Best movies like Thicker Than Water
Last updated March 2024
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Plot Summary:
After the death of her father, Natalie Travers (Melissa Gilbert) discovers he was married to a rodeo star before he married Natalie’s mother. Upset that her father kept part of his life a secret from her and bewildered over how a prominent judge could fall for a cowgirl, she sets out to find Maggie Mae Jarrett. But Natalie meets her daughter Jessie Mae Jarrett (Lindsay Wagner) who is struggling to keep the wild horses on her land alive and safe.
IMDB Rating: 6.3
IMDB Votes: 574
Genere: Drama
Country: USA, Germany
Duration: 120 min
Plot tags: sentimental, touching, serious, realistic
Best tv shows and movies like Thicker Than Water (2005):
Similar in 77%
Touching Wild Horses (2002)
Plot Summary:
After a car accident that claimed his father and sister's lives and left his mother in a coma, a young man is sent to live with his reclusive aunt (Jane Seymour) on Sable Island, a world-renowned wild horse preserve.
IMDB Rating: 6.5
IMDB Votes: 505
Genere: Drama
Country: Canada, UK, Germany
Duration: 91 min
Plot tags: touching, serious, sentimental, sincere
Similar in 88%
Adam at Six A.M. (1970)
Plot Summary:
A disenchanted young Professor of Semantics at a California college learns of a distant relative's death in Missouri. He journeys cross-country to the funeral, then decides to spend the summer there and work as a laborer for a power-line company. In time, he meets a girl and falls in love but then faces an important decision as to which direction he wants his life to go.
IMDB Rating: 5.6
IMDB Votes: 417
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 100 min
Plot tags: psychological, touching, serious, realistic, contemplative, gloomy, biting, suspense, cult film
Similar in 85%
Beverly Lewis' The Confession (2013)
Plot Summary:
Based on the novel by New York Times best-selling author Beverly Lewis, "The Confession" is the continuing story of Katie Lapp, a young Amish woman who goes on a journey in search of her identity - only to find herself embroiled in a mystery that must be solved before she can be reunited with the "Englisher" mother who gave her up to adoption 20 years earlier. Written by Brian Bird.
IMDB Rating: 6.2
IMDB Votes: 807
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 89 min
Plot tags: sincere, touching, serious, realistic, sad, scenic
Similar in 88%
Vicious Circle (2009)
Plot Summary:
Shot on digital , HD and 8 mm. Filmed through both sides of North America. 'Vicious Circle' pushes the limits of what can be accomplished on a bike. Featuring the first ever 65 foot 'Double Road Gap' , some of the gnarliest tricks ever done on a mountain bike and the fastest racers coming out of Canada. BMX is also featured in the DVD. This movie includes the top athletes of the industry , plus the introduction of Graham Agassiz and Isael CotÚ.
IMDB Rating: 6.8
IMDB Votes: 84
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration:
Plot tags: touching, serious, realistic, captivating
Similar in 90%
The Last Cowboy (2003)
Plot Summary:
John William 'Will' Cooper is a modern-day rancher, maintaining his ranch in hard times along with his friend and foreman Amos Russell. When Will's estranged daughter Jake returns to the ranch for her grandfather's funeral, father and daughter clash over how to run the ranch and over the death years before of Jake's mother, which she blames on Will. Crisis comes in the form of insurmountable debt, and it is only by working together that Will and Jake have any chance of saving their home and their family.
IMDB Rating: 6.2
IMDB Votes: 673
Genere: Drama, Western
Country: USA
Duration: 100 min
Plot tags: sincere, touching, serious, realistic
Similar in 77%
A Father's Choice (2000)
Plot Summary:
The fast-paced city life of two sisters is turned upside down when they are sent to live in the country with their father after their mother is killed.
IMDB Rating: 6.1
IMDB Votes: 721
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 96 min
Plot tags: touching, serious, realistic, captivating, sincere, entertaining
Similar in 84%
The Long Shot (2004)
Plot Summary:
Annie Garret is a young woman who moves with her irresponsible husband Ross and their seven-year-old daughter Taylor from Colorado to a ranch in northern California where Ross abandons them after he fails to land a job. With no money and no friends, and Taylor and Annie's prized racehorse, Tolo, to look after, Annie lands a job at a ranch hand and stable person at a stud farm owned by the stern Mary Lou O'Brien who is hiding some person demons of her own. Despite Annie's own setbacks in life, she decides to find an outing by entering her horse in a high-stakes riding competition. But when her horse goes blind from a race illness, Annie must struggle with her hardships to put the impossible to the test.
