Best movies like The World According to Garp
Last updated March 2024
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Plot Summary:
Based on the John Irving novel, this film chronicles the life of T S Garp, and his mother, Jenny. Whilst Garp sees himself as a "serious" writer, Jenny writes a feminist manifesto at an opportune time, and finds herself as a magnet for all manner of distressed women.
IMDB Rating: 7.1
IMDB Votes: 29000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 136 min
Plot tags: dark comedy, offbeat, cult classic, clever, touching, humorous, black comedy, sad, period piece, picaresque
Best tv shows and movies like The World According to Garp (1982):
Similar in 88%
Come Back to the 5 & Dime, Jimmy Dean, Jimmy Dean (1982)
Plot Summary:
The Disciples of James Dean meet up on the anniversary of his death and mull over their lives in the present and in flashback, revealing the truth behind their complicated lives. Who is the mysterious Joanne and what's the real story behind Mona's son, James Dean Junior ?.
IMDB Rating: 7.1
IMDB Votes: 5000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 109 min
Plot tags: clever, emotional, talky, independent film, sentimental, touching, humorous, realistic, contemplative, semi serious
Similar in 76%
Henry Fool (1997)
Plot Summary:
An egocentric bum transforms the lives of a shy New Jersey garbageman and his sister.
IMDB Rating: 7.1
IMDB Votes: 8000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 137 min
Plot tags: independent film, philosophical, cult classic, dark comedy, offbeat, humorous, talky, stylized, allegory, black comedy
Similar in 85%
The Adventures of Sebastian Cole (1998)
Plot Summary:
In June, 1983, in Dutchess County, New York, Sebastian Cole joins his mother, step-father, and sister for dinner. Hank, Sebastian's step-father, drops a bomb: he announces he's changing sexes. Sebastian's sister splits immediately for California, and his mother takes him back to England. Jump ahead eight months, Sebastian is back in New York, knocking on Hank's door. Hank (now Henrietta, although all the surgeries aren't complete) takes Sebastian in and is his rock over the next few months of high school. Sebastian's "adventures" are mostly self-destructive.
IMDB Rating: 6.6
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 99 min
Plot tags: independent film, sentimental, clever, touching, humorous, realistic, semi serious, road movie, sexy, enigmatic
Similar in 87%
The Misfortunates (2009)
Plot Summary:
13-year-old Gunther Strobbe grows up surrounded by alcohol, trash and his completely useless father and uncles. Slowly but surely, he's being prepared for the same hapless life. Can he defy his destiny?.
IMDB Rating: 7.3
IMDB Votes: 11000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: Belgium, Netherlands
Duration: 108 min
Plot tags: sincere, touching, semi serious, sentimental, humorous, realistic, dark comedy, epic, disturbing, comedy drama
Similar in 76%
Winter Passing (2005)
Plot Summary:
Actress Reese Holden has been offered a small fortune by a book editor if she can secure for publication the love letters that her father, a reclusive novelist, wrote to her mother, who has since passed away. Returning to Michigan, Reese finds that an ex-grad student and a would-be musician have moved in with her father, who cares more about his new friends than he does about his own health and well-being.
IMDB Rating: 6.2
IMDB Votes: 9000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 98 min
Plot tags: touching, emotional, serious, realistic, heartbreaking, cult classic, psychological, clever, contemplative, gloomy
Similar in 87%
The Hotel New Hampshire (1984)
Plot Summary:
The film talks about a family that weathers all sorts of disasters and keeps going in spite of it all. It is noted for its wonderful assortment of oddball characters.
IMDB Rating: 5.9
IMDB Votes: 9000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: UK, Canada, USA
Duration: 109 min
Plot tags: black comedy, offbeat, humorous, dark comedy, realistic, semi serious, independent film, erotic, psychological, road movie
Similar in 87%
Heartburn (1986)
Plot Summary:
Rachel is a food writer at a New York magazine who meets Washington columnist Mark at a wedding and ends up falling in love with him despite her reservations about marriage. They buy a house, have a daughter, and Rachel thinks they are living happily ever after until she discovers that Mark is having an affair while she is waddling around with a second pregnancy.
