Best movies like Off the Map
Last updated March 2024
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Plot Summary:
An 11-year-old girl watches her father come down with a crippling depression. Over one summer, she learns answers to several mysteries and comes to terms with love and loss.
IMDB Rating: 7.1
IMDB Votes: 3000
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 108 min
Plot tags: stylized, intense, sincere, touching, atmospheric, emotional, realistic, semi serious, crying, spiritual
Best tv shows and movies like Off the Map (2003):
Similar in 76%
November Christmas (2010)
Plot Summary:
A young father asks for pumpkins at the local farm stand. "In August? No." the farmer replies. The farmer ruminates on the odd request and gets involved with strangers for the first time since his son's death long ago.
IMDB Rating: 7.5
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 96 min
Plot tags: emotional, sincere, serious, disturbing, sad, realistic
Similar in 76%
Local Color (2006)
Plot Summary:
A successful artist looks back with loving memories on the summer of his defining year, 1974. A talented but troubled 18-year-old aspiring artist befriends a brilliant elderly alcoholic painter who has turned his back on not only art but life. The two form what appears to be at first a tenuous relationship. The kid wants to learn all the secrets the master has locked away inside his head and heart. Time has not been kind to the old master. His life appears pointless to him until the kid rekindles his interest in his work and ultimately gives him the will to live. Together, they give one another a priceless gift. The kid learns to see the world through the master's eyes. And the master learns to see life through the eyes of innocence again. This story is based on a real life experience.
IMDB Rating: 6.8
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 107 min
Plot tags: sincere, touching, serious, realistic, emotional, contemplative, independent film
Similar in 80%
Tiger Eyes (2012)
Plot Summary:
After Davey's father is killed in a hold-up, she and her mother and younger brother visit relatives in New Mexico. Here Davey is befriended by a young man who helps her find the strength to carry on and conquer her fears.
IMDB Rating: 6.3
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 92 min
Plot tags: sincere, serious, emotional, realistic, touching
Similar in 89%
A Map of the World (1999)
Plot Summary:
School nurse Alice Goodwin lives with her husband and two daughters on a dairy farm in a small Wisconsin community. After an accident on her property involving a friend's child, the town turns against her and Alice finds herself fighting charges of child abuse.
IMDB Rating: 6.5
IMDB Votes: 5000
Genere: Drama
Country: USA, Germany
Duration: 125 min
Plot tags: black comedy, sincere, touching, serious, emotional, realistic, disturbing, contemplative, gloomy, crying
Similar in 88%
Fathers and Sons (2005)
Plot Summary:
Intertwined tales of three families who grow up on the same street, focusing on the relationship of fathers and sons. The first section features Anthony and Jenny and traces the father-son bond that develops between Anthony and his newborn son over 30 years. The second story centers on the affairs of an airline pilot who shares a house but not a life with his wife. He crosses paths with an unusual woman and spends an extraordinary night with his son. The final chapter follows the homecoming of Elliot to his estranged family. As his father dies, Elliot meets and falls in love with a woman who sees past his tough-guy exterior.
IMDB Rating: 5.9
IMDB Votes: 406
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 101 min
Plot tags: touching, realistic, serious, emotional, captivating, offbeat, crying, entertaining
Similar in 85%
Steal Me (2005)
Plot Summary:
Chasing his wayward mother to Montana, fifteen year old Jake finds the picture perfect Tucker family instead who photoshop him into their lives, despite his questionable past. Too bad Jake can not stop himself from stealing, being seduced by the sexy next door neighbor, courting the mother of the house, encouraging the son in his first love affair, and leading the neighborhood boys in an ever escalating series of pranks. A drama about stealing radios, cars, and hearts.
IMDB Rating: 5.8
IMDB Votes: 294
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 95 min
Plot tags: touching, serious, realistic, independent film, crying
Similar in 86%
Something Like Happiness (2005)
Plot Summary:
Over the course of a year, in a small town scarred and beaten down by industrialization, Tonda and Monika, friends since childhood, come to experience what life might be like if they could be with one another – which they seemingly can't. Or can they?.
