Best movies like The Shadow Box
Last updated March 2024
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Plot Summary:
Over the course of a day in a California hospice, three terminally ill patients are observed with their families reflecting on life and death. Adapted for television from the award-winning play by Michael Cristofer.
IMDB Rating: 6.5
IMDB Votes: 232
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 96 min
Plot tags:
Best tv shows and movies like The Shadow Box (1980):
Similar in 78%
Money Buys Happiness (1999)
Plot Summary:
A man and a woman, unpleasant bickering nitwits both, push a big stupid metaphor (in the shape of a piano) across Seattle.
IMDB Rating: 5.9
IMDB Votes: 39
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 109 min
Plot tags: spiritual
Similar in 87%
Death of a Salesman (1966)
Plot Summary:
Adaptation of Arthur Miller's play.
IMDB Rating: 7.9
IMDB Votes: 662
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 100 min
Plot tags:
Similar in 90%
Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (1976)
Plot Summary:
The story of conflicts, power plays and secrets in a wealthy Mississippi family.
IMDB Rating: 7.0
IMDB Votes: 345
Genere: Drama
Country: UK
Duration: 100 min
Plot tags: southern gothic
Similar in 79%
She Lives! (1973)
Plot Summary:
A young couple searches for the cure for the girl's terminal illness.
IMDB Rating: 6.9
IMDB Votes: 132
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 74 min
Plot tags:
Similar in 84%
The Last Passport (2009)
Plot Summary:
THE LAST PASSPORT takes place in a passport office...or so you think. George Miller is a 70 year old man who through a variety of encounters, takes us on a journey through his mysterious past to show us we are not all that different.
IMDB Rating: 7.9
IMDB Votes: 99
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 89 min
Plot tags: independent film
Similar in 75%
All the Way Home (1981)
Plot Summary:
A wife and mother in 1915 Tennessee copes with the loss of her husband and the necessity of raising their children alone.
IMDB Rating: 7.3
IMDB Votes: 105
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 120 min
Plot tags:
Similar in 83%
Generational Sins (2017)
Plot Summary:
A dying mother, Sarah, tells her last wish to her eldest son, Drew, that he take his younger brother, Will, to the place they were born. Despite tragic family history, hope gives promise to the future.
IMDB Rating: 5.6
IMDB Votes: 3000
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 90 min
Plot tags: independent film
Similar in 79%
Endings (2010)
Plot Summary:
Emmy Ferguson is a 10-year old who learns that, after a long bout with leukemia, today is probably her last day on earth. Chris Ryan is a 35-year-old drug addict who is determined to make this his last day. And Adonna Frost, suffering from advanced breast cancer, has made a similar decision about the end of her life. They are all strangers to each other, but as Emmy embarks on a strange journey, and as the day's events bring these three dying people together, through Emmy's unique point of view, their lives are changed forever.
IMDB Rating: 6.8
IMDB Votes: 30
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 97 min
Plot tags: independent film
Similar in 78%
Suicide Service (2017)
Plot Summary:
The motivations of two men running an illegal assisted suicide service to help relieve suffering change with the the appearance of two very different women in their lives.
IMDB Rating: 7.5
IMDB Votes: 49
Genere: Drama
Country: Norway
Duration: 109 min
Plot tags: neo noir
Similar in 90%
Who Will Love My Children? (1983)
Plot Summary:
Based on a true story of Iowa farm wife Lucile Fray. Ann-Margret plays a dying mother of ten whose last wish is to find loving families for her children.
IMDB Rating: 7.3
IMDB Votes: 629
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 95 min
Plot tags: depressing
Similar in 85%
The Blackwater Lightship (2004)
Plot Summary:
A man in the final stages of AIDS is cared for by his sister and mother and grandmother.
IMDB Rating: 6.8
IMDB Votes: 384
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 120 min
Plot tags:
Similar in 82%
The Books of John (2007)
Plot Summary:
"The Books Of John" is a movie that follows the lives of three different people, Frank McLean, Will and Caryn. Frank finds himself alone after losing his longtime partner suddenly and without warning. Months later he finds that his partner had been keeping secret diaries. With the information in the diaries, Frank delves into his lover's past in an attempt to get to know more about the man that he never really knew. Will is a party boy who is a friend of Frank and Frank's late lover John.
IMDB Rating: 3.8
IMDB Votes: 121
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 89 min
Plot tags: independent film, queer cinema
Similar in 80%
Umbrella (2016)
Plot Summary:
Alexander Way, a secondary school teacher with a fractured personal life, finds himself attempting to rescue a woman from a violent sexual attack. Alexander finds himself overpowered, beaten & taken to hospital. Jesiah Jarvus, a famous British musician who is frequently touring, has lost his goal in life. Having not spoken with his father in over 20 years, troubling news offers them the chance to reconcile & move forward in both their lives. Theodore Smith attempts to bury the sadness that threatens to engulf his childhood upon hearing the news that his parents will be separating. Elethea Conall, a newly qualified nurse, continues to look after her patients whilst attempting to escape from her past. What do they all have in common?.
