Best movies like Small Change
Last updated March 2024
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Plot Summary:
Various experiences of childhood are seen in several sequences that take place in the small town of Thiers, France. Vignettes include a boy's awakening interest in girls, couples double-dating at the movies, brothers giving their friend a haircut, a boy dealing with an abusive home life, a baby and a cat sitting by an open window, a child telling a dirty joke, and a boy who develops a crush on his friend's mother.
IMDB Rating: 7.6
IMDB Votes: 6000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: France
Duration: 104 min
Plot tags: existential, art house, aesthetic, sentimental, sincere, uplifting, touching, feel good, serious, realistic
Best tv shows and movies like Small Change (1976):
Similar in 84%
The Little Thief (1988)
Plot Summary:
In a small town in post-World-War-II France, an unhappy sixteen-year-old (Janine Castang) tries to escape her dreary situation by any means at her disposal. Three successive friends (Michel Davenne, a married lover; Raoul, a fellow thief; Mauricette Dargelos, a photographer and fellow prisoner) help her learn from her mistakes.
IMDB Rating: 6.8
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: France
Duration: 109 min
Plot tags: anthology, sentimental, touching, serious, realistic, intellectual, fake documentary
Similar in 90%
Monsieur Lazhar (2011)
Plot Summary:
During a harsh Montréal winter, an elementary-school class is left reeling after its teacher commits suicide. Bachir Lazhar, a charismatic Algerian immigrant, steps in as the substitute teacher for the classroom of traumatized children. All the while, he must keep his personal life tucked away: the fact that he is seeking political refuge in Québec – and that he, like the children, has suffered an appalling loss.
IMDB Rating: 7.5
IMDB Votes: 21000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: Canada
Duration: 95 min
Plot tags: touching, sincere, inspirational, compassionate, realistic, thought provoking, visually appealing, art house, serious, contemplative
Similar in 77%
Tricks (2007)
Plot Summary:
Six-year-old Stefek challenges fate. He believes that setting a chain of events in motion will help him get closer to his father who left his mother. His sister helps him bribe fate with small sacrifices, but things go wrong and then Stefek tries a very risky trick.
IMDB Rating: 7.0
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: Poland
Duration: 95 min
Plot tags: feel good, humorous, touching, realistic, semi serious, sentimental
Similar in 82%
My Life as a Dog (1985)
Plot Summary:
A boy, obsessed with comparing himself with those less fortunate, experiences a different life at the home of his aunt and uncle in 1959 Sweden.
IMDB Rating: 7.6
IMDB Votes: 22000
Genere: Drama, Comedy
Country: Sweden
Duration: 101 min
Plot tags: sentimental, touching, realistic, philosophical, existential, thought provoking, art house, cult classic, sincere, clever
Similar in 89%
Boats Out of Watermelon Rinds (2004)
Plot Summary:
In his award-winning debut feature film, director Ahmet Ulucay portrays the innocence of childhood and the lure of the cinema for two teens in a small Turkish village. Working for a watermelon seller by day, Remet spends his evenings trying to rebuild a film projector with his friend Mehmet. Both have big dreams to be famous film directors one day.
IMDB Rating: 7.8
IMDB Votes: 6000
Genere: Comedy, Drama, Family, Romance
Country: Turkey
Duration: 97 min
Plot tags: atmospheric, humorous, sentimental, sincere, semi serious, art house, islamic
Similar in 75%
S.W.A.L.K. (1971)
Plot Summary:
Two youngsters declare to their parents that they want to get married. Not sometime in the future but as soon as possible.
IMDB Rating: 7.6
IMDB Votes: 3000
Genere: Comedy, Drama, Romance
Country: UK
Duration: 103 min
Plot tags: offbeat, cult classic, teen, dark comedy, sincere, atmospheric, feel good, humorous, stylized, semi serious
Similar in 89%
The Art of Crying (2006)
Plot Summary:
Life is not easy for 11-year-old Allan living in South Jutland during the early 1970s. His mentally unstable father frequently threatens suicide and his mother has long since given up. It's up to Allan to keep the family together. When a rival family threatens his father's livelihood, Allan starts committing atrocious acts.
IMDB Rating: 7.3
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: Denmark
Duration: 107 min
Plot tags: serious, realistic, psychological, captivating, black comedy, cult classic, crying, cult film
Similar in 86%
Peppermint Soda (1977)
Plot Summary:
In the fall of 1963, Anne is becoming a teenager. She lives in Paris with her mother and her older sister, Frédérique. They're just back from summer at the beach with their father. School starts. A turbulent year awaits them both.
