Best movies like The Bird People in China
Last updated March 2024
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Plot Summary:
Wada (Masahiro Motoki), a salary man, is enlisted to venture off to China to investigate a potential Jade mine. After his arrival, Wada encounters a violent, yet sentimental, yakuza (Renji Ishibashi), who takes the liberty of joining his adventure through China. Led on their long and disastrous journey to the mine by Shen, the three men come across something even more magical and enticing.
IMDB Rating: 7.4
IMDB Votes: 5000
Genere: Adventure, Comedy, Drama, Fantasy
Country: Japan
Duration: 118 min
Plot tags: mesmerizing, offbeat, humorous, semi serious, weird, bizarre
Best tv shows and movies like The Bird People in China (1998):
Similar in 87%
Adrenaline Drive (1999)
Plot Summary:
A gas leak explosion at a yakuza hideout provides a shy nurse and a rental car clerk with the opportunity to take a briefcase full of money. A cross-country chase ensues.
IMDB Rating: 6.9
IMDB Votes: 951
Genere: Comedy
Country: Japan
Duration: 112 min
Plot tags: dark comedy, road movie, offbeat, humorous, realistic, stylized, semi serious
Similar in 88%
The Last Days of the World (2011)
Plot Summary:
The life of a student named Kanou is transformed when a tiny man informs him that Earth will soon be annihilated. Kanou decides to do just as he pleases with the time he has left, leading to strange adventures that could be real -- or just a dream.
IMDB Rating: 5.6
IMDB Votes: 113
Genere: Comedy, Drama, Fantasy
Country: Japan
Duration: 96 min
Plot tags: atmospheric, humorous, semi serious, road movie, mind bending, offbeat
Similar in 85%
Citizen Dog (2004)
Plot Summary:
Follow the life of Pod as he moves to Bangkok from the country. Pod's new life starts with getting a job, loosing a finger and dreaming about a girl. A movie were nothing is impossible, and just because you get killed by raining red helmets doesnt mean you have to stop driving motorcycle taxi.
IMDB Rating: 7.3
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Comedy, Fantasy, Romance
Country: Thailand
Duration: 100 min
Plot tags: surreal, feel good, humorous, semi serious, sad, art film, offbeat, weird
Similar in 86%
Samurai Fiction (1998)
Plot Summary:
Three centuries ago, a precious sword has been stolen by Kazamatsuri -- the sword, which historic and symbolic value is priceless for the clan (Shogun Tokugawa donated it to clan 80 years before that, at the same time that he established them as the local rulers). Lord's counselor's young son Heishiro goes to retrieve the sword himself to protect the clan from the shame or possible demise. He is accompanied with two friends, Shintaro and Tadasuke, and followed by the ninjas of the clan. After Kazamatsuri wounds Heishiro and kills one of his friends, the young aristocrat still wants revenge more than sword itself, but meanwhile have to recover from his wounds, in the small forest house of a lonely samurai and his daughter. At the same time, Kamazatsuri stays in nearby town in the entertainment center run by Okatsu and falls into her. The older samurai tries to dissuade Heishiro from fighting with Kamazatsuri, but is himself gradually drawn into the conflict.
IMDB Rating: 7.2
IMDB Votes: 3000
Genere: Action, Adventure, Comedy
Country: Japan
Duration: 111 min
Plot tags: stylized, psychological, exciting, offbeat, humorous, semi serious, spoof, parody, light, atmospheric
Similar in 75%
Glory to the Filmmaker! (2007)
Plot Summary:
Takeshi Kitano plays a version of himself in which he's a struggling director cycling through a number of different genres in an effort to complete his latest project.
IMDB Rating: 6.3
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: Japan
Duration: 108 min
Plot tags: humorous, semi serious, exciting, captivating, surreal, offbeat, weird
Similar in 90%
Sweet Rain: Accuracy of Death (2008)
Plot Summary:
Chiba appears seven days before a person dies an unexpected death. His job is to observe the person for seven days then decide either to ‘execute’ or ‘pass over’. Today, again, in the rain, he waits. His subject, her death due in seven days, is Kazue Fujiki. She works for a manufacturing company in the complaints department. Exhausted after her day, she emerges from her office. It’s time for the Reaper to go to work.