IMDB Rating: 6.0
IMDB Votes: 16
Genere: Drama
Country: UK
Duration: 90 min
Plot tags: psychological, sentimental, touching, captivating, independent film
Similar in 77%
South Mountain (2019)
Plot Summary:
When her teenagers head off to camp and her husband abruptly leaves her to begin a new family, Lila is left to her own curious and chaotic devices for a summer in her rural home in the Catskill mountains.
IMDB Rating: 5.5
IMDB Votes: 257
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 82 min
Plot tags: sincere, melancholic, sentimental, light, romantic, disturbing
Similar in 77%
Summer Wishes, Winter Dreams (1973)
Plot Summary:
Rita, a middle aged New York City homemaker, finds herself in an emotional crisis which forces her to re-examine her life, as well as her relationships with her mother, her eye doctor husband, her alienated daughter and estranged son.
IMDB Rating: 6.4
IMDB Votes: 840
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 93 min
Plot tags: independent film, psychological, sincere, serious, realistic, gloomy
Similar in 86%
Shiba (1993)
Plot Summary:
A multi-lingual tour guide who owns multiple passports one day drives his wife and daughter to a desolate seashore town and checks in a secluded, spacious, ruins-like hotel. From that moment on, he throws himself into gambling, tossing the dice with local residents all day. Sometimes he wins big, but sometimes he loses all. Feeling neglected and uncomfortable, his wife and daughter soon leave him and return home. He stays and wanders in this fishing village and gradually immerses himself in the surroundings—a place rife with immoral vagabonds, outlaws and weirdoes.
IMDB Rating: 6.9
IMDB Votes: 21
Genere: Drama
Country: Taiwan
Duration: 104 min
Plot tags:
Similar in 77%
A Family Upside Down (1978)
Plot Summary:
An elderly married couple find that as their physical and mental health deteriorates, they find themselves dependent more and more upon their grown children.
IMDB Rating: 6.9
IMDB Votes: 156
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 98 min
Plot tags:
Similar in 79%
Ranchlands (2019)
Plot Summary:
The story of a spiritually scarred man whose life changes forever when he must return to his estranged family to help care for a brother who is suffering from brain cancer. With the help of a spiritually enlightened caregiver, he faces the demons of the past and a secret that has haunted him and his family for many years.
IMDB Rating: 5.2
IMDB Votes: 161
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 69 min
Plot tags: rough, touching, suspense, suspenseful
Similar in 84%
An Early Frost (1985)
Plot Summary:
Set in the mid-eighties Michael Pierson, a young gay man, is struck with AIDS in the prime of his life. He's forced to be open about the disease and his homosexuality for the first time with his co-workers (he's a successful lawyer) and family. He, and the people around him, must face up to the inevitablity of his death and the disease that's killing him. "An Early Frost" was many people's first look at an AIDS victim as a human being instead of a statistic.
IMDB Rating: 8.0
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 95 min
Plot tags: sincere, touching, serious, captivating, emotional, realistic, gloomy, tear jerker, queer cinema, tearjerker
Similar in 84%
Melting Away (2011)
Plot Summary:
Shlomo who discovers in his son's Assaf room, women's clothing and accessories, decides to 'teach the boy a lesson'. When Assaf returns to his parents' home on a rainy night from a party, his attempts to enter home fail. His father, with the silent consent of his mother, locked the door. At present, 4 years later, Gallia turns to an investigation agency to help her find her son Assaf and bring him to Shlomo, his father who is dying of cancer. One night, at a night club in Tel Aviv, Assaf is seen performing as a beautiful transgender lady singer who goes by the name of Anna. After a few days a private nurse turns up at Shlomo's room at the hospital, sent as she claims by the insurance agency to assist Shlomo. The nurse is Anna (his son Assaf) and she manages to conquer Shlomo's heart by her charming personality and her special attitude toward life.
