Movies like I am William (2017)
The best movies like I am William (2017) are Secondhand Lions (2003), Uncle Buck (1989) and An Autumn Romance (2021). If I am William hooked you with its family, these 30 similar films are what to watch next, and every pick says why it matches.
Quick picks
- Highest ratedThe Secret Garden (1993)7.4/10 from 1,027 votes
- NewestThe Unbreakable Boy (2025)Released 2025
Secondhand Lions (2003)
The comedic adventures of an introverted boy left on the doorstep of a pair of reluctant, eccentric great-uncles, whose exotic remembrances stir the boy's spirit and re-ignite the men's lives.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both family
Worth the HypeMovies like thisUncle Buck (1989)
Buck Russell, a lovable but slovenly bachelor, suddenly becomes the temporary caretaker of his nephew and nieces after a family emergency. His freewheeling attitude soon causes tension with his older niece Tia, loyal girlfriend Chanice, and just about everyone else who crosses his path.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both family
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisAn Autumn Romance (2021)
When librarian Taylor Harris suddenly loses her job, she decides to visit her brother in a small town in Montana. There, she gets involved in the fight to help save her brother's hotel from tycoon Joel Sheenan, who wants to renovate it.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both family
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe Unbreakable Boy (2025)
When Scott and Teresa LeRette learn that their son Austin is both autistic and has brittle bone disease, they initially worry for their son’s future. But with Scott’s growing faith and Austin’s incredible spirit, they become 'unbreakable', finding joy, gratitude, and courage even in the most trying times.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both family
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisSimon Birch (1998)
Simon Birch and Joe Wenteworth are boys who have a reputation for being oddballs. Joe never knew his father, and his mother, Rebecca, is keeping her lips sealed no matter how much he protests. Simon, meanwhile, is an 11-year-old dwarf whose outsize personality belies his small stature. Indeed, he often assails the local reverend with thorny theological questions and joins Joe on his quest to find his biological father.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both family
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisCheaper by the Dozen (2003)
The Baker brood moves to Chicago after patriarch Tom gets a job coaching football at Northwestern University, forcing his writer wife, Kate, and the couple's 12 children to make a major adjustment. The transition works well until work demands pull the parents away from home, leaving the kids bored -- and increasingly mischievous.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both family
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisA Boy Named Charlie Brown (1969)
Poor Charlie Brown. He can't fly a kite, and he always loses in baseball. Having his faults projected onto a screen by Lucy doesn't help him much either. Against the sage advice and taunting of the girls in his class, he volunteers for the class spelling bee.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both family
Worth the HypeMovies like thisLove at the Shore (2017)
Single mom Jenna Thompson only five weeks to deliver her next teen novel to her publisher. So, this year's annual beach vacation with her kids will be a working vacation. Upon arrival, the family soon meets their new next-door neighbor, confident, devil-may-care surfer Lucas McKinnon.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both family
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisMy Girl 2 (1994)
Vada Sultenfuss has a holiday coming up, and an assignment: to do an essay on someone she admires and has never met. She decides she wants to do an assignment on her mother, but quickly realises she knows very little about her. She manages to get her father to agree to let her go to LA to stay with her Uncle Phil and do some research on her mother.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both family
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisYours, Mine & Ours (2005)
Admiral Frank Beardsley returns to New London to run the Coast Guard Academy, his last stop before a probable promotion to head the Guard. A widower with eight children, he runs a loving but tight ship, with charts and salutes. The kids long for a permanent home. Helen North is a free spirit, a designer whose ten children live in loving chaos, with occasional group hugs. Helen and Frank, high school sweethearts, reconnect at a reunion, and it's love at first re-sighting. They marry on the spot. Then the problems start as two sets of kids, the free spirits and the disciplined preppies, must live together. The warring factions agree to work together to end the marriage.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both family
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisMy Christmas Prince (2017)
Samantha, a dedicated teacher in Manhattan, returns to her home town of Maple Falls, Wyoming every year for Christmas. This year, she’s delighted when her boyfriend Alex, a European diplomat from the tiny country of Madelvia, decides to joins her. Samantha later discovers Alex is actually a prince destined for the throne, turning her entire world upside down. Realizing that staying with Alex means spending her life in the constant glare of publicity and giving up the job opportunity of a lifetime, Samantha must decide if she loves Alex enough to make the transition from teacher to royal – or will it be too big a leap
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both family
SnoozefestMovies like thisGoodbye Christopher Robin (2017)
The behind the scenes story of the life of A.A. Milne and the creation of the Winnie the Pooh stories inspired by his son Christopher Robin.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both family
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe Secret Garden (1993)
A young British girl born and reared in India loses her neglectful parents in an earthquake. She is returned to England to live at her uncle's castle. Her uncle is very distant due to the loss of his wife ten years before. Neglected once again, she begins exploring the estate and discovers a garden that has been locked and forgotten. Aided by one of the servants' boys, she begins restoring the garden, and eventually discovers some other secrets of the manor.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both family
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe Great Gilly Hopkins (2015)
Young and feisty Gilly Hopkins devises a scheme to escape from her new foster home and reunite with her birth mother.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both family
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 family
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisA Monster Calls (2016)
12-year-old Conor encounters an ancient tree monster who proceeds to help him cope with his mother's terminal illness and being bullied in school.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both family
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe Happiest Millionaire (1967)
A happy and unbelievably lucky young Irish immigrant, John Lawless, lands a job as the butler of an unconventional millionaire, Biddle. His daughter, Cordelia Drexel Biddle, tires of the unusual antics of her father--especially since the nice young men around town all fear him. Wouldn't you fear a father-in-law that keeps alligators for pets and teaches boxing at his daily Bible classes?