IMDB Rating: 6.8
IMDB Votes: 1000
Genere: Comedy, Drama, Fantasy
Country: Japan
Duration: 113 min
Plot tags: humorous, semi serious, captivating, stylized, offbeat
Similar in 85%
Hana (2006)
Plot Summary:
In a poor district of Edo lives a young samurai named Soza. He has been sent by his clan to avenge the death of his father. He isn't an accomplished swordsman however, and he prefers sharing the life of the residents, teaching the kids how to write etc. When he finally finds the man he is looking for, he will have to decide whether he follows the way of the samurai or chooses peace and reconciliation.
IMDB Rating: 6.6
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: Japan
Duration: 127 min
Plot tags: atmospheric, serious, captivating, humorous
Similar in 88%
The Voice of the Moon (1990)
Plot Summary:
Returning to themes he first explored in La strada (1954), Fellini crafts a parable on the whisperings of the soul that only madmen and vagabonds are capable of hearing. The odd couple, Ivo Salvini (Benigni), a fake inspector of wells, and Gonnella (Villaggio), a former prefect, wander through the Emilia-Romagna countryside of Fellini's childhood and discover a dystopia of television commercials, fascism, beauty pageants, rock music, Catholicism, and pagan ritual.
IMDB Rating: 6.3
IMDB Votes: 3000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: Italy, France
Duration: 126 min
Plot tags: postmodern, offbeat, humorous, surreal, stylized, semi serious
Similar in 90%
Takeshis' (2005)
Plot Summary:
Beat Takeshi lives the busy and sometimes surreal life of a showbiz celebrity. One day he meets his blond lookalike named Kitano, a shy convenience store cashier, who, still an unknown actor, is waiting for his big break. After their paths cross, Kitano seems to begin hallucinating about becoming Beat.
IMDB Rating: 6.3
IMDB Votes: 4000
Genere: Comedy, Drama, Fantasy
Country: Japan
Duration: 108 min
Plot tags: surreal, stylized, semi serious, mind bending, psychedelic, offbeat, non-linear, postmodern
Similar in 89%
Gemini (1999)
Plot Summary:
A successful doctor, Yukio's picture perfect life is gradually wrecked, and taken over by his avenging twin brother, who bumps off his family members one by one and reclaims his lover who is now Yukio's wife.
IMDB Rating: 6.8
IMDB Votes: 3000
Genere: Drama, Fantasy, Horror, Mystery, Thriller
Country: Japan
Duration: 84 min
Plot tags: psychedelic, disturbing, controversial, mind blowing, scary, psychological, tense, atmospheric, mind bending, serious
Similar in 87%
Yaji & Kita: The Midnight Pilgrims (2005)
Plot Summary:
A re-imagining of the classic Japanese comedy "Yaji and Kita's Travel Journey", this is the story of two samurai in Edo period Japan who are in love. One is married, the other is a drug addict. They decide to go on a trip to Ise Sanctuary, where it is presumed everything will be made right. What happens once they get on the road is as wild and wacky as anything your likely to see.
IMDB Rating: 6.5
IMDB Votes: 454
Genere: Comedy, Fantasy
Country: Japan
Duration: 124 min
Plot tags: humorous, surreal, not serious, captivating, mind bending, offbeat
Similar in 88%
Zatoichi in Desperation (1972)
Plot Summary:
Zatoichi tries to save a maiden in distress in this sequel to the popular series about a blind samurai swordsman who moonlights as a masseur. Always fighting for the underdog, noble Zatoichi sets out to keep a girl from becoming a prostitute. But he makes enemies despite his good intentions and must fight off thugs, warriors and the girl's boyfriend.
