Movies like What a Mess (1982)
The best movies like What a Mess (1982) are The Trouble with Angels (1966), Thunderstruck (2012) and Freaky Friday (2003). If What a Mess hooked you with its comedy, these 30 similar films are what to watch next, and every pick says why it matches.
Quick picks
- Highest ratedCrimes and Misdemeanors (1989)7.4/10 from 990 votes
- NewestFreakier Friday (2025)Released 2025
- In GermanFrau Müller muss weg! (2015)Also in German
The Trouble with Angels (1966)
Mary and her friend, Rachel, are new students at St. Francis Academy, a boarding school run by the iron fist of Mother Superior. The immature teens grow bored and begin playing pranks on both the unsuspecting nuns and their unpleasant classmates, becoming a constant thorn in Mother Superior's side. However, as the years pass, Mary and Rachel slowly mature and begin to see the nuns in a different light.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both comedy
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThunderstruck (2012)
After NBA star Kevin Durant switches talent with 16 year old Brian, the teenager becomes the star of his high school team, but Durant starts struggling and eventually learns an important lesson.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both comedy
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisFreaky Friday (2003)
Mother and daughter bicker over everything -- what Anna wears, whom she likes and what she wants to do when she's older. In turn, Anna detests Tess's fiancé. When a magical fortune cookie switches their personalities, they each get a peek at how the other person feels, thinks and lives.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both comedy
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisFrau Müller muss weg! (2015)
Because of their children's bad grades, some parents want the teacher Mrs. Müller gone. They meet with Mrs. Müller and try to convince her to leave the class.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both comedy
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisMuch Ado About Nothing (2013)
A modern retelling of Shakespeare's classic comedy about two pairs of lovers with different takes on romance and a way with words.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both comedy
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisFreakier Friday (2025)
Years after Tess and Anna endured an identity crisis, Anna now has a daughter of her own and a soon-to-be stepdaughter. As they navigate the myriad challenges that come when two families merge, Tess and Anna discover lightning might indeed strike twice.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both comedy
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisRamona and Beezus (2010)
Ramona is a little girl with a very big imagination and a nose for mischief. Her playful antics keep everyone in her loving family on their toes, including her older sister Beezus, who's just trying to survive her first year of high school. Through all the ups and downs of childhood, Ramona and Beezus learn that anything's possible when you believe in yourself and rely on each other.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both comedy
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisMatilda (1996)
Matilda Wormwood is an brilliant and intelligent little girl. Unfortunately, her parents, Harry and Zinnia, fail to see that fact. As time passes, she finally starts school and has a kind teacher, loyal friends, and a terrifying, sadistic headmistress. As she becomes fed up with the constant cruelty, she discovers she has a special gift that she just might be able to use to outwit the unruly adults around her.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both comedy
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe Million Dollar Duck (1971)
Professor Dooley takes home a duck from his research laboratory as a toy for his son, but soon finds out that it lays golden eggs.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both comedy
SnoozefestMovies like thisDuplex (2003)
When a young couple buys their dream home, they have no idea what the sweet little old lady upstairs is going to put them through!
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both comedy
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisDennis the Menace (1993)
Mr. Wilson's ever-present annoyance comes in the form of one mischievous kid named Dennis. But he'll need Dennis's tricks to uncover a collection of gold coins that go missing when a shady drifter named Switchblade Sam comes to town.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both comedy
SnoozefestMovies like thisGabriel Iglesias: I'm Sorry for What I Said When I Was Hungry (2016)
Hawaiian-shirt enthusiast Gabriel "Fluffy" Iglesias finds the laughs in racist gift baskets, Prius-driving cops and all-female taco trucks.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both comedy
Worth the HypeMovies like thisLittle Big League (1994)
When the owner of the Minnesota Twins passes away, he bequeaths the team to his preteen grandson. The newly minted head honcho quickly appoints himself manager, causing unrest in an organization that struggles to take orders from a 12-year-old.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both comedy
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisJerry Seinfeld: 23 Hours to Kill (2020)
Jerry Seinfeld takes the stage in New York and tackles talking vs. texting, bad buffets vs. so-called "great" restaurants and the magic of Pop Tarts.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both comedy
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisSketch (2025)
When a young girl’s sketchbook falls into a strange pond, her drawings come to life—chaotic, real, and on the loose. As the town descends into chaos, her family must reunite and stop the monsters they never meant to unleash.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both comedy
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe Air Up There (1994)
Jimmy Dolan is a college basketball coach who wants a big promotion. To get it, he needs to make a dramatic find. He ends up deep in Africa, hoping to recruit Saleh, a huge basketball prodigy Jimmy glimpsed in a home movie. But Saleh is the chief's son and has responsibilities at home, since the tribe's land is threatened by a mining company with its own hotshot basketball team.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both comedy
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisBeverly Hills Chihuahua 2 (2011)