IMDB Rating: 6.9
IMDB Votes: 194
Genere: Drama
Country: Israel, Canada
Duration: 86 min
Plot tags: thought provoking, touching, realistic, captivating, psychological, sincere, serious
Similar in 75%
Lullaby (2014)
Plot Summary:
Estranged from his family, Jonathan (Hedlund) discovers his father has decided to take himself off life support in forty-eight hours’ time. During this intensely condensed period, a lifetime of drama plays out. Robert (Jenkins) fights a zero sum game to reclaim all that his illness stole from his family. A debate rages on patients’ rights and what it truly means to be free. Jonathan reconciles with his father, reconnects with his mother (Archer), sister (Brown-Findlay), and his love (Adams) and reclaims his voice through two unlikely catalysts – a young, wise-beyond-her-years patient (Barden) and a no-nonsense nurse (Hudson). Through this intensely life affirming prism, an unexpected and powerful journey of love, laughter, and forgiveness unfolds.
IMDB Rating: 6.1
IMDB Votes: 3000
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 117 min
Plot tags: touching, sentimental, serious, realistic, sad
Similar in 87%
The Effect of Gamma Rays on Man-in-the-Moon Marigolds (1972)
Plot Summary:
Middle-aged widow Beatrice Hunsdorfer (Joanne Woodward) and her daughters Ruth (Roberta Wallach) and Matilda (Nell Potts) are struggling to survive in a society they barely understand. Beatrice dreams of opening an elegant tea room but does not have the wherewithal to achieve her lofty goal. Epileptic Ruth is a rebellious adolescent, while shy but highly intelligent and idealistic Matilda seeks solace in her pets and school projects, including one designed to show how small amounts of radium affect marigolds.
IMDB Rating: 7.4
IMDB Votes: 3000
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 100 min
Plot tags: touching, psychological, sentimental, realistic, emotional, talky, surreal, art house, sincere, clever
Similar in 86%
In the Gloaming (1997)
Plot Summary:
Danny, dying of Aids, returns home for his last months. Always close to his mother, they share moments of openness that tend to shut out Danny's father and his sister.
IMDB Rating: 7.1
IMDB Votes: 1000
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 67 min
Plot tags: sentimental, sincere, touching, serious, emotional, realistic, contemplative, gloomy, queer cinema
Similar in 85%
Reconciliation (2009)
Plot Summary:
RECONCILIATION is a groundbreaking, provocative story about an estranged father and son struggling to overcome the heartbreaking consequences of their past. Grant Taylor (Eric Nenninger) has been troubled by intense childhood memories ever since his wife, Sara (Chelsey Crisp), gave him the exciting news..."You are going to be a dad!" As fatherhood nears, Grant privately wrestles with his embarrassment and anger toward his own father. His memories come to a head when Sara receives a call informing them that Grant's dad, Jeff (Jack Maxwell), is terminally ill and his last wish is to see his son. With Sara's encouragement, Grant reluctantly goes to see the man he disowned at his 10th birthday party, when he found out his father was gay. At the hospice, father and son confront the past as they come face to face for the first time in 16 years. Will Grant forgive his father for abandoning their family.
IMDB Rating: 6.3
IMDB Votes: 152
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 101 min
Plot tags: uplifting, touching, serious, emotional, realistic, independent film
Similar in 80%
Two Against Time (2002)
Plot Summary:
This film finds a mother and her teen daughter both being diagnosed with cancer. This discovery helps to overcome the longtime antagonistic relationship that the two have developed.
IMDB Rating: 5.8
IMDB Votes: 210
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 100 min
Plot tags: serious, realistic, touching, captivating, humorous
Similar in 87%
I'm Losing You (1998)
Plot Summary:
A wealthy businessman Perry Krohn attempts to juggle the needs of his dedicated wife, demanding mistress and grown children while facing his own certain death from lung cancer.
IMDB Rating: 5.0
IMDB Votes: 501
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 100 min
Plot tags: realistic, talky, serious, emotional, independent film, clever, gloomy, biting, suspense
Similar in 76%
Red Roses and Petrol (2003)
Plot Summary:
A dysfunctional Irish family gathers after the death of their patriarch.
IMDB Rating: 6.4
IMDB Votes: 124
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 97 min
Plot tags: psychological, sincere, touching, serious, captivating, black comedy, dark comedy
Similar in 82%
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 84%
Naked As We Came (2012)
Plot Summary:
Love, loss and hope are tumultuously explored amidst a tranquil backdrop and asks us all the question: What is your dream?.
IMDB Rating: 6.2
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 87 min
Plot tags: touching, realistic, semi serious, sentimental, sincere, independent film, erotic, queer cinema
Similar in 86%
Life as a House (2001)
Plot Summary:
When a man is diagnosed with terminal cancer, he takes custody of his misanthropic teenage son, for whom quality time means getting high, engaging in small-time prostitution, and avoiding his father.
IMDB Rating: 7.5
IMDB Votes: 45000
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 125 min
Plot tags: emotional, sentimental, touching, sincere, sad, inspirational, tear jerker, realistic, feel good, captivating