IMDB Rating: 6.8
IMDB Votes: 1000
Genere: Action, Adventure, Drama
Country: Japan
Duration: 95 min
Plot tags: grindhouse, cult classic, scary, atmospheric, saga, semi serious, cult film
Similar in 90%
The Story of Qiu Ju (1992)
Plot Summary:
The Story of Qiu Ju is a 1992 Chinese comedy-drama film. The film was directed by Zhang Yimou and, as in many of his films, stars Gong Li in the title role. The screenplay is an adaption of Chen Yuanbin's novella The Wan Family's Lawsuit. The film tells the story of a peasant woman, Qiu Ju, who lives in a rural area of China. When her husband is kicked in the groin by the village head, Qiu Ju, despite her pregnancy, travels to a nearby town, and later a big city to deal with its bureaucrats and find justice.
IMDB Rating: 7.6
IMDB Votes: 7000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: China, Hong Kong
Duration: 100 min
Plot tags: realistic, sincere, clever, touching, serious, surprise ending, tense, light, road movie, atmospheric
Similar in 86%
Moon Father (1999)
Plot Summary:
The unborn child of Mamlakat is telling her story. She is 17, beautiful and vivacious, and dreaming secretly of becoming an actress. She lives with her father and brother in a small village in Central Asia. One night she is seduced by an actor from a travelling troupe, who poses as a friend of Tom Cruise, and makes her pregnant. She tries to abort, but her father and brother become determined to find the seducer, setting in motion a cascade of comic adventures.
IMDB Rating: 7.2
IMDB Votes: 3000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: Germany, Austria, Russia, France, Japan, Tajikistan, Switzerland, Uzbekistan
Duration: 107 min
Plot tags: independent film, mesmerizing, touching, offbeat, humorous, captivating, surreal, semi serious, road movie, tragic
Similar in 75%
The Matsugane Potshot Affair (2006)
Plot Summary:
When a gold ingot and a severed human head are discovered in a small provincial town, the rush to solve the curious case wavers between tragic and darkly humorous.
IMDB Rating: 6.0
IMDB Votes: 235
Genere: Comedy, Crime, Drama
Country: Japan
Duration: 112 min
Plot tags: humorous, semi serious, captivating, offbeat, realistic
Similar in 90%
Scabbard Samurai (2010)
Plot Summary:
Nomi Kanjuro (Takaaki Nomi) is a master less samurai on the run after throwing away his sword for good. He has with him his headstrong 9-year-old daughter Tae (Sea Kumada). A bounty is soon placed on Nomi Kanjuro and 3 assassins go after the score. When Nomi Kanjuro is eventually captured and placed in front of the local feudal lord (Jun Kunimura) he is given a choice. A boy prince has been grieving ever since the death of his mother. Nobody has been able to make the boy smile. Nomi can attempt to make the boy smile within 30 days or he must commit seppuku (suicide).
IMDB Rating: 6.8
IMDB Votes: 1000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: Japan
Duration: 103 min
Plot tags: sentimental, touching, feel good, semi serious, jidai geki, fairy tale, sincere, offbeat, humorous, realistic
Similar in 90%
The Pornographers (1966)
Plot Summary:
Subu makes pornographic films. He sees nothing wrong with it. They are an aid to a repressed society, and he uses the money to support his landlady, Haru, and her family. From time to time, Haru shares her bed with Subu, though she believes her dead husband, reincarnated as a carp, disapproves. Director Shohei Imamura has always delighted in the kinky exploits of lowlifes, and in this 1966 classic, he finds subversive humor in the bizarre dynamics of Haru, her Oedipal son, and her daughter, the true object of her pornographer-boyfriend’s obsession. Imamura’s comic treatment of such taboos as voyeurism and incest sparked controversy when the film was released, but The Pornographers has outlasted its critics, and now seems frankly ahead of its time.