Puppy mayhem turns the lives of newlywed Chihuahua parents Papi and Chloe upside down when their rambunctious, mischievous puppies present one challenge after another. But when their human owners end up in trouble, the tiny pups will stop at nothing to save them - because in good times and hard times, the family always sticks together. So Papi, Chloe and the puppies embark on a heroic adventure, proving once again that big heroes come in small packages.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both comedy
SnoozefestMovies like thisMonkey Business (1952)
Research chemist Barnaby Fulton works on a fountain of youth pill for a chemical company. One of the labs chimps gets loose in the laboratory and mixes chemicals, but then pours the mix into the water cooler. When trying one of his own samples, washed down with water from the cooler, Fulton begins to act just like a twenty-year-old and believes his potion is working. Soon his wife and boss are also behaving like children.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both comedy
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Family Jewels (1965)
A young heiress must choose between six uncles, one of which is up to no good and out to harm the girl's beloved bodyguard who practically raised her.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both comedy
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisMr. Bones (2001)
A medicine man is sent looking for the son of his tribal king, and brings back an American golfer and a host of goons intent on keeping him in the golf tournament.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both comedy
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisCat Ballou (1965)
A woman seeking revenge for her murdered father hires a famous gunman, but he's very different from what she expects.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both comedy
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisLeprechaun (1993)
A demonic leprechaun terrorizes a group of young people whom he believes stole his gold.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both comedy
SnoozefestMovies like thisCurly Sue (1991)
Bill is a penniless drifter who scams strangers out of just enough money to feed himself and his partner in crime, an orphan girl known as Curly Sue. Bill and Curly Sue target Grey, a yuppie lawyer, but their con takes an unexpected turn when the successful woman begins to like the ramshackle duo. But there's one problem—Grey's jealous, conniving boyfriend, Walker.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both comedy
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisCrazy Race 2 - Warum die Mauer wirklich fiel (2004)
In 1989, Jenny Ecker, an 18-year-old daughter of an entrepreneur, flees from Hildesheim to the east - out of love. The teenager has fallen hopelessly in love with an East Berliner. Jenny’s parents are foaming from wrath and offer a reward: One-hundred thousand, later even a million, deutschmarks for whoever brings them their daughter back. The prospect of so much money gets east and west into quite a disarray – and in the end, the Wall really falls.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both comedy
Crimes and Misdemeanors (1989)
A renowned ophthalmologist is desperate to cut off an adulterous relationship…which ends up in murder; and a frustrated documentary filmmaker woos an attractive television producer while making a film about her insufferably self-centered boss.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both comedy
Worth the HypeMovies like thisFather of the Bride (1991)
George Banks is an ordinary, middle-class man whose 22 year-old daughter Annie has decided to marry a man from an upper-class family, but George can't think of what life would be like without his daughter. His wife tries to make him happy for Annie, but when the wedding takes place at their home and a foreign wedding planner takes over the ceremony, he becomes slightly insane.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both comedy
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisFather of the Bride Part II (1995)
Just when George Banks has recovered from his daughter's wedding, he receives the news that she's pregnant ... and that George's wife is expecting too. He was planning on selling their home, but that's a plan that—like George—will have to change with the arrival of both a grandchild and a kid of his own.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both comedy
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Miser (1980)
The children of Harpagon, Cléante and his sister Elise, are each in love but they still haven’t spoken to their father yet. Harpagon is a miser who wants to choose the right man and the right woman for his children. Based on Molière’s play.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both comedy
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisPippi Longstocking (1997)
Pippi Longstocking is an extraordinary little girl who lives alone in her house, while her father sails the seven seas. Pippi's irrepressibly fun nature makes her easy to befriend, as neighbors Tommy and Annika find, but can also earn ire, especially from social worker Mrs. Prysselius.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both comedy
SnoozefestMovies like thisA Serious Man (2009)
It is 1967, and Larry Gopnik, a physics professor at a quiet Midwestern university, has just been informed by his wife Judith that she is leaving him. He scrambles to find a semblance of meaning as he loses control of nearly every aspect of his life.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both comedy
Popcorn FlickMovies like this
Like What a Mess and something else?
Blend two favourites and we’ll find the films in between.
Frequently asked questions
What are the best movies like What a Mess?
The closest matches to What a Mess are The Trouble with Angels (1966), Thunderstruck (2012) and Freaky Friday (2003). Below are 27 more, each with the reason it matches.
What should I watch after What a Mess?
Start with The Trouble with Angels (1966), the closest match to What a Mess.
What is the highest-rated movie like What a Mess?
Crimes and Misdemeanors (1989), rated 7.4/10 by 990 TMDB users.
What is the newest movie like What a Mess?
Freakier Friday (2025) is the most recent release on this list.
Are there German movies like What a Mess?
Yes: Frau Müller muss weg! (2015) and Crazy Race 2 - Warum die Mauer wirklich fiel (2004).
How are movies similar to What a Mess chosen?
First come films that Trakt’s viewers watch alongside What a Mess, then TMDB’s recommendations and films it rates as similar in story and genre. Each pick says which signal put it there.