IMDB Rating: 6.1
IMDB Votes: 12000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 108 min
Plot tags: melancholic, lyrical, sentimental, humorous, realistic, semi serious, talky, emotional, sex comedy, cult classic
Similar in 81%
Hannah and Her Sisters (1986)
Plot Summary:
Between two Thanksgivings, Hannah's husband falls in love with her sister Lee, while her hypochondriac ex-husband rekindles his relationship with her sister Holly.
IMDB Rating: 7.8
IMDB Votes: 75000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 107 min
Plot tags: ironic, humorous, talky, witty, sentimental, captivating, clever, intellectual, realistic, funny
Similar in 82%
Metroland (1997)
Plot Summary:
After ten years absence Toni, Chris's best friend, suddenly reappears in London to bring chaos and doubt into Chris's calm, tranquil, slightly boring, predictable life. Chris starts to remember his carefree youth as a photographer in Paris when he lived with and enjoyed a torrid affair with Annick. It was also in Paris that he first met and fell in love with Marion. The temptations and pressure exerted on Chris by Toni to return to their former carefree life of sex, drugs and rock'n'roll soon starts to have an impact on Chris's marriage. He starts to question his values, his lifestyle choices and his relationship with Marion and even suspects her of starting an affair with Toni whom she dislikes! Eventually circumstances come to a head and Chris is forced to decide whether to follow Toni back to the hedonistic, irresponsible life of his youth or face the harsh realities of the present and stay with Marion.
IMDB Rating: 6.3
IMDB Votes: 4000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: Spain, France, UK
Duration: 105 min
Plot tags: cult classic, sexual, comedy drama, sentimental, touching, humorous, realistic, semi serious, crying, weeping
Similar in 89%
The Angriest Man in Brooklyn (2014)
Plot Summary:
After learning that a brain aneurysm will kill him in about 90 minutes, a perpetually unhappy man struggles to come to terms with his fate and make amends with everyone he has ever hurt.
IMDB Rating: 5.7
IMDB Votes: 24000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 83 min
Plot tags: compassionate, sentimental, surreal, stylized, thought provoking, tragicomedy, dark comedy, humorous, teen, parody
Similar in 88%
Just Looking (1999)
Plot Summary:
It's 1955. Lenny is a 14-year old boy who is totally fascinated by sex. He is too scared to "do it," so he dedicates his summer to seeing two other people do it. Easier said than done. Caught in the act of spying, his mother and stepfather ship him off to spend the summer with his aunt and uncle in "the country" -- Queens. His plan looks like a bust and his summer seems destined for boredom, until he meets a whole new group of friends -- young teens who have a "sex club.".
IMDB Rating: 6.6
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 97 min
Plot tags: sexy, touching, sexual, sentimental, feel good, humorous, realistic, semi serious, sex comedy, period piece
Similar in 82%
Box of Moon Light (1996)
Plot Summary:
Al Fountain, a middle-aged electrical engineer, is on the verge of a mid-life crisis, when he decides to take his time coming home from a business trip, rents a car, and heads out looking for a lake he remembers from his childhood. But his wandering takes him into the life of Kid, a free-spirited young man who helps Al escape from the routine of everyday life and find freedom to enjoy himself.
IMDB Rating: 7.1
IMDB Votes: 6000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: Japan, USA
Duration: 112 min
Plot tags: road movie, scenic, thought provoking, touching, humorous, independent film, sincere, mumblecore, mind blowing, clever
Similar in 75%
Everything Is Illuminated (2005)
Plot Summary:
A film based on the semi-autobiographical novel of the same name by American writer Jonathan Safran Foer, in which a young Jewish American man endeavors—with the help of eccentric, distant relatives—to find the woman who saved his grandfather during World War II, in a Ukrainian village which was ultimately razed by the Nazis.
IMDB Rating: 7.4
IMDB Votes: 60000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 106 min
Plot tags: touching, road movie, tragicomedy, clever, scenic, sentimental, melancholic, humorous, feel good, sad
Similar in 89%
House of D (2004)
Plot Summary:
In the present, artist Tom Warshaw recalls his traumatic coming of age. As a 13-year-old growing up in New York City in 1973, Tom hangs out with Pappass, a mentally disabled man. With Tom's mother battling depression after the death of her husband, the young boy is left to his own devices. When Tom develops a crush on schoolmate Melissa, Pappass feels abandoned and begins behaving erratically.
