Movies like Vanilla Sky (2001)
The best movies like Vanilla Sky (2001) are Frequencies (2013), Dead Again (1991) and Dark City (1998). If Vanilla Sky hooked you with its mystery and romance, these 30 similar films are what to watch next, and every pick says why it matches.
Quick picks
- Highest ratedTwelve Monkeys (1995)7.6/10 from 9,539 votes
- NewestCaddo Lake (2024)Released 2024
Frequencies (2013)
The story of the forbidden relationship between a 'low born' boy and a 'high born' girl in an alternate reality where every person's relationships and life worth are determined by their innate 'frequencies'.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both romance & science fiction
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisDead Again (1991)
In 1949, composer Roman Strauss is executed for the murder of his wife. In 1990s Los Angeles, a detective comes across a mute amnesiac woman who is somehow linked to the Strauss murder.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both mystery & romance
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisDark City (1998)
A man struggles with memories of his past, including a wife he cannot remember, in a nightmarish world with no sun and run by beings with telekinetic powers who seek the souls of humans.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both mystery & science fiction
Worth the HypeMovies like thisWifelike (2022)
A grieving detective in the near-future hunts down criminals who trade artificial humans on the black market. In the fight to end AI exploitation, an underground resistance attempts to infiltrate him by sabotaging the programming of the artificial human assigned as his companion to behave like his late wife. She begins to question her reality as memories of a past life begin to surface in a world where nothing is as it seems.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction & mystery
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisMarnie (1964)
Marnie is a beautiful but emotionally withdrawn thief, stealing from employers before disappearing under new identities. When her new boss, Mark Rutland, discovers her secret, his fascination turns to obsession, and he blackmails her into marriage, convinced he can cure her. But as he probes deeper into Marnie’s fractured mind, long-buried fears and compulsions begin to surface.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both mystery & romance
Worth the HypeMovies like thisTwelve Monkeys (1995)
In the year 2035, convict James Cole reluctantly volunteers to be sent back in time to discover the origin of a deadly virus that wiped out nearly all of the earth's population and forced the survivors into underground communities. But when Cole is mistakenly sent to 1990 instead of 1996, he's arrested and locked up in a mental hospital. There he meets psychiatrist Dr. Kathryn Railly and the son of a famous virus expert who may hold the key to the Army of the 12 Monkeys; thought to be responsible for unleashing the killer disease.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction & mystery
Worth the HypeMovies like thisWomb (2010)
A woman's consuming love forces her to bear the clone of her dead beloved. From his infancy to manhood, she faces the unavoidable complexities of her controversial decision.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both romance & science fiction
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Forgotten (2004)
Telly Paretta is a grieving mother struggling to cope with the loss of her 9-year-old son. She is stunned when her psychiatrist reveals that she has created nine years of memories about a son she never had. But when she remembers a man who had a similar experience, Telly embarks on a search to prove her son's existence, and her sanity.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both mystery & science fiction
SnoozefestMovies like thisCaddo Lake (2024)
When an 8-year-old girl mysteriously vanishes on Caddo Lake, a series of past deaths and disappearances begin to link together, forever altering a broken family’s history.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both mystery & science fiction
Worth the HypeMovies like thisHypnotic (2023)
A detective becomes entangled in a mystery involving his missing daughter and a secret government program while investigating a string of reality-bending crimes.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both mystery & science fiction
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisBlack Mirror: Bandersnatch (2018)
In 1984, a young programmer begins to question reality as he adapts a dark fantasy novel into a video game. A mind-bending tale with multiple endings.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction & mystery
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisCube (1998)
A group of strangers find themselves trapped in a maze-like prison. It soon becomes clear that each of them possesses the peculiar skills necessary to escape, if they don't wind up dead first.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction & mystery
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisAnon (2018)
Set in a near-future world where there is no privacy, ignorance or anonymity, our private memories are recorded and crime almost ceases to exist. In trying to solve a series of unsolved murders, Sal Frieland stumbles onto a young woman who appears to have subverted the system and disappeared. She has no identity, no history and no record. Sal realizes it may not be the end of crime but the beginning. Known only as 'The Girl', Sal must find her before he becomes the next victim.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction & mystery
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisOtherLife (2017)
Ren Amari is the driven inventor of a revolutionary new drug. OtherLife expands the brain's sense of time and creates virtual reality directly in the user's mind. With OtherLife, mere seconds in real life feel like hours or days of exciting adventures. As Ren and her colleagues race around the clock to launch OtherLife, the government muscles in to use the drugs as a radical solution to prison overcrowding. They will create virtual cells where criminals serve long sentences in just minutes of real time. When Ren resists, she finds herself an unwilling guinea pig trapped in a prison cell in her mind. She must escape before she descends into madness, and then regain control of OtherLife before others suffer the same fate.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction & mystery
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisWhat Happened to Monday (2017)