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both family
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisAnne 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 family
Worth the HypeMovies like thisLemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events (2004)
Three wealthy children's parents are killed in a fire. When they are sent to a distant relative, they find out that he is plotting to kill them and seize their fortune.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both family
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisNanny McPhee (2005)
Widower Cedric Brown hires Nanny McPhee to care for his seven rambunctious children, who have chased away all previous nannies. Taunted by Simon and his siblings, Nanny McPhee uses mystical powers to instill discipline. And when the children's great-aunt and benefactor, Lady Adelaide Stitch, threatens to separate the kids, the family pulls together under the guidance of Nanny McPhee.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both family
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisSnow Dogs (2002)
When a Miami dentist inherits a team of sled dogs, he's got to learn the trade or lose his pack to a crusty mountain man.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both family
SnoozefestMovies like thisBorisek (1976)
The ten-year-old orphan Borisek is fathered by the entire military unit. The boy serves there with determination as a medic. When he and the soldiers reach Bohemia, he meets the mother of the soldier he saw die, but for a long time he does not find the courage to tell her the cruel truth...
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both family
White Fang (1991)
Jack London's classic adventure story about the friendship developed between a Yukon gold hunter and the mixed dog-wolf he rescues from the hands of a man who mistreats him.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both family
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisOliver & Company (1988)
Putting its own 'twist' on the story of Oliver Twist, the orange runt of a litter of kittens must fight for survival on the rough streets on New York City, finding unlikely friends in the dogs owned by a down-on-his luck man named Fagin. Soon, Oliver and his new band of comrades must fight for survival when Fagin is unable to pay his debts.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both family
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisSmile at Last (1985)
16-year-old Mari, raised without a mother by a drunkard father, is put in an orphanage which she immediately, though unsuccessfully, tries to flee from. The sensitive Mari finds it hard to adapt to the coarse manners and brutal games amongst the children. Only gradually does she develop a sense for the similarly difficult fates of her fellow sufferers, who have long forgotten how to cry. She even falls in love for the first time, not with her self-appointed “protector” Tauri, but with the rough-mannered Robi.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both family
Alice in Wonderland (1951)
On a golden afternoon, wildly curious young Alice tumbles into the burrow and enters the merry, madcap world of Wonderland full of whimsical escapades.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both family
Worth the HypeMovies like thisAngus, Thongs and Perfect Snogging (2008)
Georgia Nicolson is fourteen, lives with nosey parents who don't understand her, an annoying three year old sister and has to wear a beret to school. She would, however, rather be blonde, have a smaller nose and a boyfriend. Revolving around her hilarious journal entries, prepare to be engulfed in the world of the soaring joys and bottomless angst of being a teenager.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both family
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisEmil of Lonneberga (1971)
Emil Svensson lives with his mother and father, little sister Ida, farmhand Alfred, and maid Lina on a picturesque farm in Småland. He is an unusually lively little boy, who just can't resist trying out every whim that enters into his white-haired head. Always with the best intentions in mind, because he is a good-hearted child, but often with catastrophic results, especially for his short-tempered father. As a result, Emil spends a lot of quality time in the wood shed carving wood figurines and waiting for Anton's temper to cool down. And the father's patience is certainly tried, as Emil gets his head stuck in the family's only soup bowl, hoists little Ida up the flag pole, and arranges a lavish Christmas party for the poor.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both family
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisNew Mischief by Emil (1972)
Emil's reputation for being a troublemaker makes the Svensson family's neighbours take up a collection for sending the boy off to America. But even if he among other unfortunate mishaps causes his father to get stuck in the outhouse window and get bitten by crawfish, all is forgotten when he skillfully wins the family a free horse. And when Alfred the farmhand gets seriously ill, Emil puts his own life on the line, venturing into a snow storm to get his best friend to a doctor before it is too late.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both family
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisEmil and the Piglet (1973)
Nursing a piglet back to life because it's the runt of the litter earns Emil a friend for life.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both family
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Frequently asked questions
What are the best movies like I am William?
The closest matches to I am William are Secondhand Lions (2003), Uncle Buck (1989) and An Autumn Romance (2021). Below are 27 more, each with the reason it matches.
What should I watch after I am William?
Start with Secondhand Lions (2003), the closest match to I am William.
What is the highest-rated movie like I am William?
The Secret Garden (1993), rated 7.4/10 by 1,027 TMDB users.
What is the newest movie like I am William?
The Unbreakable Boy (2025) is the most recent release on this list.
How are movies similar to I am William chosen?
First come films that Trakt’s viewers watch alongside I am William, then TMDB’s recommendations and films it rates as similar in story and genre. Each pick says which signal put it there.