Best movies like Tokyo Family
Last updated March 2024
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Plot Summary:
In this film director Yoji Yamada bows down before his teacher and role model. Yamada was assistant director on Yazujirō Ozu’s Tōkyō monogatari, a moving family portrait set after the Second World War. In his remake, Yamada has made very few departures from Ozu’s masterpiece in order to update the story of ageing couple Shukichi and Tomiko to present day Japan. Once again, the pair decides to leave their quiet lives in the country to pay a visit to their children and grandchildren in Tokyo. Once there, they discover that neither their oldest son, a doctor named Koichi, nor their eldest daughter Shigeko - who runs a beauty parlour - has time for them: both are too busy attending to their everyday concerns. Even the youngest son went his own way. The old couple feel lonely and bewildered in the fast-paced metropolis.
IMDB Rating: 7.5
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Drama
Country: Japan
Duration: 146 min
Plot tags: realistic, sincere, touching, emotional, psychological, captivating, sentimental, serious, crying
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A Story of Yonosuke (2012)
Plot Summary:
The year is 1987 and Japan is just reaching the peak of its economic success. Eighteen-year old Yonosuke Yokomichi arrives in Tokyo from Nagasaki. Ordinary in every way possible, he lives in a suburb far from the excitement of the big city and commutes to a university in the center of Tokyo.
IMDB Rating: 7.5
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Drama
Country: Japan
Duration: 160 min
Plot tags: psychological, realistic, tense, captivating, independent film, crying
Similar in 75%
Her Love Boils Bathwater (2016)
Plot Summary:
A terminally ill single mother is determined to reconcile her splintered family.
IMDB Rating: 7.4
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Drama
Country: Japan
Duration: 125 min
Plot tags: psychological, sentimental, sincere, captivating, melancholic, disturbing, inspirational, comedy drama, crying, detective
Similar in 83%
Like Someone in Love (2012)
Plot Summary:
An old man and a young woman meet in Tokyo. She knows nothing about him, he thinks he knows her. He welcomes her into his home, she offers him her body. But the web that is woven between them in the space of twenty four hours bears no relation to the circumstances of their encounter.
IMDB Rating: 7.0
IMDB Votes: 13000
Genere: Drama
Country: Japan, France
Duration: 109 min
Plot tags: touching, serious, realistic, witty, sexy, avant garde, poignant, relaxing, sincere, contemplative
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What a Wonderful Family! 3: My Wife, My Life (2018)
Plot Summary:
At the Hirata home, three generations of their family live together. A crisis ensues when one afternoon, housewife Fumie falls asleep and wakes up to find a thief has stolen her secret money she kept hidden in the refrigerator.
IMDB Rating: 6.9
IMDB Votes: 456
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: Japan
Duration: 123 min
Plot tags: captivating, crying
Similar in 77%
Ritual (2000)
Plot Summary:
A disillusioned filmmaker has an encounter with a young girl who has a ritual of repeating "Tomorrow is my birthday" everyday. He tries to communicate with her through his video camera.
IMDB Rating: 7.5
IMDB Votes: 3000
Genere: Drama
Country: Japan
Duration: 128 min
Plot tags: psychological, serious, emotional, inspirational, bleak, realistic, cynical, independent film, biting, suspense
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Quill: The Life of a Guide Dog (2004)
Plot Summary:
As a Labrador puppy, Quill is sent to live with a couple, Isamu and Mitsuko Nii, who work as volunteers, training guide dogs (seeing eye dogs). When he grows to an adult dog, he is taken to a guide dog school, by a friendly, yet firm trainer Satoru Tawada. Although Quill is a little slower than the other dogs at the school, he seems to have an unusual 'empathy' and remarkable patience with his trainers. Tawada decides that Quill would be the ideal guide dog for Mitsuru Watanabe, but Wanatabe, a lonely and ill-tempered middle aged man, isn't as enthusiastic - he would "would rather sleep than be dragged around by a dog.". From here, the story is narrated by Wanatabe's daughter, Mitsuko, and slowly, Wantanbe is rehabilitated, venturing into the outside world, and learning, not only to trust other humans, but the animal at his side who guides him.
IMDB Rating: 7.1
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Drama
Country: Japan
Duration: 100 min
Plot tags: touching, uplifting, sentimental, emotional, sincere, captivating, tear jerker, serious, realistic, tearjerker
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Tokyo Shutter Girl (2013)
Plot Summary:
The movie Tokyo Shutter Girl, based on the comic series by Kenichi Kiriki, consists of three separate works by three separate directors, each set in Tokyo. It is about three Japanese schoolgirls in a photo club.