In a world where families are limited to one child due to overpopulation, a set of identical septuplets must avoid being put to a long sleep by the government and dangerous infighting while investigating the disappearance of one of their own.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction & mystery
Worth the HypeMovies like thisShuffle (2012)
Lovell Milo is a man who begins experiencing his life out of order; every day he wakes up at a different age, on a different day of his life, never knowing where or when he’s going to be once he falls asleep. He’s terrified and wants it to stop - until he notices a pattern in his experience, and works to uncover why this is happening to him - and what or who is behind it.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both mystery & romance
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisReminiscence (2021)
Nicolas Bannister, a rugged and solitary veteran living in a near-future Miami flooded by rising seas, is an expert in a dangerous occupation: he offers clients the chance to relive any memory they desire. His life changes when he meets a mysterious young woman named Mae. What begins as a simple matter of lost and found becomes a passionate love affair. But when a different client's memories implicate Mae in a series of violent crimes, Bannister must delve through the dark world of the past to uncover the truth about the woman he fell for.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both mystery & science fiction
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisZoe (2018)
Two colleagues at a revolutionary research lab design technology to improve and perfect romantic relationships. As their work progresses, their discoveries become more profound.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction & romance
SnoozefestMovies like thisAll Good Things (2010)
Newly-discovered facts, court records and speculation are used to elaborate the true love story and murder mystery of the most notorious unsolved murder case in New York history.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both mystery & romance
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisEnter Nowhere (2015)
Three strangers arrive one by one to a mysterious cabin in the middle of nowhere after enduring separate life-altering predicaments. Searching for a way out of the woods, frustrated, hungry and battling to stay warm they discover their mysterious connection and realize what they have to do in order to get out of the woods alive.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both mystery & science fiction
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Jacket (2005)
A military veteran goes on a journey into the future, where he can foresee his death and is left with questions that could save his life and those he loves.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both mystery & science fiction
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisMaya (1961)
Disillusioned with his wealthy friends, a man pretends to be poor and goes to live in the slums where he falls in love with a burglar's sister.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both romance
Windstruck (2004)
Kyung-jin, a police officer who finds herself chasing down a suspected bag-snatcher on her day off. However, the man she catches turns out to be Myungwoo, a passer-by who was himself trying to apprehend the real criminal.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both romance
Worth the HypeMovies like thisRing Around the Rosie (2006)
While spending time at her grandparent's secluded summerhouse to clean up the place after her grandmother's death, a young woman is plagued by horrible visions and dreams of tragic past events.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both mystery
SnoozefestMovies like thisMaterial Girls (2006)
Two wealthy sisters, both heiresses to their family's cosmetics fortune, are given a wake-up call when a scandal and ensuing investigation strip them of their wealth.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both romance
SnoozefestMovies like thisGet Over It (2001)
When Berke Landers, a popular high school basketball star, gets dumped by his life-long girlfriend, Allison, he soon begins to lose it. But with the help of his best friend Felix's sister Kelly, he follows his ex into the school's spring musical. Thus ensues a love triangle loosely based upon Shakespeare's "A Midsummer Night's Dream", where Berke is only to find himself getting over Allison and beginning to fall for Kelly.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both romance
SnoozefestMovies like thisDragonfly (2002)
A grieving doctor is being contacted by his late wife through his patient's near death experiences.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both mystery
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisHouse of Wax (2005)
A group of unwitting teens are stranded near a strange wax museum and soon must fight to survive and keep from becoming the next exhibit.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both mystery
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisCypher (2002)
An unsuspecting, disenchanted man finds himself working as a spy in the dangerous, high-stakes world of corporate espionage. Quickly getting way over-his-head, he teams up with a mysterious femme fatale.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both science fiction
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisAngel Passing (1998)
An aging concert pianist in a nursing home, suffering from Alzheimers, revisits his past. When he comes back to his home, now occupied by an artist, a touching bond develops for a few moments between them. Two strangers, one asking for forgiveness about his past, the other with the ability to forgive in her own life. A touching short, with very few words but deeply portrayed feelings.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both romance
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Frequently asked questions
What are the best movies like Vanilla Sky?
The closest matches to Vanilla Sky are Frequencies (2013), Dead Again (1991) and Dark City (1998). Below are 27 more, each with the reason it matches.
What should I watch after Vanilla Sky?
Start with Frequencies (2013), the closest match to Vanilla Sky.
What is the highest-rated movie like Vanilla Sky?
Twelve Monkeys (1995), rated 7.6/10 by 9,539 TMDB users.
What is the newest movie like Vanilla Sky?
Caddo Lake (2024) is the most recent release on this list.
Are there English movies like Vanilla Sky?
Yes: Frequencies (2013), Dead Again (1991) and Dark City (1998).
How are movies similar to Vanilla Sky chosen?
First come films that Trakt’s viewers watch alongside Vanilla Sky, then TMDB’s recommendations and films it rates as similar in story and genre. Each pick says which signal put it there.