Movies like The Idea of a Lake (2016)
The best movies like The Idea of a Lake (2016) are Holy Lands (2019), The Beloved (2026) and The Safety of Objects (2002). If The Idea of a Lake hooked you with its drama, these 30 similar films are what to watch next, and every pick says why it matches.
Quick picks
- Highest ratedUnder the Same Moon (2007)8.0/10 from 378 votes
- NewestThe Beloved (2026)Released 2026
- In SpanishThe Beloved (2026)Also in Spanish
Holy Lands (2019)
When lapsed Jew and former cardiologist Harry suddenly decides to spend his retirement as a pig farmer in Nazareth, Israel, the move deeply shocks his family and his new neighbours. Back in New York, Harry’s ex-wife Monica is trying to manage the lives of their adult children, Annabelle and David, as well as her own.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Beloved (2026)
Acclaimed film director Esteban Martínez is a legend both for his films and for his past marked by violence and excess. For his latest project, he offers his daughter Emilia a role under the pretext of helping her with her stalled acting career. Living together on set will foster a closeness they haven’t shared for years, but it will also reopen old wounds that never healed.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Safety of Objects (2002)
In a suburban landscape, the lives of several families interlace with loss, despair and personal crisis. Esther Gold has lost focus on all but caring for her comatose son, Paul, and neglects her daughter and husband. Lawyer Jim Train is devoted to his career, not his family. Helen Christianson wants to find a new spark in life, while Annette Jennings tries to rebuild hers.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisBastard Out of Carolina (1996)
A poor, struggling South Carolinian mother and daughter face painful choices with their resolve and pride. Bone, the eldest daughter, and Anney her tired mother, grow both closer and farther apart: Anney sees Glen as her last chance.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisUnder the Same Moon (2007)
Tells the parallel stories of nine-year-old Carlitos and his mother, Rosario. In the hopes of providing a better life for her son, Rosario works illegally in the U.S. while her mother cares for Carlitos back in Mexico.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisHounddog (2008)
A drama set in the American South, where a precocious, troubled girl finds a safe haven in the music and movement of Elvis Presley.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisA Taste of Honey (1961)
While out to avoid spending time with her narcissistic and promiscuous mother, sixteen-year-old Jo has a brief affair that leaves her pregnant and abandoned. When her mother remarries, Jo's only support becomes her friend Geoffrey, a homosexual.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisChile '76 (2022)
Chile, 1976. Carmen heads off to her beach house. When the family priest asks her to take care of a young man he is sheltering in secret, Carmen steps onto unexplored territories, away from the quiet life she is used to.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisWasp (2003)
Zoë is a single mother who lives with her four children in Dartford. She is poor and can't afford to buy food. One day her old flame drives by and asks her to go on a date with him. Scared that he doesn't want to go out with her, she lies and tells him that she is just babysitting the kids. This will be her first date in years.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe Girl in the Book (2015)
The story of a young writer's transformation when her past invades her present.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
SnoozefestMovies like thisI Believe in Unicorns (2015)
Feeling awkward and isolated, an imaginative and strong-willed teenage girl runs away from home with an older punk rock drifter.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisStrange Weather (2016)
Years after her son's suicide, a woman longs to confront both the past and a friend of his who took his business idea.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
SnoozefestMovies like thisLinda (2024)
Self-assured, mysterious, and captivating Linda agrees to work at an affluent home in Buenos Aires. Her charm sparks strong sexual attraction among all members of the family, exposing how fragile their externally happy veneer really is.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisA Thousand and One (2023)
Struggling but unapologetically living on her own terms, Inez is moving from shelter to shelter in mid-1990s New York City. With her 6-year-old son Terry in foster care and unable to leave him again, she kidnaps him so they can build their life together. As the years go by, their family grows and Terry becomes a smart yet quiet teenager, but the secret that has defined their lives threatens to destroy the home they have so improbably built.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Truth About Emanuel (2013)
A troubled young woman becomes obsessed with her mysterious new neighbor, who bears a striking resemblance to the girl's dead mother.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisTótem (2023)
In a bustling Mexican household, seven-year-old Sol is swept up in a whirlwind of preparations for the birthday party for her father, Tona, led by her mother, aunts, and other relatives. As the day goes on, building to an event both anticipated and dreaded, Sol begins to understand the gravity of the celebration this year and watches as her family does the same.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Tree of Blood (2018)
Marc and Rebeca, a young couple, travel to an old country house that used to belong to their family. Once there, they write the shared history of their roots, creating a huge family tree that harbours relationships of love, heartbreak, sex, madness, jealousy and infidelity, and under which also lies a history laden with secrets.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisMy Zoe (2019)
Isabelle, a geneticist recovering from a toxic marriage, is raising her only daughter, Zoe, with her contentious ex-husband. Zoe means everything to her mother and so when tragedy strikes the fractured family, Isabelle travels to Russia in seeking the help of a world-renowned fertility physician who Isabelle believes can help bring back her little girl.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisIron Jawed Angels (2004)
Defiant young activists take the women's suffrage movement by storm, putting their lives at risk to help American women win the right to vote.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisA Dry White Season (1989)
During the 1976 Soweto uprising, a white school teacher's life and values are threatened when he asks questions about the death of a young black boy who died in police custody.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisFatso (1980)
Dominick DiNapoli is a man who loves food and is overweight as a result. After an obese cousin dies due to health problems, Dominick's sister Antoinette sets out to help him lose weight. Although he has a hard time trying to slim down, Dominick finds inspiration when he meets and falls for shop owner Lydia. Can he get up the courage to ask her out, or will he go back to the comfort of overeating?