IMDB Rating: 7.2
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: Japan
Duration: 128 min
Plot tags: surreal, dark comedy, erotic, mind bending, psychedelic, cult classic, erotic drama, clever, offbeat, humorous
Similar in 79%
Chasuke's Journey (2015)
Plot Summary:
Things are hectic in heaven. Dozens of scribes sit before a long scroll incessantly scribbling away. They are composing the biographies of earth-dwellers. What is invented by the men in heaven is lived out below. And their employer, God, is increasingly vehement in demanding avant-garde ideas. Take, for example, the beautiful Yuri, a girl who dies in a car crash. Some of the heavenly scribes find this very dull and send former gangster Chas, who has become a heavenly tea-boy, back down to earth with instructions to save Yuri no matter what. And so Chas ends up in Okinawa, gets to know the earth-dwellers, interferes in their fates, becomes celebrated as 'Mr Angel' and is hounded by brutal enemies. His falling in love with Yuri is of course a foregone conclusion. But no one could anticipate what happens next. Not even God himself.
IMDB Rating: 6.0
IMDB Votes: 297
Genere: Action, Comedy, Fantasy
Country: Japan
Duration: 106 min
Plot tags: humorous, semi serious, light, captivating, romantic, offbeat
Similar in 82%
Homeland (2014)
Plot Summary:
When Jiro Sawada was a sophomore in high school he was framed for something he did not do. Afterwards, he left his hometown in a small village in Fukushima Prefecture. After the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami, Jiro Sawada goes back to his hometown, when nobody is able to live there, and begins to live there again. His separated family begin to reunite.
IMDB Rating: 6.9
IMDB Votes: 108
Genere: Drama
Country: Japan
Duration: 118 min
Plot tags: touching, atmospheric, serious, emotional, realistic, gloomy
Similar in 82%
The Family Game (1983)
Plot Summary:
A sendup of the stereo-typical Japanese family: dad is a salaryman jerk, unable to relate to anyone; mom is a hopeless housewife; the older son is a moderate academic success; but the younger son is a rebellious goof-off for whom a tutor must be hired. The tutor, played by the prototypical bad-boy actor Matsuda Yusaku, proceeds to blow the entire family apart.
IMDB Rating: 7.2
IMDB Votes: 1000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: Japan
Duration: 107 min
Plot tags: sentimental, clever, humorous, realistic, witty, semi serious, biting, suspense
Similar in 78%
A Chinese Odyssey Part One: Pandora's Box (1995)
Plot Summary:
Fantasy adventure about the arrival of Buddhism in China. When the Goddess of Happiness tosses the Longevity Monk and his disciples out of heaven (because the Monkey King tried to attain immortality), the Monkey King is reincarnated as the Joker. He now spends his time chasing two jealous women. When one of them is dying, the Joker goes back in time in an attempt to save her.
IMDB Rating: 7.5
IMDB Votes: 8000
Genere: Action, Adventure, Comedy, Drama, Fantasy
Country: Hong Kong, China
Duration: 87 min
Plot tags: stylized, exciting, offbeat, humorous, semi serious, spoof, parody, fun
Similar in 88%
A Chinese Odyssey Part Two: Cinderella (1995)
Plot Summary:
This sequel to "Pandora's Box" continues director Jeffrey Lau's adaptation of the Buddhism saga "Journey to the West". Stranded five centuries in the past, Joker Monkey King must battle a variety of monsters, seductive women and super-powered villains to save the dying Pak Jing-Jing.
IMDB Rating: 7.8
IMDB Votes: 8000
Genere: Action, Adventure, Comedy, Drama, Fantasy, Romance
Country: Hong Kong, China
Duration: 98 min
Plot tags: dorama, exciting, offbeat, epic, serious, stylized, semi serious, spoof, parody, campy
Similar in 84%
Kikujiro (1999)
Plot Summary:
Brash, loudmouthed and opportunistic, Kikujiro is the unlikely companion for Masao who is determined to see the mother he has never met. The two begin a series of adventures which soon turns out to be a whimsical journey of laughter and tears with a wide array of surprises and unique characters along the way.