IMDB Rating: 7.0
IMDB Votes: 1000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: France
Duration: 101 min
Plot tags: cult classic, sentimental, sincere, touching, humorous, realistic, contemplative, semi serious, teen comedy, period drama
Similar in 78%
You'll Be a Man (2013)
Plot Summary:
Leo is 10 and wise beyond his years. A solitary dreamer who seeks refuge in books. When the carefree 20-year-old Theo steps into his life, it forces Leo out of his shell. Despite their age difference, the two becomes best friends, helping each other face up to their responsibilities.
IMDB Rating: 6.8
IMDB Votes: 111
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: France
Duration: 87 min
Plot tags: semi serious, sentimental, touching, realistic
Similar in 80%
Mumu (2010)
Plot Summary:
The story a rescue, the rescue of a bad brat's life in the post-WWII period. In 1947, Roger reaches 11 years old. He's a kid badly loved, mischievous and specializes in silly things to do. He is sent to a small boarding school in a small village. Mumu reigns over here. She's not the bitchest school teacher of the area. Roger has already been expelled from several schools and this is his last chance to avoid the reformatory his father has been promising him for a long time. But this is will change with the vigilance of Mumu, who, despite her strict aspects, proves herself to have a big heart.
IMDB Rating: 6.3
IMDB Votes: 241
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: France
Duration: 95 min
Plot tags: sentimental, touching, humorous, realistic, semi serious, light, sincere, captivating, crying
Similar in 77%
Viva Cuba (2005)
Plot Summary:
The friendship between two children is threatened by their parents’ differences. Malú is from a family that was upper-class before the Revolution and remains well-to-do through remittances from relatives overseas, and her single mother (Larisa Vega Alamar) does not want her to play with Jorgito, as she thinks his background coarse and commonplace. Jorgito’s mother (Luisa María Jiménez Rodríguez),.
IMDB Rating: 6.9
IMDB Votes: 1000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: France, Cuba
Duration: 92 min
Plot tags: touching, serious, realistic, sincere, road movie
Similar in 90%
Valentin (2002)
Plot Summary:
Valentin, a 9-year-old boy living with his grandmother in late-1960s Buenos Aires, believes his family has problems that only he can solve. The youngster dreams of being reunited with his mother, who's separated from Valentin's abusive father.
IMDB Rating: 7.5
IMDB Votes: 4000
Genere: Comedy, Drama, Romance
Country: Argentina, Netherlands, France, Spain, Italy
Duration: 86 min
Plot tags: sentimental, touching, sweet, uplifting, realistic, lyrical, sincere, hispanic, serious, crying
Similar in 79%
Boy (2010)
Plot Summary:
It's 1984, and Michael Jackson is king - even in Waihau Bay, New Zealand. Here we meet Boy, an 11-year-old who lives on a farm with his gran, a goat, and his younger brother, Rocky (who thinks he has magic powers). Shortly after Gran leaves for a week, Boy's father, Alamein, appears out of the blue. Having imagined a heroic version of his father during his absence, Boy comes face to face with the real version-an incompetent hoodlum who has returned to find a bag of money he buried years before. This is where the goat enters.
IMDB Rating: 7.5
IMDB Votes: 29000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: New Zealand
Duration: 87 min
Plot tags: touching, humorous, unusual plot structure, surreal, visually appealing, poignant, cult classic, emotional, atmospheric, fairy tale
Similar in 90%
Mickybo and Me (2004)
Plot Summary:
The film tells the story of two boys who become friends at the start of the Troubles in 1970. The boys share an obsession with Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, with the consequence that they run away to Australia.
IMDB Rating: 7.2
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: UK, France, Ireland
Duration: 95 min
Plot tags: sincere, sentimental, touching, semi serious, humorous, captivating, realistic
Similar in 90%
Stella (2008)
Plot Summary:
1977. Stella entre en sixième, dans un grand lycée parisien. Stella entre dans le monde... Un nouveau monde, à l'opposé de celui qu'elle connaît. Presque un miracle. Elle, elle vit dans un café, un café d'ouvrier, à la frontière de Paris. Cette rentrée va changer sa vie.