IMDB Rating: 6.1
IMDB Votes: 39
Genere: Drama
Country: Japan
Duration: 92 min
Plot tags: anthology, sexual
Similar in 86%
An Autumn Afternoon (1962)
Plot Summary:
Shuhei Hirayama is a widower with a 24-year-old daughter. Gradually, he comes to realize that she should not be obliged to look after him for the rest of his life, so he arranges a marriage for her.
IMDB Rating: 8.0
IMDB Votes: 10000
Genere: Drama
Country: Japan
Duration: 113 min
Plot tags: visual, visually stunning, sentimental, touching, serious, realistic, gloomy, avant garde, masterpiece
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The White Angel (2007)
Plot Summary:
Beyaz Melek’ filmi; bir aşkın öyküsüdür.Bu aşk öyküsü, iki insanın birbirine duyduğu aşk değil, bir grup insanın hayata ve birbirlerine duyduğu aşkın ve sevginin hikayesidir.Filmde, doğudan batıya, mekteplisinden köylüsüne, gencinden yaşlısına sevginin her türlü motifi hem duygusal hem de esprili bir dille anlatılır.
IMDB Rating: 6.5
IMDB Votes: 7000
Genere: Drama
Country: Turkey
Duration: 115 min
Plot tags: touching, realistic, psychological, captivating, sentimental, serious
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Our Homeland (2012)
Plot Summary:
From the late 1950s through the '70s, more than 90,000 of the ethnic Koreans in Japan emigrated to North Korea, a country that promised them affluence, justice, and an end to discrimination. KAZOKU NO KUNI tells the story of one of their number, who returns for just a short period. For the first time in 25 years, Sonho is reunited with his family in Tokyo after being allowed to undergo an operation there. Sonho’s younger sister Rie is at the centre of the film, and is not hard to recognise as the director’s alter-ego. In her documentaries DEAR PYONGYANG and SONA, THE OTHER MYSELF, Yang Yonghi told the story of her own life, and how, at age six, she experienced the departure of her three older brothers, who left their family for Pyongyang.
IMDB Rating: 7.2
IMDB Votes: 285
Genere: Drama
Country: Japan
Duration: 100 min
Plot tags: sincere, touching, serious, realistic, contemplative, gloomy
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Another House (2013)
Plot Summary:
Mathieu Roy's L’Autre maison is an intimate and powerful family drama featuring three generations of great Quebec Actors. Marcel Sabourin plays Henri Bernard, an 86 year-old man with a failing grip on reality. His sons, a jet setting middle aged photo-journalist (Roy Dupuis) and a younger pilot-in-training (Emile Proulx-Cloutier) disagree on a course of action, leaving the father and the younger son inhabiting a rustic cottage in the woods. As the older man's health deteriorates, options become more limited; when an IED accident in Afghanistan kills the photo-journalist's translator, the family must come together like never before. Shot in Quebec, Iceland, Africa and Asia, Another House blends elements of memory, perception and lyricism into a remarkable cinematic mix that moves the story well beyond direct domestic issues into a visual realm that balances nature and humanity.
IMDB Rating: 6.3
IMDB Votes: 124
Genere: Drama
Country: Canada
Duration: 100 min
Plot tags: touching, emotional, realistic, psychological, sincere, serious, gloomy
Similar in 88%
Family Tree (2010)
Plot Summary:
When Frédérick, the patriarch of the Alsatian Muller family, is conspicuously absent from his son Charles' funeral, Frédérick's surviving son and his granddaughter, raw from their loss, await an explanation. Once revealed, Frédérick's reasons and the painful secret Charles harbored for years threaten the foundations of the entire family.
IMDB Rating: 6.6
IMDB Votes: 205
Genere: Drama
Country: France
Duration: 97 min
Plot tags: psychological, sincere, touching, serious, captivating, emotional, realistic, gloomy
Similar in 78%
Lou (2010)
Plot Summary:
Living in rural New South Wales, working-class single mother Rhia is struggling to evade debt collectors and raise three young daughters. The eldest, and hardened beyond her years, Lou blames Rhia for the departure of her father, who walked out 10 months ago and hasn't been seen since. Mother-daughter relations hit bottom when Rhia takes in Doyle, her father in-law, who is in the beginning stages of Alzheimer's. Doyle turns Lou's initial hostility around with exciting tales of his South Seas adventures. But coursing deepest in his mind are fractured memories of Annie, his late wife. Before long, Doyle "sees" Annie in Lou and imagines he is courting her all over again.
IMDB Rating: 6.4
IMDB Votes: 386
Genere: Drama
Country: Australia
Duration: 86 min
Plot tags: realistic, touching, emotional, psychological, captivating, serious, gloomy
Similar in 82%
Paper Covers Rock (2008)
Plot Summary:
Samantha is recovering from a suicide attempt and ready for a fresh start in life. She has to fight for the custody of her daughter.