IMDB Rating: 6.5
IMDB Votes: 634
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 94 min
Plot tags: uplifting, serious, realistic, sincere
Similar in 75%
Choking Man (2006)
Plot Summary:
The social anxiety of a morbidly shy Ecuadorian dishwasher working in a Queens diner provides the psychological engine that powers this blend of drama and magical realism.
IMDB Rating: 5.9
IMDB Votes: 597
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 85 min
Plot tags: realistic, atmospheric, touching, captivating, psychological, sentimental, serious, gloomy
Similar in 76%
Crossroads (2006)
Plot Summary:
The life of a young Jesuit seminarian is turned upside down when he falls in love with a young woman while working as a volunteer at a soup kitchen.
IMDB Rating: 6.0
IMDB Votes: 300
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 89 min
Plot tags: thought provoking, realistic, psychological, captivating, sincere, touching, serious, sexual
Similar in 76%
Alex of Venice (2014)
Plot Summary:
After her stay-at-home husband leaves her, a workaholic lawyer finds that she is not completely up to the tasks of caring for her young son, ailing father and household all by herself.
IMDB Rating: 5.8
IMDB Votes: 3000
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 86 min
Plot tags: sincere, touching, serious, realistic, romantic drama, independent film
Similar in 79%
Flying Lessons (2010)
Plot Summary:
With her life at a crossroads, 25 year old Sophie Conway returns home to the small town she always wanted to forget. Once home, she is faced with the friends and lovers she left behind, a tangled relationship with her Mother, and Harry Pleasant, an Alzheimer's Disease patient who, in an opposing way, shares Sophie's struggle to remember.
IMDB Rating: 5.4
IMDB Votes: 441
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 104 min
Plot tags: sentimental, touching, realistic, serious, inspirational
Similar in 90%
A Touch of Fate (2003)
Plot Summary:
One night in a small town in North Carolina, fate brings together three lives: an entertainment lawyer returning home to his dying mother after years in escape of his past, a woman trying to reclaim her supposed love, and a boy with a penchant for the sixth sense who struggles with the death of his father and overbearing love of his single mother. When the past and future suddenly bind these people together on a journey of need, forgiveness and discovery, they realize they've gained something when they least expected it.
IMDB Rating: 5.5
IMDB Votes: 216
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 101 min
Plot tags: touching, serious, realistic, independent film
Similar in 85%
Steam (2007)
Plot Summary:
Three women — a young coed, a forty-something single mother, and one a senior-aged widow — meet in the sauna of the local gym, where they gradually get to know one another and bond over their respective trials and tribulations.
IMDB Rating: 5.3
IMDB Votes: 213
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 120 min
Plot tags: touching, serious, emotional, talky, erotic, realistic, gloomy, sexual, sexy
Similar in 75%
Carry Me Home (2004)
Plot Summary:
A widow named Harriet and her two children Carrie and Brian are living in rural New York in 1947 and are still recovering from the death of Harriet's husband killed in World War II. Carrie is a tomboy and hangs around with boys and they have their own clubhouse. Carrie and her friends make mischief and taunt their mentally challenged neighbor Charlie by stealing one of his puppies. Harriet meets a man named Bernard and begin a courtship, but Carrie is furious that her mother is dating Bernard and wants it to stop. The jealousy and anger of Carrie raises to a fever pitch when Carrie and her friends destroy their neighbor Mr. Grizzle's garden and pour sugar into his tractor. Grizzle then takes Charlie's other puppies away from him and then Grizzle's barn is destroyed by fire. Carrie learns it's time for her to grow up and make amends with her mother and her neighbors for the grief and pain she caused them.