IMDB Rating: 7.2
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Drama
Country: France
Duration: 103 min
Plot tags: sentimental, semi serious, touching, humorous, realistic, teen
Similar in 76%
Abandoned (2001)
Plot Summary:
Áron is a happy child in his family. But at some point things take a different turn, and his mother starts to lose her health rapidly. As this happens, the man in charge decides what's best for Áron without consulting the young boy's opinion, and the boy finds himself thrown out of his warm home into an orphanage in the woods. He's utterly displeased by what's happening, without knowing he has yet to face much worse. After a hard time getting over the harrassment of his classmates and being accepted as one of them, another obstacle on the way to his peace of mind faces him: His obnoxious teachers. He has no intention of being bad, but it's beyond his ability to blend into the revolting place he's in. The nasty treatment of the teaching crew gets the better of him, and he's not all that calm and passive anymore. But that leads into unpleasant events which Áron himself wouldn't want.
IMDB Rating: 7.2
IMDB Votes: 610
Genere: Drama
Country: Hungary
Duration: 100 min
Plot tags: sincere, uplifting, touching, serious, art house, bleak, emotional, realistic
Similar in 82%
The Amazing Catfish (2013)
Plot Summary:
Young Claudia works in a supermarket where she promotes various types of products. One night, she ends up in the emergency room with severe appendicitis and meets Martha, a patient, laying in the bed next to hers.
IMDB Rating: 7.0
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: Mexico, France
Duration: 89 min
Plot tags: touching, semi serious, sentimental, humorous, realistic, social, art house, road movie, beautiful
Similar in 86%
Turning Green (2005)
Plot Summary:
Set in late 1970s Ireland, it tells the story of 16-year-old James Powers, an American who finds himself lost after his mother dies and he is forced to live with his three Irish aunts. Displaced and depressed, he longs for a way to make it back to America. One lucky weekend in London, James discovers pornography and, desperate for cash, he decides to sell them back in Ireland. His success spreads wildly. After finding a possible way home, he must decide where home really is, and finds that one's place in the world is all a state of mind.
IMDB Rating: 5.4
IMDB Votes: 480
Genere: Drama, Comedy
Country: USA, Ireland
Duration: 85 min
Plot tags: sincere, touching, realistic, humorous, semi serious, independent film
Similar in 90%
The Beautiful Person (2008)
Plot Summary:
In the wake of her mother's tragic death, French teenager Junie (Léa Seydoux) transfers to a different high school. Though Junie lives mostly inside her own head, her beauty and stoicism win her the attention of the entire male student population. Junie begins dating the gentle Otto Cleves (Grégoire Leprince-Ringuet), but finds herself intensely drawn to her youthful Italian language teacher, Nemours (Louis Garrel). When Nemours begins to reciprocate, serious complications ensue.
IMDB Rating: 6.6
IMDB Votes: 8000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: France
Duration: 97 min
Plot tags: sexual, psychological, touching, serious, emotional, melancholic, captivating, disturbing, sexy, art house
Similar in 77%
Jo's Boy (2011)
Plot Summary:
Grandson of a legendary rugby player, son of a legendary rugby player, and he himself a legendary rugby player, Jo Canavero raises his only son, Tom, in a small village in the Tarn region. To the great displeasure of Jo, thirteen-year-old Tom is as good at math as he is useless on the rugby field. For a Canavero, the legend can't stop there, even if it means setting up a rugby team specifically for Tom, despite the wishes of the whole village and of Tom himself.
IMDB Rating: 5.7
IMDB Votes: 608
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: France
Duration: 97 min
Plot tags: sentimental, touching, serious, captivating, realistic
Similar in 76%
The Dandelions (2012)
Plot Summary:
A young girl is frustrated by her over-protective mom. At school, she meets another fearless little girl that is going to have a big influence on her.
IMDB Rating: 6.7
IMDB Votes: 1000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: France
Duration: 89 min
Plot tags: touching, semi serious, humorous, realistic
Similar in 77%
Monsieur Ibrahim (2003)
Plot Summary:
Monsieur Ibrahim is a story about a young Jewish boy in Paris who meets an old Muslim Turkish grocery store owner. The film touches the themes of friendship and love as the old man is a father figure to the boy as he teaches him of the Koran. The film is based on a book of the popular book by the French author Eric-Emmanuel Schmitt.
IMDB Rating: 7.3
IMDB Votes: 12000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: France
Duration: 96 min
Plot tags: sentimental, touching, sweet, emotional, uplifting, feel good, atmospheric, serious, captivating, dramatic
Similar in 90%
The Party (1980)
Plot Summary:
Le Boum is the story of a 13-year-old French girl dealing with moving to a new city and school in Paris, while at the same time her parents are getting a divorce.