IMDB Rating: 6.6
IMDB Votes: 167
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 90 min
Plot tags: sincere, psychological, touching, emotional, serious, realistic, gloomy
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Tokyo Tower: Mom and Me, and Sometimes Dad (2007)
Plot Summary:
Adapted from the bestselling Japanese autobiography of the same title, this gentle coming-of-age drama concerns an adolescent boy, Boku - Masaya, torn between the inherited recklessness of his father Oton and the inherited responsibility, wisdom and emotional strength of his mother Okan. Following a period of intensely rebellious behavior, Boku learns that his mom has contracted cancer; suddenly, his mother comes to live with him in Tokyo the entire emotional landscape of his life is altered.
IMDB Rating: 7.4
IMDB Votes: 1000
Genere: Drama
Country: Japan
Duration: 142 min
Plot tags: sentimental, sincere, touching, serious, emotional, captivating, independent film, realistic
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A Night for Dying Tigers (2010)
Plot Summary:
The night before Jack (Gil Bellows) is slated to begin a five-year prison sentence for murder, his wife, Melanie (Jennifer Beals), and assorted siblings gather for a dinner to bid Jack farewell and good luck on his trip up the river. But the party slides into a bitter fight over the bad behavior of Jack's brothers (John Pyper-Ferguson and Tygh Runyan) and sister Karen (Lauren Lee Smith). Terry Miles directs this dark comic drama.
IMDB Rating: 5.2
IMDB Votes: 443
Genere: Drama
Country: Canada
Duration: 90 min
Plot tags: realistic, emotional, psychological, captivating, serious, gloomy
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About Her Brother (2010)
Plot Summary:
Ginko’s younger brother Tetsuro, a failed comedian, is the oddball of the family. Embarrassing, loud and plain inappropriate at times causes Ginko to disown him. The two reunite when she discovers Tetsuro is terminally ill. Tetsuro’s impending death marks the beginning of love and toleration.
IMDB Rating: 7.0
IMDB Votes: 843
Genere: Drama
Country: Japan
Duration: 126 min
Plot tags: realistic, psychological, emotional, captivating, independent film, sincere, touching, serious, entertaining
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The New Year Parade (2008)
Plot Summary:
When Mike and Lisa separate, their children suffer quietly in the middle of the annual Mummer's Parade.
IMDB Rating: 6.2
IMDB Votes: 126
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 85 min
Plot tags: sentimental, realistic, psychological, contemplative, captivating, sincere, serious, emotional, gloomy, independent film
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Rhapsody in August (1991)
Plot Summary:
The story centers on an elderly hibakusha, who lost her husband in the 1945 atomic bombing of Nagasaki, caring for her four grandchildren over the summer. She learns of a long-lost brother, Suzujiro, living in Hawaii who wants her to visit him before he dies.
IMDB Rating: 7.2
IMDB Votes: 7000
Genere: Drama
Country: Japan
Duration: 98 min
Plot tags: emotional, melancholic, lyrical, psychological, sincere, atmospheric, serious, talky, philosophical, meditative
Similar in 79%
Things Behind the Sun (2006)
Plot Summary:
Now that Itzhak's father is in a coma, and dying, Itzhak is finally willing to visit him, thus breaking a ten-year silence. During his visits to the hospital, Itzhak, a beaten and reserved man, is frustrated to find himself neglected by his own family: his wife, a long suppressed artist whose life's dream is fulfilled that same week; his twenty-seven-year-old son - a "philosopher" still living at home; and his twenty-five-year-old daughter - a tormented lesbian who has had no contact with her family for a long time. Itzhak doesn't realize, though, that his ten year old daughter, Didush, neglected and almost invisible to her family, is secretly visiting her grandfather whom she has never met previously and sets out to discover the old family secret.
IMDB Rating: 7.6
IMDB Votes: 98
Genere: Drama
Country: Israel
Duration: 111 min
Plot tags: psychological, emotional, realistic, touching, sincere, serious
Similar in 85%
Kabei: Our Mother (2008)
Plot Summary:
Set in Tokyo in 1940, the peaceful life of the Nogami Family suddenly changes when the father, Shigeru, is arrested and accused of being a Communist. His wife Kayo works frantically from morning to night to maintain the household and bring up her two daughters with the support of Shigeru's sister Hisako and Shigeru's ex-student Yamazaki, but her husband does not return. WWII breaks out and casts dark shadows on the entire country, but Kayo still tries to keep her cheerful determination, and sustain the family with her love. This is an emotional drama of a mother and an eternal message for peace.