IMDB Rating: 6.8
IMDB Votes: 10000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 97 min
Plot tags: sentimental, light, emotional, intense, spiritual, period piece, cult classic, feel good, humorous, realistic
Similar in 81%
World's Greatest Dad (2009)
Plot Summary:
In the wake of a freak accident, Lance suffers the worst tragedy and the greatest opportunity of his life. He is suddenly faced with the possibility of fame, fortune and popularity, if he can only live with the knowledge of how he got there.
IMDB Rating: 6.9
IMDB Votes: 40000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 99 min
Plot tags: dark comedy, black comedy, clever, melancholic, dark, disturbing, cult classic, hilarious, offbeat, philosophical
Similar in 79%
The Paper (1994)
Plot Summary:
Henry Hackett is the editor of a New York City tabloid. He is a workaholic who loves his job, but the long hours and low pay are leading to discontent. Also, publisher Bernie White faces financial straits, and has hatchetman Alicia Clark, Henry's nemesis, impose unpopular cutbacks.
IMDB Rating: 6.7
IMDB Votes: 15000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 112 min
Plot tags: talky, clever, sentimental, humorous, black comedy, sincere, realistic, semi serious, intellectual, feel good
Similar in 85%
Diary of a Mad Housewife (1970)
Plot Summary:
Tina Balser is a bored New York housewife-mother married to Jonathan, a pompous, social-climbing lawyer who ridicules her in front of their children, criticizing everything she does or wears. She begins an affair with George Prager, a dashing, successful and blatantly sadistic writer. Finally after George has tormented Tina in much the same manner Jonathan has, and has been unfaithful to boot, she goes back to her husband and begins group therapy.
IMDB Rating: 7.0
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 95 min
Plot tags: romantic, sexy, clever, humorous, realistic, witty, semi serious, biting, sex comedy, suspense
Similar in 77%
Birds of America (2008)
Plot Summary:
A regular guy struggles with a repressive home and professional life, as well as making amends for the trouble his free-spirited brother and sister cause about town.
IMDB Rating: 6.0
IMDB Votes: 6000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 85 min
Plot tags: touching, semi serious, humorous, realistic, funny, family saga, offbeat, crying, black comedy, dark comedy
Similar in 89%
How to Kill Your Neighbor's Dog (2000)
Plot Summary:
The story of Peter McGowan, a chain-smoking, impotent, insomniac playwright who lives in Los Angeles. Once very successful, he is now in the tenth year of a decade-long string of production failures. He finds himself bonding with a new neighbor's lonely young daughter who has mild cerebral palsy; and during one of his middle-of-the-night strolls, he encounters his oddball doppelgänger.
IMDB Rating: 6.8
IMDB Votes: 4000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: Germany, USA
Duration: 107 min
Plot tags: humorous, melancholic, light, sentimental, touching, realistic, semi serious, black comedy, dark comedy, hilarious
Similar in 77%
Soft Fruit (1999)
Plot Summary:
For the first time in 15 years, all four siblings in a family show up to care for their dying mother, who is only given a couple of weeks to live. One comes from America with her two children. A divorced sister also comes with her child and sneaks off regularly to meet a mystery man who may be her ex-husband. The third & youngest daughter is an unmarried nurse aware of her ticking biological clock. The only son chases after his grumpy father who seems to not care a whit about his wife's circumstances. The four are also faced my their mother's dreams to accomplish a few things before she dies - to visit a beach she had visited in the past, to see her youngest married, and to visit Paris. She also wants to be embalmed and be honored with a 21 gun salute. Thus the whole group has to set off in the quest to fulfill their mother's wishes.
IMDB Rating: 6.6
IMDB Votes: 566
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: Australia, USA
Duration: 101 min
Plot tags: humorous, independent film, black comedy, sentimental, touching, offbeat, realistic, semi serious, dark comedy, erotic
Similar in 89%
Parenthood (1989)
Plot Summary:
The story of the Buckman family and friends, attempting to bring up their children. They suffer/enjoy all the events that occur: estranged relatives, the "black sheep" of the family, the eccentrics, the skeletons in the closet, and the rebellious teenagers.
IMDB Rating: 7.1
IMDB Votes: 54000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 124 min
Plot tags: touching, humorous, realistic, funny, emotional, light, talky, philosophical, sweet, romantic comedy
Similar in 83%
Running with Scissors (2006)
Plot Summary:
Young Augusten Burroughs absorbs experiences that could make for a shocking memoir: the son of an alcoholic father and an unstable mother, he's handed off to his mother's therapist, Dr. Finch, and spends his adolescent years as a member of Finch's bizarre extended family.