IMDB Rating: 6.7
IMDB Votes: 10000
Genere: Comedy, Drama, Romance
Country: France
Duration: 110 min
Plot tags: emotional, sentimental, semi serious, touching, humorous, feel good, realistic, light, romantic, sexy
Similar in 90%
Angus (1995)
Plot Summary:
Angus is a large, pathetic 14 year old whose thoughts are most often filled with the image of one Melissa Lefevre. Angus is shy and thinks that he has no chance of ever 'getting' her. Being especially uncool, he is incredibly surprised (along with the rest of the school) that he is chosen to dance with her at the Winter Ball. The only one not surprised is the cool-kid who set him up to fail, but Angus' best friend is going to help him win the heart of Melissa by developing a new look for him.
IMDB Rating: 6.7
IMDB Votes: 7000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: UK, France, Germany, USA
Duration: 90 min
Plot tags: feel good, light, sentimental, humorous, teen, touching, realistic, epic, semi serious, independent film
Similar in 83%
Murmur of the Heart (1971)
Plot Summary:
In the end of the first Indochina War, an open-minded teenage boy finds himself between the urge to discover love and the ever-present, dominating affection of his mother.
IMDB Rating: 7.6
IMDB Votes: 11000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: France, Italy, West Germany
Duration: 118 min
Plot tags: sexy, disturbing, touching, sentimental, controversial, erotic, art house, sex comedy, funny, inspirational
Similar in 84%
Treading Water (2013)
Plot Summary:
At first glance, Mica seems a perfectly normal boy. But first glances can often be deceiving... For one, Mica's house is now a museum honouring Guillermo Garibai, the legendary Mexican crooner. Mica spends most of his time there, giving guided tours to aging Garibai fans. But stranger still, Mica smells. He smells like fish. Numerous doctors, his life-long therapist and even his own parents are at a loss. No one wants to be Mica's friend. Girls won't talk to him. His life appears pointless, uneventful, doomed. That is, until Laura walks into it.
IMDB Rating: 6.0
IMDB Votes: 728
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: Mexico, Canada
Duration: 92 min
Plot tags: semi serious, touching, humorous, realistic, stylized, offbeat, vintage
Similar in 83%
Spud (2010)
Plot Summary:
It's South Africa 1990. Two major events are about to happen: The release of Nelson Mandela and, more importantly, it's Spud Milton's first year at an elite boys only private boarding school. John Milton is a boy from an ordinary background who wins a scholarship to a private school in Kwazulu-Natal, South Africa. Surrounded by boys with nicknames like Gecko, Rambo, Rain Man and Mad Dog, Spud has his hands full trying to adapt to his new home. Along the way Spud takes his first tentative steps along the path to manhood. (The path it seems could be a rather long road). Spud is an only child. He is cursed with parents from well beyond the lunatic fringe and a senile granny. His dad is a fervent anti-communist who is paranoid that the family domestic worker is running a shebeen from her room at the back of the family home. His mom is a free spirit and a teenager's worst nightmare, whether it's shopping for Spud's underwear in the local supermarket.
IMDB Rating: 6.6
IMDB Votes: 3000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: South Africa
Duration: 103 min
Plot tags: sentimental, sincere, realistic, feel good, parody, serious, emotional, independent film
Similar in 89%
You're My Hero (2003)
Plot Summary:
Thirteen-year-old Ramon is on the verge of many adolescent discoveries -- and the confusion that goes along with them. Shy and awkward, he's moved from town to town throughout his childhood and believes that life is about winning and losing. But he soon learns it's all about survival. Like Ramon, Spain is in transition (President Francisco Franco is about to die); it's a time of social upheaval marked by change, illusion and struggle.
IMDB Rating: 7.0
IMDB Votes: 382
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: Spain
Duration: 102 min
Plot tags: realistic, touching, semi serious, captivating, humorous
Similar in 90%
Rocket Science (2007)
Plot Summary:
Hal, a 15-year-old high-school student with a minor yet socially alienating (and painful) disability: he stutters uncontrollably. Determined to work through the problem, Hal opts for an extreme route he joins the school debating team, which sends him on a headfirst plunge into breakneck speech competitions and offers a much-needed boost toward correcting the problem.
IMDB Rating: 6.6
IMDB Votes: 14000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 101 min
Plot tags: clever, sincere, psychological, sentimental, touching, teen, indie film, realistic, funny, feel good
Similar in 82%
Welcome to the Dollhouse (1995)
Plot Summary:
An unattractive 7th grader struggles to cope with suburban life as the middle child with un-attentive parents and bullies at school.
IMDB Rating: 7.4
IMDB Votes: 37000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 88 min
Plot tags: dark comedy, disturbing, realistic, depressing, black comedy, brutal, controversial, cult classic, teen, talky