IMDB Rating: 7.1
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Drama
Country: Czech Republic, Germany
Duration: 102 min
Plot tags: sentimental, sincere, touching, serious, emotional, realistic, humorous, ambiguous ending
Similar in 83%
Jess + Moss (2011)
Plot Summary:
Jess, age 18, and Moss, age 12 are second cousins in the dark-fire tobacco fields of rural Western Kentucky. Without immediate families that they can relate to, and lacking friends their own age, they only have each other. Over the course of a summer they venture on a journey exploring deep secrets and hopes of a future while being confronted with fears of isolation, abandonment and an unknown tomorrow.
IMDB Rating: 6.4
IMDB Votes: 980
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 83 min
Plot tags: atmospheric, realistic, contemplative, stylized, psychological, captivating, teen, aesthetic, sincere, touching
Similar in 81%
Around the Bend (2004)
Plot Summary:
A tale of four generations of men, all of whom have had their offspring at a young age: a great-grandfather, a grandfather, a father in his twenties and a son who is about 7 years old. When the oldest member passes away, the trio heads out on the road together in the Southwest to search out an old family secret that connects to their past.
IMDB Rating: 6.4
IMDB Votes: 4000
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 85 min
Plot tags: sentimental, touching, road movie, emotional, semi serious, humorous, family saga, realistic, crying, funny
Similar in 75%
Land (2021)
Plot Summary:
Edee, in the aftermath of an unfathomable event, finds herself unable to stay connected to the world she once knew and in the face of that uncertainty, retreats to the magnificent, but unforgiving, wilds of the Rockies. After a local hunter brings her back from the brink of death, she must find a way to live again.
IMDB Rating: 6.7
IMDB Votes: 15000
Genere: Adventure, Drama
Country: USA, Canada
Duration: 89 min
Plot tags: psychological, sincere, captivating, serious
Similar in 86%
Bodies, Rest & Motion (1993)
Plot Summary:
Rebelling against his dreary life in a small Arizona town, salesman Nick abandons his girlfriend, Beth, and strikes out onto the highway in search of... something else. Encouraged by her best friend, Carol, Beth reluctantly accepts the romantic attentions of Sid, a local housepainter.
IMDB Rating: 5.7
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 95 min
Plot tags: grindhouse, independent film, clever, touching, humorous, realistic, semi serious, philosophical, thought provoking, intellectual
Similar in 87%
Secrets of the Heart (1997)
Plot Summary:
Javi and his friend Carlos visit an old house on the outskirts of a small Spanish village. According to his brother Juan this is a haunted house and one can hear the voices of the dead. Later he is intrigued with a room which is always closed (the room where his father was found dead). He is so interested in these mysteries that he starts to investigate all the secrets of these dead people and their stories.
IMDB Rating: 7.0
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Drama
Country: Spain, France, Portugal
Duration: 105 min
Plot tags: emotional, sincere, touching, serious, realistic, crying
Similar in 82%
What Girls Learn (2001)
Plot Summary:
Two teenage girls must come to terms with their stepfather when their mother is struck by illness.
IMDB Rating: 5.8
IMDB Votes: 340
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 115 min
Plot tags: touching, sentimental, sincere, emotional, serious, realistic, contemplative, gloomy
Similar in 79%
Down in the Delta (1998)
Plot Summary:
Rosa Lynn sends her druggie daughter Loretta and her children Thomas and Tracy away from the big city to live with their uncle Earl in the ancestral home in rural Mississippi. Earl puts Loretta to work in his restaurant, Just Chicken, while also telling them about the generations of their family, the Sinclairs, dating back to their time in slavery before the the Civil War.
IMDB Rating: 6.9
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 112 min
Plot tags: touching, emotional, independent film, sentimental, sincere, serious, realistic, crying, clever, feel good
Similar in 76%
An American Rhapsody (2001)
Plot Summary:
A Hungarian family forced to flee the Communist country for the United States, must leave a young daughter behind. Six years later the family arranges to bring the absent daughter to the United States where she has trouble adjusting. The daughter then decides to travel to Budapest to discover her identity.