IMDB Rating: 6.1
IMDB Votes: 23000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 116 min
Plot tags: disturbing, stylized, intense, touching, realistic, talky, humorous, tragicomedy, psychological, cult classic
Similar in 89%
The Squid and the Whale (2005)
Plot Summary:
Based on the true childhood experiences of Noah Baumbach and his brother, The Squid and the Whale tells the touching story of two young boys dealing with their parents divorce in Brooklyn in the 1980's.
IMDB Rating: 7.3
IMDB Votes: 89000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 81 min
Plot tags: depressing, sincere, talky, dark comedy, absurd, indie film, intellectual, realistic, witty, thought provoking
Similar in 90%
Igby Goes Down (2002)
Plot Summary:
A young man's peculiar upbringing renders him unable to competently cope with the struggle of growing up.
IMDB Rating: 6.9
IMDB Votes: 35000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: USA, Germany
Duration: 98 min
Plot tags: dark comedy, depressing, cynical, humorous, clever, realistic, witty, talky, suspense, black comedy
Similar in 79%
Carnal Knowledge (1971)
Plot Summary:
The concurrent sexual lives of best friends Jonathan and Sandy are presented, those lives which are affected by the sexual mores of the time and their own temperament, especially in relation to the respective women who end up in their lives.
IMDB Rating: 6.9
IMDB Votes: 15000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 98 min
Plot tags: controversial, sexy, depressing, sex comedy, realistic, witty, talky, cynical, sexual, erotic
Similar in 84%
Wonder Boys (2000)
Plot Summary:
Grady (Michael Douglas) is a 50-ish English professor who hasn't had a thing published in years -- not since he wrote his award winning "Great American Novel" 7 years ago. This weekend proves even worse than he could imagine as he finds himself reeling from one misadventure to another in the company of a new wonder boy author.
IMDB Rating: 7.2
IMDB Votes: 66000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: USA, Germany, UK, Japan
Duration: 107 min
Plot tags: melancholic, humorous, realistic, talky, dark comedy, touching, intellectual, feel good, dark, clever
Similar in 90%
The Fisher King (1991)
Plot Summary:
Two troubled men face their terrible destinies and events of their past as they join together on a mission to find the Holy Grail and thus to save themselves.
IMDB Rating: 7.5
IMDB Votes: 90000
Genere: Comedy, Drama, Fantasy
Country: USA
Duration: 137 min
Plot tags: psychological, touching, inspirational, compassionate, disturbing, dark comedy, clever, melancholic, cerebral, thought provoking
Similar in 80%
Slums of Beverly Hills (1998)
Plot Summary:
In 1976, a lower-middle-class teenager struggles to cope living with her neurotic family of nomads on the outskirts of Beverly Hills.
IMDB Rating: 6.7
IMDB Votes: 14000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 91 min
Plot tags: dark comedy, humorous, disturbing, sincere, semi serious, teen, independent film, clever, black comedy, period piece
Similar in 88%
Terms of Endearment (1983)
Plot Summary:
Aurora and Emma are mother and daughter who march to different drummers. Beginning with Emma's marriage, Aurora shows how difficult and loving she can be. The movie covers several years of their lives as each finds different reasons to go on living and find joy. Aurora's interludes with Garrett Breedlove, retired astronaut and next door neighbor are quite striking.
IMDB Rating: 7.4
IMDB Votes: 64000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 132 min
Plot tags: tear jerker, touching, emotional, sad, heartbreaking, sentimental, compassionate, romantic, crying, realistic
Similar in 76%
Mrs. Doubtfire (1993)
Plot Summary:
Loving but irresponsible dad Daniel Hillard, estranged from his exasperated spouse, is crushed by a court order allowing only weekly visits with his kids. When Daniel learns his ex needs a housekeeper, he gets the job -- disguised as an English nanny. Soon he becomes not only his children's best pal but the kind of parent he should have been from the start.
IMDB Rating: 7.1
IMDB Votes: 285000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 125 min
Plot tags: feel good, touching, funny, hilarious, light, sentimental, romantic, sweet, romantic comedy, clever