IMDB Rating: 5.2
IMDB Votes: 229
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 97 min
Plot tags: sentimental, touching, serious, emotional, realistic
Similar in 78%
Mom, Dad and Her (2008)
Plot Summary:
Sydney is a troubled teen heading for trouble. After being caught shoplifting and a case of alcohol poisoning, Sydney's desperate single mother sends her off to the country to live with her father, Ben, and his new pregnant wife, Emma. Sydney misses her boyfriend, her city life and doesn't get on with her dad or stepmom. Slowly she starts to settle in as she makes friends with Jess, a local girl whose mother died of cancer. Sydney makes a couple of mistakes but after her grandfather's death the extended family start to heal.
IMDB Rating: 5.7
IMDB Votes: 405
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 90 min
Plot tags: sentimental, atmospheric, serious, realistic
Similar in 81%
The Wise Kids (2011)
Plot Summary:
A vivid, dynamic Southern coming-of-age drama, takes place in the transitional space between high school and college, when life seems to be all questions and no answers, and the future is scarily wide open. Set in and around a Charleston, SC Baptist church, weaving through this ensemble piece are three main characters - Brea, an introspective pastor's daughter experiencing debilitating doubt, the hyperactive Laura, Brea's best friend and a devout believer, and Tim, the open-hearted son of a single father, confronting his homosexuality for the first time. Tensions and buried feelings abound, as colleges are chosen and adults behave badly, as Brea, Laura and Tim attempt to hang onto what they have, all the while yearning to break free.
IMDB Rating: 6.4
IMDB Votes: 1000
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 95 min
Plot tags: touching, serious, realistic, contemplative, sexual, christian film, sexy, queer cinema
Similar in 80%
Mending Fences (2009)
Plot Summary:
When big-city TV journalist Kelly Faraday (Laura Leighton) gets fired, she moves back to her Nevada hometown, where a severe drought may force her aging mother, Ruth (Angie Dickinson), to sell the family farm to a casino developer. As Kelly and Ruth sort out old differences, the erstwhile reporter and her ex-beau Walt (David Lee Smith) begin to suspect the casino of manipulating the town's water supply. Stephen Bridgewater directs this drama.
IMDB Rating: 6.4
IMDB Votes: 231
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 88 min
Plot tags: realistic, sentimental, psychological, captivating, touching, serious
Similar in 78%
Ricochet River (2001)
Plot Summary:
hree teenagers looking for adventure find more than they expected in this coming-of-age drama. High school seniors Wade (Jason James Richter) and Lorna (Kate Hudson) have spent all their lives in the small logging town of Calamus Grove, a conservative place where change comes slowly. Jesse Howl (Douglas Spain), a teenager of Native American ancestry, has just moved to Calamus Grove, and soon finds he doesn't fit in this close-knit community. Wade and Lorna go out of their way to befriend Jesse, and soon find that they're also regarded as outcasts among their peers. Eager to get away from the narrow minds which are stifling them, the three friends grab a car and take off for a summer road trip that turns out to be full of lessons in life and love. Ricochet River was based on the novel by Robin Cody.
IMDB Rating: 4.8
IMDB Votes: 326
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 112 min
Plot tags: sentimental, touching, serious, realistic, independent film, talky
Similar in 86%
Under the Starry Sky (2013)
Plot Summary:
The debut feature from Franco-Senegalese filmmaker Dyana Gaye charts the interconnected destinies of three far-flung sojourners across three continents. A quiet drama, about the anxieties of negotiating journeying to foreign countries and making a place for oneself in the world.
IMDB Rating: 6.6
IMDB Votes: 92
Genere: Drama
Country: France, Belgium, Senegal
Duration: 87 min
Plot tags: sincere, touching, serious, realistic
Similar in 78%
Lebanon, Pa. (2010)
Plot Summary:
Will, a charming 35-year-old Philadelphia ad man, heads to Lebanon, Pa. to bury his recently deceased father. He forms an unexpected friendship with CJ, his bright, newly pregnant 17-year-old cousin. As Will becomes interested in CJ's married teacher and CJ confronts her conflicted father, both struggle with formidable decisions about the path their lives will take. Can we vault our differences and meet in the middle? This bittersweet comic drama tenderly explores the cultural divide in America through the lives of one extended family.