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
SnoozefestMovies like thisIn My Life (2009)
A headstrong woman moves to New York and must come to terms with her estranged gay son and his partner.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Wilma or The Ghosts of Freedom (2025)
Wilma has many qualifications and talents, yet suffers just as many disappointments in life. After she catches her husband cheating, she runs away to Vienna in search of a new life. There she lives with bustling bohemians, tries her luck at a variety of jobs and perhaps... at love again.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Veni Vidi Vici (2024)
The Maynards and their children lead an almost perfect billionaire family life. Amon is a passionate hunter, but doesn’t shoot animals, as the family's wealth allows them to live totally free from consequences.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
H7N3 (2014)
A doctor struggles with his professional obligations as he attempts to diagnose a little girl's alarming symptoms on the eve of a viral outbreak.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Bran Nue Dae (2009)
In the Summer of 1965 a young man is filled with the life of the idyllic old pearling port Broome - fishing, hanging out with his mates and his girl. However his mother returns him to the religious mission for further schooling. After being punished for an act of youthful rebellion, he runs away from the mission on a journey that ultimately leads him back home.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Heidi (1968)
Heidi is an orphaned girl initially raised by her aunt Dete in Maienfeld, Switzerland. In order to get a job in Frankfurt, Dete brings 5-year-old Heidi to her grandfather, who has been at odds with the villagers for years and lives in seclusion on the alm. He at first resents Heidi's arrival, but the girl manages to penetrate his harsh exterior and subsequently has a delightful stay with him and her best friend, young Peter the goat-herd.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Check-Up (TBA)
Two brothers united by the game, and broken by the passion
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
My Family (1995)
Traces over three generations an immigrant family's trials, tribulations, tragedies, and triumphs. Maria and Jose, the first generation, come to Los Angeles, meet, marry, face deportation all in the 1930s. They establish their family in East L.A., and their children Chucho, Paco, Memo, Irene, Toni, and Jimmy deal with youth culture and the L.A. police in the '50s. As the second generation become adults in the '60s, the focus shifts to Jimmy, his marriage to Isabel (a Salvadorian refugee), their son, and Jimmy's journey to becoming a responsible parent.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisSeven Minutes in Heaven (1986)
Natalie allows her classmate Jeff, who has run away from home, to stay at her place while her father is away on a business trip. Natalie soon starts dating Jeff's friend James Casey, who isn't as faithful as she thinks, while her best friend Polly falls in love with baseball player Zoo Knudsen.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
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Frequently asked questions
What are the best movies like The Idea of a Lake?
The closest matches to The Idea of a Lake are Holy Lands (2019), The Beloved (2026) and The Safety of Objects (2002). Below are 27 more, each with the reason it matches.
What should I watch after The Idea of a Lake?
Start with Holy Lands (2019), the closest match to The Idea of a Lake.
What is the highest-rated movie like The Idea of a Lake?
Under the Same Moon (2007), rated 8.0/10 by 378 TMDB users.
What is the newest movie like The Idea of a Lake?
The Beloved (2026) is the most recent release on this list.
Are there Spanish movies like The Idea of a Lake?
Yes: The Beloved (2026), Under the Same Moon (2007) and Chile '76 (2022).
How are movies similar to The Idea of a Lake chosen?
First come films that Trakt’s viewers watch alongside The Idea of a Lake, then TMDB’s recommendations and films it rates as similar in story and genre. Each pick says which signal put it there.