Movies like Instant Love (1964)
The best movies like Instant Love (1964) are Hurry Sundown (1967), Little Lord Fauntleroy (1980) and Head Full of Honey (2018). If Instant Love hooked you with its drama, these 30 similar films are what to watch next, and every pick says why it matches.
Quick picks
- Highest ratedLucy Shimmers and the Prince of Peace (2020)8.4/10 from 384 votes
- NewestOmaha (2025)Released 2025
Hurry Sundown (1967)
A ruthless Southern opportunist tries to buy his cousin's land, and when thwarted, brings several tragedies to the lives of his loved ones.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisLittle Lord Fauntleroy (1980)
Young Cedric Errol and his widowed mother live in genteel poverty in 1880s Brooklyn after the death of his father. Cedric's grandfather, the Earl of Dorincourt, has long ago disowned his son for marrying an American. But after the death of the Earl's remaining son, he decides to accept Cedric as his heir.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisHead Full of Honey (2018)
A young girl tries to help her grandfather, who is suffering from Alzheimer’s, navigate his increasing forgetfulness, and ends up going on a remarkable adventure with him.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Bridge Part 2 (2016)
The second-half of the movie picks up in the present day, seven years later, with Ryan returning home from being on the road touring as a professional singer and Molly working at her father's corporation.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisWon't Back Down (2012)
Jamie Fitzpatrick and Nona Alberts are two women from opposites sides of the social and economic track, but they have one thing in common: a mission to fix their community's broken school and ensure a bright future for their children. The two women refuse to let any obstacles stand in their way as they battle a bureaucracy that's hopelessly mired in traditional thinking, and they seek to re-energize a faculty that has lost its passion for teaching.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisEleanor the Great (2025)
94-year-old Eleanor Morgenstein tries to rebuild her life after the death of her best friend. As a result, she moves back to New York City after living in Florida for decades.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Christmas Shoes (2002)
Two separate stories mesh - in the first, a young music teacher, Maggie Andrews, begins dying of a heart condition and her son Nathan tries to get a pair of Christmas shoes for her before she dies. In the second, lawyer Robert Layton and his wife Kate are slowly drifting apart and the matter comes to a head during Christmas when Kate takes over for Maggie for the school choir.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisNovember Christmas (2010)
A young father asks for pumpkins at the local farm stand. "In August? No." the farmer replies. The farmer ruminates on the odd request and gets involved with strangers for the first time since his son's death long ago.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisIt's a Wonderful Life (1946)
George Bailey has spent his entire life giving to the people of Bedford Falls. All that prevents rich skinflint Mr. Potter from taking over the entire town is George's modest building and loan company. But on Christmas Eve the business's $8,000 is lost and George's troubles begin.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisNoel (2004)
With Christmas Eve just around the corner in bustling New York, five lonely and sad strangers find their lives inadvertently intersected.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
SnoozefestMovies like thisLucy Shimmers and the Prince of Peace (2020)
Second chances start when a hardened criminal crosses paths with a precocious little girl who is helped by an angel to change hearts during the holiday season.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisThe Last Rifleman (2023)
A WWII veteran escapes his care home in Northern Ireland and embarks on an arduous but inspirational journey to France to attend the 75th anniversary of the D-Day landings, finding the courage to face the ghosts of his past.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisOmaha (2025)
A young girl and her brother are awoken by their father and loaded into the car on an early morning in 2008. As they road trip across the American West, she discovers the truth about their seemingly spontaneous journey.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisWoman of Straw (1964)
Anthony Richmond schemes to get the fortune of his tyrannical, wheelchair-using tycoon uncle Charles Richmond by persuading Maria, a nurse he employs, to marry him.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisSound of Christmas (2016)
Lizzie is a young piano teacher working at a music school while trying to save enough money for a Steinway piano. The school is gearing up for their major Christmas fundraiser and she has committed much of her time to plan the event. One afternoon, she meets Brad who takes an interest in her playing and asks if she will teach his uninterested teenage daughter. She begins to break through to the young girl, and sparks begin to fly with Brad, but she is shocked to find out that his interest is not solely in her playing, but in the property that houses the music school. She sets out to save the school and the event, but can she work things out with Brad?
