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Movies like The Public House (1989)

The best movies like The Public House (1989) are Hello Sister, Goodbye Life (2006), Heaven (2019) and Anne of Green Gables (2016). If The Public House hooked you with its drama and tv movie, these 30 similar films are what to watch next, and every pick says why it matches.

Quick picks

  1. Hello Sister, Goodbye Life (2006)

    A college student must take care of her 7-year-old half sister after the death of their parents.

    Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama

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  2. Heaven (2019)

    Heaven Leigh Casteel, gifted and intelligent, is the eldest of five dirt-poor children struggling to survive in a mountain shack. As she endures neglect and abuse, Heaven discovers a dark secret that changes everything she thought she knew about her family. Then tragedy tears her world apart and she must forge her own way in the cruel, unknown world.

    Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama

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  3. Anne of Green Gables (2016)

    Anne Shirley, an orphan, is fostered by farmer Matthew Cuthbert and his sister Marilla, who were expecting a boy to be sent them to help with their farm work. They accept Anne, who quickly endears herself to them and to the local villagers.

    Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama

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  4. Rebound: 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 this
  5. TalhotBlond (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

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  6. Girl 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

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  7. The 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

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  8. American Son (2019)

    Time passes and tension mounts in a Florida police station as an estranged interracial couple awaits news of their missing teenage son.

    Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama

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  9. Homeless to Harvard: The Liz Murray Story (2003)

    Based on a true story. Liz Murray is a young girl who is taken care of by her loving, but drug-addicted parents. Liz becomes homeless at 15 and after a tragedy comes upon her, she begins her work to finish high school.

    Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama

    Worth the HypeMovies like this
  10. Fab Five: The Texas Cheerleader Scandal (2008)

    Based on a true story. Five high school cheerleaders, including the daughter of the school principal, run amok -- and teachers, parents and administrators allow them to get away with a wide range of scandalous behavior. Known as the "Fab Five," the girls disregard school rules, drink alcohol and post suggestive pictures on the Internet. But when the new cheerleading coach attempts to discipline them, her superiors ask her to resign.

    Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama

  11. Personal Effects (2009)

    Walter is a rising star in the NCAA wrestling world until his life is ripped apart by the brutal murder of his sister. Returning home to console his mother Gloria he seeks vengeance on the man who is accused of the crime. A chance meeting with a beautiful mature woman gives him solace to the situation. Will this unlikely pairing bloom into a romance and heal a wound the world cannot see or will the loss of his sister push him over the edge?

    Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama

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  12. Return to Zero (2014)

    Based on the true story of a successful couple, Maggie and Aaron who are preparing for the arrival of their first child.

    Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama

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  13. Cheaters (2000)

    In the fall of 1994, a teacher at Chicago's run-down Steinmetz High conspires with the school's academic decathlon team to cheat on an academic competition.

    Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama

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  14. My Dinner with Hervé (2018)

    An unlikely friendship evolves over one wild night in LA between a struggling journalist and actor Hervé Villechaize, the world's most famous gun-toting dwarf, resulting in life-changing consequences for both.

    Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama

    Popcorn FlickMovies like this
  15. ...First Do No Harm (1997)

    When Lori Reimuller learns that her young son Robbie has epilepsy, she first trusts the judgment of the hospital staff in how best to bring it under control. As Robbie's health slides radically downhill, however, she becomes frustrated and desperate, and so does her own research into the existing literature on treatments. When she decides to try an alternative treatment called the Ketogenic Diet, devised long ago by a doctor from Johns Hopkins, she is met with narrow-minded resistance from Robbie's doctor, who is prepared to take legal action to prevent Lori from removing him from the hospital.

    Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama

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  16. I Am Elizabeth Smart (2017)

    The story of Elizabeth Smart's kidnapping and captivity, as told from her perspective.

    Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama

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  17. Seeds of Yesterday (2015)

    The Sheffield family reveal and go through some home truths as their middle child inherits the Foxworth mansion. The family's ghosts looming over, and more tragedies are in store as the curse lives on.

    Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama

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  18. Horns (2013)

    In the aftermath of his girlfriend's mysterious death, a young man awakens to strange horns sprouting from his temples.

    Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama

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  19. Evelyn (2002)

    Desmond Doyle is devastated when his wife abandons their family on the day after Christmas. His unemployment, and the fact that there is no woman in the house to care for the children—Evelyn, Dermot and Maurice—make it clear to the authorities this is an untenable situation. The Catholic Church and the Irish courts decide to put the Doyle children into Church-run orphanages.

    Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama

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  20. Second Best (1994)

    The difficult relationship between a british postal officer and his adoptive son.

    Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama

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  21. Betrayal of Silence (1988)

    A new lawyer investigates the abuse case of a young orphan girl and begins to believe that the orphanage priests have something to hide.

    Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama

  22. Casey's Gift: For Love of a Child (1990)

    The friendships held between two families is threatened when one of their sons drowns in the other family's swimming pool.

    Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama

  23. Oliver Twist (2005)

    An orphan endures a harsh life in a workhouse before fleeing to London, where he falls in with a gang of juvenile pickpockets led by the criminal Fagin, and eventually finds a better life, exposing the cruelties of poverty and child labor in Victorian England.

    Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama

    Popcorn FlickMovies like this
  24. Summer Things (2002)

    Two couple of friends, one very rich, the other almost homeless, decide to go on Holiday. Julie, a single mother, joins them too. Once at seaside, it starts a complicate love cross among them that will involve also a transsexual, a jealous brother, a Latin Lover and another nervous stressed couple. Not to mention about the daughter of one of them that is secretly in Chicago with one of her father's employees... At the end of the summer, all of them will join the same party...

    Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama

  25. The Little Princess (1939)

    A little girl goes in search of her father who is reported missing by the military during the Second Boer War.

    Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama

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  26. Blue Miracle (2021)

    To save their cash-strapped orphanage, a guardian and his kids partner with a washed-up boat captain for a chance to win a lucrative fishing competition.

    Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama

    Worth the HypeMovies like this
  27. Sundays and Cybele (1962)

    The tragic story of a young orphan girl who is befriended by an innocent but emotionally disabled veteran of the French Indochina War.

    Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama

    Worth the HypeMovies like this
  28. Rabbit Hole (2010)

    Life for a happy couple is turned upside down after their young son dies in an accident.

    Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama

    Popcorn FlickMovies like this
  29. Indra (2002)

    A man embarks on a quest to make peace between two families fighting over the water problem in their district. In a bid to solve this crisis, he agrees to marry a girl from the rival family.

    Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama

  30. The Unseen (2017)

    After the tragic loss of their son, perfect couple Gemma and Will begin to experience strange auditory hallucinations and losses of vision, as they attempt to escape their worries while vacationing at an acquaintance's remote cottage in the Lake District.

    Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama

Like The Public House and something else?

Blend two favourites and we’ll find the films in between.

Frequently asked questions

What are the best movies like The Public House?

The closest matches to The Public House are Hello Sister, Goodbye Life (2006), Heaven (2019) and Anne of Green Gables (2016). Below are 27 more, each with the reason it matches.

What should I watch after The Public House?

Start with Hello Sister, Goodbye Life (2006), the closest match to The Public House.

What is the highest-rated movie like The Public House?

Blue Miracle (2021), rated 7.3/10 by 312 TMDB users.

What is the newest movie like The Public House?

Blue Miracle (2021) is the most recent release on this list.

How are movies similar to The Public House chosen?

First come films that Trakt’s viewers watch alongside The Public House, then TMDB’s recommendations and films it rates as similar in story and genre. Each pick says which signal put it there.

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