Movies like Chillu (1982)
The best movies like Chillu (1982) are Hounddog (2008), Bastard Out of Carolina (1996) and Eleanor the Great (2025). If Chillu hooked you with its drama, these 30 similar films are what to watch next, and every pick says why it matches.
Quick picks
- Highest ratedWhat Maisie Knew (2013)7.1/10 from 465 votes
- NewestEleanor the Great (2025)Released 2025
Hounddog (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 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 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 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 thisBobby Jones: Stroke of Genius (2004)
The story of golf icon and legend, Bobby Jones, who retired from competition at the tender age of 28.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
SnoozefestMovies like thisRebound: The Legend of Earl 'The Goat' Manigault (1996)
A dramatization of the life of Earl 'The Goat' Manigault (Don Cheadle), with a lot of factual based occurrences. A reformed junkie returns from prison to clean up his act and devote the rest of his life to the young kids of Harlem. 1996 was the 25th anniversary of the first tournament named after him.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe Congress (2013)
An aging, out-of-work actress accepts one last job, though the consequences of her decision affect her in ways she didn't consider.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Young One (1960)
A jazz musician seeks refuge from a lynch mob on a remote island, where he meets a hostile game warden and the young object of his attentions.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies 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 thisCall Me Crazy: A Five Film (2013)
A psychotherapist helps a law student cope with schizophrenia in one of five interconnected tales dealing with mental illness.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies 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 thisGirl in the Box (2016)
The true story of 20-year-old Colleen Stan, a hitchhiking woman abducted by a young couple and held captive for seven years, during which time she's tortured and forced to live as a slave to her captors.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisHoly 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 thisWhat Maisie Knew (2013)
In New York City, six-year-old Maisie is caught in the middle of a bitter custody battle between her self-absorbed parents—an aging rock singer mother and a distracted art dealer father. As both quickly marry new partners to strengthen their legal standing, Maisie is shuttled back and forth in an endless game of emotional point-scoring. Yet amid the chaos and upheaval, Maisie begins to find true comfort and affection in her new step-parents.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisGoal II: Living the Dream (2007)
Tempted away from Newcastle United to join Real Madrid, rising star Santiago Munez finds this latest change of fortune the greatest challenge yet - personally as well as professionally. He is reunited with Gavin Harris, though they must compete to be on the team, and estranged from fiancee Roz, whose nursing career keeps her back home.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
SnoozefestMovies like thisThe Short History of the Long Road (2019)
Nola grew up living in a van with her father, Clint—two nomads against the world. When tragedy strikes, Nola must confront the reality of life on the road alone, learning to own her grief, her past, and her new destination.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisTalhotBlond (2012)
Thomas Montgomery, a married father of two young daughters, gets seduced by the world of online gambling and chat rooms where a virtual romance and sexual obsession ultimately leads to the murder of an innocent man.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisShirley (2020)
A famous horror writer finds inspiration for her next book after she and her husband take in a young couple.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisMindwalk (1991)
On the French island of Mont Saint-Michel, Jack, a failed presidential candidate, Tom, a poet and Sonia, a physicist, engage in an intellectual conversation about politics, philosophy and life over the course of a single day.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisHands of Stone (2016)
The legendary Roberto Duran and his equally legendary trainer Ray Arcel change each other's lives.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisA Flash Of Passion (2025)
A deliciously dramtic telenovela short film. The 7th Tickle Gang film produced for a 48-hour film festival.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Three (2005)
After a yachting accident, a millionaire and his wife are shipwrecked on a desert island along with their former deckhand, Manuel.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
SnoozefestMovies like thisWithdrawal (2025)
Artistic lovers, Viv and Jay, have become trapped in a vicious cycle of codependent heroin addiction. But when Viv’s wealthy parents hire an interventionist to take Viv to rehab, the couple decides to set off on their own with the help of a suboxone prescription... all they have to do is survive a harrowing night through drug withdrawal.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Kiss the Bride (2007)
In high school, Matt and Ryan were best friends. More than friends, actually. But in the ensuing ten years, they've lost contact. So when Matt receives an invitation to Ryan's wedding he's surprised - especially that Ryan is marrying a woman!
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
SnoozefestMovies like thisThe Year My Voice Broke (1987)
Set in 1962, a young prepubescent boy in rural Australia watches painfully as his best friend and first love blossoms into womanhood and falls for a thuggish rugby player, changing the lives of everyone involved.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
The Manxman (1929)
A fisherman and a rising lawyer who grew up together as brothers fall in love with the same woman.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisDaisy Kenyon (1947)
Daisy Kenyon is a Manhattan commercial artist having an affair with an arrogant and overbearing but successful lawyer and family man named Dan O'Mara. Daisy meets a single man, a war veteran named Peter Lapham, and after a brief and hesitant courtship decides to marry him, although she is still in love with Dan.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisPuccini for Beginners (2006)
When her inability to commit leads to a breakup with her girlfriend, opera-loving writer Allegra winds up in the bed of amiable professor Philip. He is so smitten with Allegra that he dumps his lover, Grace, and convinces Allegra to continue their affair. When Allegra meets Grace, sparks fly, and she begins a parallel romance, unaware that her new lover is the woman Philip left to be with her.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
SnoozefestMovies like thisNearing Grace (2006)
Having recently lost his mother, teenager Henry Nearing develops a crush on seductive classmate Grace, who toys with him. Though he has been friends with Merna for a long time, he fails to see her sincere attraction to him, and instead wastes time with the uncaring Grace.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Taal (1999)
Businessman Manav falls for aspiring singer, Mansi, but their romance faces an uphill climb when Manav must depart and Mansi's suave manager moves in.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like this
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Frequently asked questions
What are the best movies like Chillu?
The closest matches to Chillu are Hounddog (2008), Bastard Out of Carolina (1996) and Eleanor the Great (2025). Below are 27 more, each with the reason it matches.
What should I watch after Chillu?
Start with Hounddog (2008), the closest match to Chillu.
What is the highest-rated movie like Chillu?
What Maisie Knew (2013), rated 7.1/10 by 465 TMDB users.
What is the newest movie like Chillu?
Eleanor the Great (2025) is the most recent release on this list.
Are there Malayalam movies like Chillu?
The closest matches are in other languages.
How are movies similar to Chillu chosen?
First come films that Trakt’s viewers watch alongside Chillu, then TMDB’s recommendations and films it rates as similar in story and genre. Each pick says which signal put it there.