Year's Day to June 30th, 1997, when the British left their colony and turned it over to the People's Republic of China.
IMDB Rating: 6.2
IMDB Votes: 4000
Genere: Drama, Romance
Country: France, Japan, USA
Duration: 99 min
Plot tags: atmospheric, independent film, sentimental, serious, realistic, contemplative, gloomy, philosophical, sexy, thought provoking
Similar in 89%
To Live (1994)
Plot Summary:
Fugui and Jiazhen endure tumultuous events in China as their personal fortunes move from wealthy landownership to peasantry.
IMDB Rating: 8.3
IMDB Votes: 20000
Genere: Drama, War
Country: Hong Kong, China
Duration: 133 min
Plot tags: epic, family saga, sad, touching, emotional, sincere, depressing, independent film, mind blowing, tense
Similar in 88%
You Are Not Alone (1978)
Plot Summary:
Young teenager Bo (Anders Agensø) is too sensitive for the hothouse atmosphere of a boarding school run by a cold, unfeeling would-be man of the cloth (an uncharacteristically grim Ove Sprogøe). Lonely and scared, he finds a soul mate in the headmaster's son (Peter Bjerg) and the two boys form a bond that slowly grows into a sexual relationship. Frank and unadorned, this Danish film concluded director Lasse Nielsen's youth-oriented trilogy that began with La' Os Være (1975) and continued with Måske Ku' Vi (1976). ~ Hans J. Wollstein, Rovi.
IMDB Rating: 7.1
IMDB Votes: 4000
Genere: Drama, Romance
Country: Denmark
Duration: 90 min
Plot tags: sentimental, touching, erotic, serious, realistic, sexy, art house, grindhouse, romantic drama, sexual
Similar in 79%
Dream Boy (2008)
Plot Summary:
The story of Nathan, a young teenager who tries to flourish in a romantic relationship with neighbour Roy. The two young men will have to face the brutal reality of the rural south of the United States in the late 1970s.
IMDB Rating: 6.2
IMDB Votes: 4000
Genere: Drama, Romance
Country: USA
Duration: 88 min
Plot tags: touching, sincere, sentimental, serious, realistic, lgbt cinema, sexy, gothic, art house, independent film
Similar in 75%
Maurice (1987)
Plot Summary:
In 1909, Maurice Hall (James Wilby) enters Cambridge, where he befriends wealthy Clive Durham (Hugh Grant). Clive confesses he is sexually attracted to Maurice, who realizes he is a homosexual when he begins to return Clive's feelings. The two embark on an intense but chaste affair to avoid tarnishing Clive's reputation, but eventually the relationship ends, and Clive marries Anne (Phoebe Nicholls). While visiting Clive, Maurice is drawn toward his friend's servant, Alec Scudder (Rupert Graves).
IMDB Rating: 7.6
IMDB Votes: 23000
Genere: Drama, Romance
Country: UK
Duration: 140 min
Plot tags: homoerotic, sexy, melancholic, scenic, costume drama, erotic, romantic, period piece, touching, lgbt cinema
Similar in 85%
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 85%
The Flowers of War (2011)
Plot Summary:
A Westerner finds refuge with a group of women in a church during Japan's rape of Nanking in 1937. Posing as a priest, he attempts to lead the women to safety.
IMDB Rating: 7.5
IMDB Votes: 55000
Genere: Drama, History, Romance, War
Country: China
Duration: 146 min
Plot tags: touching, emotional, realistic, harsh, visually stunning, brutal, sentimental, rough, bleak, serious
Similar in 88%
A Home at the End of the World (2004)
Plot Summary:
Three friends form a bond over the year, Johnathan is gay, Clare is straight and Bobby is neither, instead he loves the people he loves. As their lives go on there is tension and tears which culminate in a strong yet fragile friendship between the three.
IMDB Rating: 6.6
IMDB Votes: 14000
Genere: Drama, Romance
Country: USA
Duration: 97 min
Plot tags: emotional, touching, intense, sincere, erotic, sexual, depressing, romantic, cult classic, art house
Similar in 89%
Memoirs of a Geisha (2005)
Plot Summary:
A sweeping romantic epic set in Japan in the years before World War II, a penniless Japanese child is torn from her family to work as a maid in a geisha house.
IMDB Rating: 7.3
IMDB Votes: 158000
Genere: Drama, Romance
Country: USA, Japan, France
Duration: 145 min
Plot tags: romantic, sentimental, captivating, dramatic, stylized, serious, touching, emotional, atmospheric, costume drama