IMDB Rating: 6.8
IMDB Votes: 5000
Genere: Drama
Country: USA, Hungary
Duration: 106 min
Plot tags: sentimental, touching, emotional, melancholic, heartbreaking, stylized, sincere, realistic, contemplative, serious
Similar in 84%
12 and Holding (2005)
Plot Summary:
Three pre-adolescents with virginal and eager-of-signals naivety, hit headlong against monstrous and inhospitable loneliness, in the incandescent fire among the ashes of their own inocence.
IMDB Rating: 7.4
IMDB Votes: 7000
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 95 min
Plot tags: touching, realistic, emotional, heartbreaking, sad, sentimental, serious, depressing, harsh, art house
Similar in 82%
Tully (2000)
Plot Summary:
Tully Jr. and Earl live on their father's Nebraska ranch, proud and independent to a fault. While the shy, reclusive Earl spends his free time watching movies, the cockier Tully works his way through a succession of short-term affairs and an off-again, on-again relationship with April, a stripper in town. When their childhood friend Ella returns to town to start a veterinary practice, however, Tully falls for her -- although the townsfolk have their doubts that he could ever commit to one woman.
IMDB Rating: 7.3
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 102 min
Plot tags: emotional, sentimental, touching, serious, independent film, realistic, romantic, social, sincere, thought provoking
Similar in 86%
What Maisie Knew (2012)
Plot Summary:
Based on the Henry James novella, the story frames on 7-year-old Maisie, caught in a custody battle between her mother – a rock and roll icon – and her father. What Maisie Knew is an evocative portrayal of the chaos of adult life seen entirely from a child’s point of view.
IMDB Rating: 7.4
IMDB Votes: 28000
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 99 min
Plot tags: touching, emotional, sad, atmospheric, talky, sincere, captivating, serious, depressing, melancholic
Similar in 82%
The Substance of Fire (1996)
Plot Summary:
Isaac Geldhart is a Holocaust survivor who, overcome by grief at the recent death of his wife, seems determined to run his publishing firm into the ground by printing books that have no hope of financial success. His son Aaron, who also works at the company, grows frustrated with Isaac's emotional decline and attempts to take over the firm. The resulting crisis involves Isaac's other two children, his daughter Sarah and his dying son Martin.
IMDB Rating: 6.1
IMDB Votes: 667
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 97 min
Plot tags: melancholic, talky, touching, serious, emotional, realistic, independent film, contemplative, gloomy, sexy
Similar in 77%
Behind the Red Door (2003)
Plot Summary:
Set in New York and New England (but filmed in Newfoundland), Behind the Red Door stars Kyra Sedgwick as Manhattan-based photographer Natalie Haddad, who enjoys success with her strangely gloomy and foreboding camerawork. When her agent and best friend Julia (Stockard Channing) arranges for her to accept a lucrative contract with a Boston ad agency, Natalie discovers that she will be working for her own gay brother Roy (Kiefer Sutherland), whom she hasn't seen in a decade. Although Roy is insufferably snobbish and manipulative, he manages to exert a curious control over Natalie, forcing her to confront several disturbing, long-suppressed memories of her past (shown in black-and-white flashbacks). Before the film is over, Natalie is made to realize why Roy's behavior is so overbearing -- and also, the viewer learns just how intimately Julia is involved in the lives of both siblings.
IMDB Rating: 6.4
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 105 min
Plot tags: psychological, sincere, touching, serious, realistic
Similar in 88%
Echo Park LA (2006)
Plot Summary:
As Magdalena's 15th birthday approaches, her simple, blissful life is complicated by the discovery that she's pregnant. Kicked out of her house, she finds a new family with her great-granduncle and gay cousin.
IMDB Rating: 7.0
IMDB Votes: 4000
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 90 min
Plot tags: touching, melancholic, sentimental, realistic, emotional, humorous, semi serious, crying, hispanic, novela
Similar in 81%
A River Runs Through It (1992)
Plot Summary:
A River Runs Through is a cinematographically stunning true story of Norman Maclean. The story follows Norman and his brother Paul through the experiences of life and growing up, and how their love of fly fishing keeps them together despite varying life circumstances in the untamed west of Montana in the 1920's.