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Given Word (1962)
Zé is a very poor man whose most prized possession is his donkey. When his donkey falls terminally ill, Zé makes a promise to Saint Bárbara: If his donkey recovers, he will carry a cross - like Jesus - all the way from his city to Saint Bárbara's church, in the state capital. Upon the recovery of his donkey, Zé leaves on his journey. He makes it to the church, but the priest refuses to accept the cross once he discovers the context of Zé's promise.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisThe Greening of Whitney Brown (2011)
Whitney, a spoiled pre-teen from Philadelphia, is forced to move to the country when her parents feel the squeeze of economic hard times. A fish out of water, far from her comfort zone, she befriends an amazing horse, and undertakes a misguided journey back to her old life, only to discover that her family is her home.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
SnoozefestMovies like thisFlicka (2006)
Katy McLaughlin desires to work on her family's mountainside horse ranch, although her father insists she finish boarding school. Katy finds a mustang in the hills near her ranch. The headstrong 16 year old then sets her mind to tame a mustang and prove to her father she can run the ranch. But when tragedy happens, it will take all the love and strength the family can muster to restore hope.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisHouse of Bamboo (1955)
Eddie Kenner is given a special assignment by the Army to get the inside story on Sandy Dawson, a former GI who has formed a gang of fellow servicemen and Japanese locals.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisWake of the Red Witch (1948)
Captain Ralls fights Dutch shipping magnate Mayrant Sidneye for the woman he loves, Angelique Desaix, and for a fortune in gold aboard the Red Witch.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
SnoozefestMovies like thisMississippi Mermaid (1969)
A tobacco planter on Réunion island in the Indian Ocean becomes engaged through correspondence to a French woman he does not know. The woman that arrives does not look like the picture he received, but he marries her anyway.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisSmall Change (1976)
The lives of a motherless young man, who's just starting to find interest in women, and his physically abused, poverty stricken friend, are mixed with more or less innocent childhood experiences and challenges most their age experience.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThis Man Must Die (1969)
When his young son is killed in a hit and run accident, Charles Thenier resolves to hunt down and murder the killer. By chance, Thenier makes the acquaintance of an actress, Helène Lanson, who was in the car at the time of the accident. He then meets Helène’s brother-in-law, Paul Decourt, a truly horrible individual.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe Christmas Cure (2017)
A doctor returns home for Christmas to find that her father has decided to retire from his own practice. After reuniting with her high school sweetheart, she wonders if she should stay and take over her father's practice.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
SnoozefestMovies like thisPromise at Dawn (1970)
A single mother raises her son in impossible circumstances first in Leningrad, then Krakow, and then France, and is over-ambitious about him but never gives in.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Mutants (2002)
Thirteen-year-old Paula lives with her mother on a well-kept estate in a small town surrounded by nice neighbours. But Paula's view of normality has been sharpened by her extensive and consistent diet of horror movies.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
The Skeleton Key (2005)
A hospice nurse working at a spooky New Orleans plantation home finds herself entangled in a mystery involving the house's dark past.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants (2005)
Four best friends (Tibby, Lena, Carmen & Bridget) who buy a mysterious pair of pants that fits each of them, despite their differing sizes, and makes whoever wears them feel fabulous. When faced with the prospect of spending their first summer apart, the pals decide they'll swap the pants so that each girl in turn can enjoy the magic.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisMiss Christmas (2017)
Holly Khun, known to Chicago as “Miss Christmas,” always finds a beautiful tree for the plaza, but this year’s was damaged, and the lighting ceremony is in 10 days. Hoping for a miracle, she combs through fan mail, and finds Joey McNary of Klaus, Wisconsin, has the perfect tree. Off she goes to Klaus, where she meets Joey’s handsome dad Sam.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisChristmas in Evergreen (2017)
Allie, a veterinarian in Evergreen, reluctantly will spend Christmas with her long-distance boyfriend. Bound for the airport, she has engine trouble, and Ryan, headed to Florida with his daughter Zoe, stops to help. Sure they won’t meet again, they ignore their attraction, and part ways. At the diner, Zoe wishes on a snow globe, and a storm seems to grant her wish.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like this
Like Instant Love and something else?
Blend two favourites and we’ll find the films in between.
Frequently asked questions
What are the best movies like Instant Love?
The closest matches to Instant Love are Hurry Sundown (1967), Little Lord Fauntleroy (1980) and Head Full of Honey (2018). Below are 27 more, each with the reason it matches.
What should I watch after Instant Love?
Start with Hurry Sundown (1967), the closest match to Instant Love.
What is the highest-rated movie like Instant Love?
Lucy Shimmers and the Prince of Peace (2020), rated 8.4/10 by 384 TMDB users.
What is the newest movie like Instant Love?
Omaha (2025) is the most recent release on this list.
How are movies similar to Instant Love chosen?
First come films that Trakt’s viewers watch alongside Instant Love, then TMDB’s recommendations and films it rates as similar in story and genre. Each pick says which signal put it there.