IMDB Rating: 7.7
IMDB Votes: 22000
Genere: Drama, Comedy
Country: Japan
Duration: 122 min
Plot tags: road movie, sad, uplifting, touching, surreal, stylized, emotional, social, contemplative, art house
Similar in 88%
Slaves of New York (1989)
Plot Summary:
Meet the denizens of New York City: artists, prostitutes, saints, and seers. All are aspiring toward either fame or oblivion, and hoping for love and acceptance. Instead they find high rents, faithless partners, and dead-end careers.
IMDB Rating: 5.7
IMDB Votes: 1000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 124 min
Plot tags: ironic, sentimental, humorous, psychological, captivating, touching, offbeat, realistic, experimental, witty
Similar in 86%
Rubin and Ed (1991)
Plot Summary:
Reclusive Rubin Farr teams up with vocal but unsuccessful multi-level salesman Ed Tuttle on a quest to bury Rubin's dead cat in the "perfect spot." Their trip takes them across Utah's desert where they have run-ins with Ed'd ex-wife Rula and an elusive Andy Warhol critic.
IMDB Rating: 7.0
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: UK
Duration: 82 min
Plot tags: road movie, dark comedy, cult classic, surreal, psychotronic, indie film, buddy comedy, offbeat, feel good, humorous
Similar in 83%
Round Ireland with a Fridge (2010)
Plot Summary:
The movie tells the story of a disillusioned television personality whose career has stalled and who is looking for answers but doesn't know the questions. When his best friend taunts him for losing his sense of adventure Tony accepts a drunken £100 bet and sets off with his unconventional traveling companion for an adventure that proved to be entertaining, educational, challenging and at times downright silly.
IMDB Rating: 5.4
IMDB Votes: 491
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: UK
Duration: 89 min
Plot tags: humorous, semi serious, feel good, captivating, light, entertaining, independent film, touching, offbeat, realistic
Similar in 75%
A Pigeon Sat on a Branch Reflecting on Existence (2014)
Plot Summary:
An absurdist, surrealistic and shocking pitch-black comedy, which moves freely from nightmare to fantasy to hilariously deadpan humour as it muses on man’s perpetual inhumanity to man.
IMDB Rating: 6.9
IMDB Votes: 19000
Genere: Comedy, Drama, Fantasy
Country: Sweden, Germany, Norway, France, Denmark
Duration: 101 min
Plot tags: surreal, realistic, talky, lyrical, dark comedy, humorous, philosophical, semi serious, absurd, art house
Similar in 81%
Warm Water Under a Red Bridge (2001)
Plot Summary:
A newly unemployed salaryman meets a particularly sexual woman.
IMDB Rating: 6.7
IMDB Votes: 3000
Genere: Comedy, Drama, Fantasy, Romance
Country: Japan, France
Duration: 119 min
Plot tags: surreal, sexy, erotic, sentimental, sincere, touching, contemplative, art house, humorous, romantic
Similar in 83%
I Don't Have Many Friends (2014)
Plot Summary:
Second year high school student Kodaka Hasegawa has transferred to his new school about a month ago, but he still hasn't made any friends. Kodaka Hasegawa was born from a Japanese father and a British mother. Because of his appearance, people think Kodaka Hasegawa is a troubled kid. One day, Kodaka Hasegawa sees classmate Yozora Mikazuki pleasantly talking to herself. Kodaka Hasegawa talks with her about how to make friends. To make friends, Yozora Mikazuki decides to form the Neighbor's Club and forces Kodaka to enroll in the club.
IMDB Rating: 5.2
IMDB Votes: 146
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: Japan
Duration: 114 min
Plot tags: humorous, semi serious, captivating, entertaining, touching, offbeat, realistic, stylized, manga
Similar in 90%
Interstate 60 (2002)
Plot Summary:
An aspiring painter meets various characters and learns valuable lessons while traveling across America.
IMDB Rating: 7.6
IMDB Votes: 36000
Genere: Adventure, Comedy, Drama, Fantasy
Country: Canada, USA
Duration: 116 min
Plot tags: road movie, surreal, witty, enigmatic, offbeat, independent film, mindfuck, psychological, black comedy, dark comedy