IMDB Rating: 7.2
IMDB Votes: 64000
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 123 min
Plot tags: touching, emotional, sentimental, melancholic, intense, tense, atmospheric, serious, captivating, realistic
Similar in 88%
The Keys to the House (2004)
Plot Summary:
Meeting his handicapped son for the first time, a young father attempts to forge a relationship with the teenager.
IMDB Rating: 7.1
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Drama
Country: Italy, Germany, France, USA
Duration: 111 min
Plot tags: psychological, serious, touching, emotional, sincere, bleak, realistic, contemplative, gloomy, crying
Similar in 76%
The Ice Storm (1997)
Plot Summary:
In the weekend after thanksgiving 1973 the Hoods are skidding out of control. Benjamin Hood reels from drink to drink, trying not to think about his trouble at the office. His wife, Elena, is reading self help books and losing patience with her husband's lies. Their son, Paul, home for the holidays, escapes to the city to pursue an alluring rich girl from his prep school. Young, budding nymphomaniac, Wendy Hood roams the neighborhood, innocently exploring liquor cabinets and lingerie drawers of her friends' parents, looking for something new. Then an ice storm hits, the worst in a century.
IMDB Rating: 7.3
IMDB Votes: 59000
Genere: Drama
Country: USA, France
Duration: 112 min
Plot tags: depressing, realistic, intense, visually appealing, existential, cerebral, visual, bleak, emotional, gloomy
Similar in 88%
Phoebe in Wonderland (2008)
Plot Summary:
The fantastical tale of a little girl who won't - or can't - follow the rules. Confounded by her clashes with the rule-obsessed world around her, Phoebe seeks enlightenment from her unconventional drama teacher, even as her brilliant but anguished mother looks to Phoebe herself for inspiration.
IMDB Rating: 7.0
IMDB Votes: 8000
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 96 min
Plot tags: psychological, touching, emotional, sincere, sad, uplifting, thought provoking, depressing, spiritual, atmospheric
Similar in 87%
Canvas (2006)
Plot Summary:
A woman's schizophrenia affects her relationships with her husband and son.
IMDB Rating: 6.5
IMDB Votes: 1000
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 101 min
Plot tags: touching, serious, realistic, sentimental, sincere, rough, melancholic, psychological
Similar in 85%
Jack (2004)
Plot Summary:
Jack, in full puberty, not only has to deal with his parents' divorce, but also feels his world is falling apart when his dad tells him he is living with a man. He slowly comes to terms with his own feelings when the girl he has a crush on turn out to have a gay dad as well and his best friend's parents end up not having the perfect marriage Jack thought they had.
IMDB Rating: 6.6
IMDB Votes: 576
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 104 min
Plot tags: sentimental, humorous, realistic, sincere, touching, emotional, semi serious, melancholic, clever, queer cinema
Similar in 76%
The Perks of Being a Wallflower (2012)
Plot Summary:
A coming-of-age story based on the best-selling novel by Stephen Chbosky, which follows 15-year-old freshman Charlie, an endearing and naive outsider who is taken under the wings of two seniors. A moving tale of love, loss, fear and hope - and the unforgettable friends that help us through life.
IMDB Rating: 7.9
IMDB Votes: 539000
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 103 min
Plot tags: touching, sincere, teen, melancholic, romantic, emotional, realistic, feel good, heartbreaking, independent film
Similar in 90%
The Spitfire Grill (1996)
Plot Summary:
Percy, upon being released from prison, goes to the small town of Gillead, to find a place where she can start over again. She is taken in by Hannah, to help out at her place, the Spitfire Grill. Percy brings change to the small town, stirring resentment and fear in some, and growth in others.
IMDB Rating: 7.0
IMDB Votes: 7000
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 117 min
Plot tags: christian film, sentimental, touching, emotional, serious, realistic, gloomy, crying, tear jerker, inspirational
Similar in 90%
White Oleander (2002)
Plot Summary:
A teenager journeys through a series of foster homes after her mother goes to prison for committing a crime of passion.
IMDB Rating: 7.1
IMDB Votes: 34000
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 109 min
Plot tags: emotional, intense, touching, disturbing, serious, realistic, erotic, sentimental, gothic, social