IMDB Rating: 7.5
IMDB Votes: 1000
Genere: Drama
Country: Japan
Duration: 133 min
Plot tags: sincere, touching, serious, emotional, realistic, captivating, disturbing
Similar in 81%
Volcano (2011)
Plot Summary:
Hannes is an old man who has grown apart from his children. Recently retired when his wife gets ill he tries to reconcile with them and to atone for his cold demeanor in the past.
IMDB Rating: 7.2
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Drama
Country: Iceland, Denmark
Duration: 99 min
Plot tags: realistic, atmospheric, emotional, psychological, captivating, uplifting, touching, serious
Similar in 82%
Be Sure to Share (2009)
Plot Summary:
Shiro’s struggle with his father’s cancer and impending death leads to a realization that he must communicate his love and admiration for him before it’s too late. A series of flashbacks reveals their relationship over time, and the trouble Shiro faced connecting to his strict father who was also his teacher and soccer coach. With a consuming secret of his own, Shiro, now in his late twenties and about to get engaged, must eventually learn how to share the pain of it with his loved ones.
IMDB Rating: 6.9
IMDB Votes: 463
Genere: Drama
Country: Japan
Duration: 109 min
Plot tags: touching, realistic, emotional, contemplative, psychological, sentimental, sincere, serious, gloomy
Similar in 88%
All Around Us (2008)
Plot Summary:
Kanao, a courtroom portrait artist, observes crimes, scandals and the decline of Japanese values without passing judgement. As he and his wife endure the tragedy of their first child’s death, hope slowly unfolds and their love story flickers to life once again.
IMDB Rating: 7.5
IMDB Votes: 890
Genere: Drama
Country: Japan
Duration: 140 min
Plot tags: emotional, realistic, touching, psychological, serious, gloomy
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A Day Late and a Dollar Short (2014)
Plot Summary:
When irascible matriarch Viola Price learns that her next asthma attack will likely kill her, she is determined to fix her fractured family before she leaves this world.
IMDB Rating: 6.9
IMDB Votes: 732
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 85 min
Plot tags: emotional, realistic, sentimental, captivating, uplifting, touching, serious
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Still Walking (2008)
Plot Summary:
Twelve years after their beloved eldest son, Junpei, drowned while saving a stranger's life, Kyohei and Toshiko welcome their surviving children home for a family reunion. Younger son Ryota still feels that his parents resent that he isn't the one who died; his new wife, Yukari, is awkwardly meeting the rest of the family for the first time. Daughter Chinami strains to fill the uncomfortable pauses with forced cheer.
IMDB Rating: 7.9
IMDB Votes: 18000
Genere: Drama
Country: Japan
Duration: 115 min
Plot tags: serious, contemplative, sincere, touching, realistic, philosophical, thought provoking, disturbing, poignant, art house
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Like Father, Like Son (2013)
Plot Summary:
Ryota Nonomiya is a successful businessman driven by money. He learns that his biological son was switched with another child after birth. He must make a life-changing decision and choose his true son or the boy he raised as his own.
IMDB Rating: 7.8
IMDB Votes: 27000
Genere: Drama
Country: Japan
Duration: 121 min
Plot tags: touching, emotional, disturbing, psychological, sincere, intense, poignant, realistic, sad, slow cinema
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Alpha Male (2006)
Plot Summary:
Drama about a family torn apart after the death of its patriarch. Haunted by their father's death, Jack and Elyssa have a fraught relationship with their remarried mother even now they have come of age.
IMDB Rating: 5.5
IMDB Votes: 345
Genere: Drama
Country: USA, UK
Duration: 100 min
Plot tags: emotional, touching, realistic, contemplative, psychological, sentimental, sincere, serious
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Pandora's Box (2008)
Plot Summary:
When an aging matriarch starts showing signs of dementia, her dysfunctional family in Istanbul must navigate a minefield of unresolved issues to care for her.
IMDB Rating: 7.2
IMDB Votes: 3000
Genere: Drama
Country: Turkey, France, Germany, Belgium
Duration: 112 min
Plot tags: sentimental, touching, serious, psychological, sincere, atmospheric, captivating, emotional, realistic, contemplative
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The Little House (2014)
Plot Summary:
Following the death of the unmarried and childless Taki, Takeshi, a young relative of hers, discovers several pages of closely written lines in which the old lady has recorded her memories. This is how he learns the truth about her youth working as a housemaid and nanny for the Hirai family in a little house in Tokyo with a red gabled roof.
IMDB Rating: 7.2
IMDB Votes: 1000
Genere: Drama, Romance
Country: Japan
Duration: 136 min
Plot tags: sentimental, realistic, psychological, captivating, touching, serious, stylized