IMDB Rating: 6.2
IMDB Votes: 584
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 100 min
Plot tags: realistic, sentimental, psychological, captivating, sincere, clever, touching, serious, independent film
Similar in 84%
A Cooler Climate (1999)
Plot Summary:
Iris is broke after her divorce and takes a job working as a housekeeper for a wealthy woman named Paula. When Paula and her husband separate, an unlikely friendship blossoms between the women.
IMDB Rating: 6.5
IMDB Votes: 702
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 99 min
Plot tags: independent film, psychological, sentimental, sincere, touching, serious, realistic, contemplative, talky
Similar in 86%
Soda Springs (2012)
Plot Summary:
The story of a man's struggle to claim his future by confronting his past. The road is not an easy one as old demons resurface to threaten everything Eden has fought to overcome.
IMDB Rating: 6.2
IMDB Votes: 470
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 115 min
Plot tags: sentimental, touching, serious, realistic, independent film
Similar in 77%
The Tic Code (1998)
Plot Summary:
A 10 year old gifted boy wants to be a jazz pianist much to the chagrin of his more classical oriented piano instructor. With his mother's help, he is an underage regular at a local nightspot, where he is teamed up with a sax superstar. Both come to learn that each suffers from Tourette's Syndrome (thus the film title). The older man has developed mannerisms to cover up his own fallibilities and resents the boy and his mother's acceptance of the disease.
IMDB Rating: 6.7
IMDB Votes: 484
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 91 min
Plot tags: sentimental, touching, realistic, independent film, offbeat, serious, contemplative, light, inspirational, feel good
Similar in 82%
A Fine Step (2014)
Plot Summary:
A Fine Step is an uplifting family drama centering on Cal Masterson (Luke Perry, Beverly Hills 90210) an award winning horseman whose relationship with his beloved horse Fandango allows him to achieve multiple championship wins. However tragedy strikes when Cal and Fandango are involved in a serious accident, ending Cal's horse riding days forever. Cal's devastation is slowly overcome when his new neighbour, 14 year old Claire Mason (Anna Claire Sneed, Glee) takes an interest in Fandango and convinces him that Fandango's competing days might not be over.
IMDB Rating: 5.3
IMDB Votes: 394
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 111 min
Plot tags: sentimental, sincere, captivating, emotional, touching, serious, realistic
Similar in 80%
Little House on the Prairie (1974)
Plot Summary:
Little House on the Prairie is an American Western drama television series, starring Michael Landon, Melissa Gilbert, and Karen Grassle, about a family living on a farm in Walnut Grove, Minnesota, in the 1870s and 1880s.
IMDB Rating: 7.5
IMDB Votes: 26000
Genere: Drama, Family, Romance, Western
Country: USA
Duration: 60 min
Plot tags: sentimental, sincere, touching, feel good, serious, retro, soap opera, juvenile, historical drama, realistic
Similar in 77%
The Rising Place (2001)
Plot Summary:
The close friendship of two young women, each of a different race, and their struggle to find purpose in their lives during this time of social injustice and world war.
IMDB Rating: 6.4
IMDB Votes: 208
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 93 min
Plot tags: sentimental, sincere, touching, serious, realistic
Similar in 86%
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 83%
Face (2002)
Plot Summary:
Genie, a Chinese-American teenager, develops feelings for a charming African-American DJ, but her grandmother forbids their romance forcing Genie to choose between family and love.
IMDB Rating: 6.2
IMDB Votes: 350
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 89 min
Plot tags: sincere, touching, emotional, sentimental, serious, realistic, contemplative
Similar in 80%
Hide Away (2011)
Plot Summary:
A successful businessman attempting to resurrect his life buys and boards a dilapidated sailboat.
IMDB Rating: 5.7
IMDB Votes: 1000
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 88 min
Plot tags: realistic, sentimental, emotional, psychological, captivating, sincere, touching, serious, independent film
Similar in 80%
Swimming (2000)
Plot Summary:
Two girl friends in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina find their relationship changing as they encounter new arrivals to the town.
IMDB Rating: 6.4
IMDB Votes: 943
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 98 min
Plot tags: sentimental, sincere, touching, humorous, realistic, semi serious, independent film