Movies like Shoplifters (2018)
The best movies like Shoplifters (2018) are Tokyo Sonata (2008), Still Walking (2008) and Like Father, Like Son (2013). If Shoplifters hooked you with its drama and crime, these 30 similar films are what to watch next, and every pick says why it matches.
Quick picks
- Highest ratedParasite (2019)8.5/10 from 21,677 votes
- NewestThe Ties That Bind Us (2025)Released 2025
- In JapaneseTokyo Sonata (2008)Also in Japanese
Tokyo Sonata (2008)
The winds of change blow as a family grapples with unemployment, alienation, mistrust and a lack of communication. When a Japanese salaryman loses his job to outsourcing to China, it's simply the beginning of a series of shattering incidents, leading to the implosion of the family unit.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisStill Walking (2008)
A family gathers together for a commemorative ritual whose nature only gradually becomes clear.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisLike Father, Like Son (2013)
Ryota Nonomiya is a successful businessman driven by money. He learns that his biological son was switched with another child after birth. He must make a life-changing decision and choose his true son or the boy he raised as his own.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisNobody Knows (2004)
In a small Tokyo apartment, twelve-year-old Akira must care for his younger siblings after their mother leaves them and shows no sign of returning.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisBroker (2022)
When a young mother reconsiders abandoning her baby, she discovers a scheme selling foundlings for adoption.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisAfter the Storm (2016)
Ryota is an unpopular writer although he won a literary award 15 years ago. Now, Ryota works as a private detective. He is divorced from his ex-wife Kyoko and he has an 11-year-old son Shingo. His mother Yoshiko lives alone at her apartment. One day, Ryota, his ex-wife Kyoko, and son Shingo gather at Yoshiko's apartment. A typhoon passes and the family must stay there all night long.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisTrue Mothers (2020)
After suffering through a long and unsuccessful series of fertility treatments, Satoko and her husband Kiyokazu make the decision to adopt a child. Six years after adopting a boy they named Asato, Satoko has quit her job to concentrate fully on her husband and son. The family lives a peaceful existence until the arrival of a stranger.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisOur Little Sister (2015)
After the death of their estranged father, 3 adult sisters invite their teenaged half-sister to live with them.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisHimizu (2012)
Two 14-year-olds from troubled, abusive homes come together sharing misery and pain. In the aftermath of an earthquake, the classmates learn how to survive while relying on one another for emotional and physical support.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both crime & drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisLittle Big Women (2020)
A story about a karaoke-addicted old woman struggling with her self-worth and a sense of betrayal at her long-lost husband's funeral where she encounters his younger and more sophisticated girlfriend while she finds out her kids might have been secretly in touch with her late husband all these years.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisEvil Does Not Exist (2023)
Takumi and his daughter Hana live in Mizubiki Village, close to Tokyo. One day, the village inhabitants become aware of a plan to build a camping site near Takumi's house offering city residents a comfortable "escape" to nature.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Farewell (2019)
A headstrong Chinese-American woman returns to China when her beloved grandmother is given a terminal diagnosis. Billi struggles with her family's decision to keep grandma in the dark about her own illness as they all stage an impromptu wedding to see grandma one last time.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisA Separation (2011)
A married couple are faced with a difficult decision – to improve the life of their child by moving to another country or to stay in Iran and look after a deteriorating parent who has Alzheimer's disease.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisBurning (2018)
Deliveryman Jong-su is out on a job when he runs into Hae-mi, a girl who once lived in his neighborhood. She asks if he'd mind looking after her cat while she's away on a trip to Africa. On her return, she introduces to Jong-su an enigmatic young man named Ben, who she met during her trip. One day Ben tells Jong-su about his most unusual hobby.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama & thriller
Worth the HypeMovies like thisRamen Shop (2018)
Masato is a young ramen chef in Japan. When he finds his late mother's journal after the sudden death of his emotionally distant father, he takes it with him to her native country, Singapore, hoping to piece together the story of his family and his life.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisDrive My Car (2021)
Yusuke Kafuku, a stage actor and director, still unable, after two years, to cope with the loss of his beloved wife, accepts to direct Uncle Vanya at a theater festival in Hiroshima. There he meets Misaki, an introverted young woman, appointed to drive his car. In between rides, secrets from the past and heartfelt confessions will be unveiled.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisCall Boy (2018)
Ryo Morinaka is a university student and works part-time at a bar. He is bored with his daily life and exists in a state of torpor. One day, his friend Shinya Tajima brings the owner of a host bar over to the place where Ryo Morinaka works. Shizuka Mido is the owner of the host bar. Soon, Ryo Morinaka begins to work for Shizuka Mido at the members only host bar. He feels embarrassment initially, but he fulfills the desires of women and develops a sense of purpose.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Ties That Bind Us (2025)
A young single father trying to find the strength to love. A feminist librarian, single by conviction, who’s decided that she won’t be a mother. A six-year-old child trying to find a place in a new family structure. By revealing their aspirations, their fears, their choices, Carine Tardieu depicts different ways in which humans create families.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisUnder the Open Sky (2021)
Mikami, an ex-yakuza of middle age with most of his life in prison, gets released after serving 13 years of sentence for murder. Hoping to find his long lost mother, from whom he was separated as a child, he applies for a TV show and meets a young TV director Tsunoda. Meanwhile, he struggles to get a proper job and fit into society. His impulsive, adamant nature and ingrained beliefs cause friction in his relationship with Tsunoda and those who want to help him.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both crime & drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisDepartures (2008)
Daigo, a cellist, is laid off from his orchestra and moves with his wife back to his small hometown where the living is cheaper. Thinking he’s applying for a job at a travel agency he finds he’s being interviewed for work with departures of a more permanent nature – as an undertaker’s assistant.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisMOTHER (2020)
Shuhei is leading a tough life. His alcoholic mother Akiko can only hook up with bad guys and order Shuhei to go get money from his disapproving grandparents instead of going to school. Except raising the little half-sister, his rock-bottom life seems to have no end.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe Runner (1984)
A young orphan named Amiro lives alone in an abandoned tanker in the Iranian port city of Abadan. He survives by shining shoes, selling water, and collecting deposit bottles. Although he sometimes finds himself at odds with both adults and competing older kids, he finds solace in dreams about departing cargo ships and airplanes—and by running.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisA Family (2021)
Taken in by the yakuza at a young age, Kenji swears allegiance to his old-school boss, pledging to adhere to the family code amid ever-changing times.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both crime & drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisHow to Make Millions Before Grandma Dies (2024)
M, a university dropout low on money and luck, volunteers to take care of his terminally ill grandmother, in the hope of pocketing an inheritance.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisParasite (2019)
All unemployed, Ki-taek's family takes peculiar interest in the wealthy and glamorous Parks for their livelihood until they get entangled in an unexpected incident.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both thriller & drama
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisPoetry (2010)
A South Korean woman in her sixties enrolls in a poetry class as she grapples with her faltering memory and her grandson's appalling wrongdoing.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisDistance (2001)
On the third anniversary of a cult's failed chemical attack on Tokyo and their subsequent mass suicide, family members of those affected gather at the cult's former base on the shores of a lake to observe the anniversary of their loved ones' deaths.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisTokyo Story (1953)
The elderly Shukishi and his wife, Tomi, take the long journey from their small seaside village to visit their adult children in Tokyo. Their elder son, Koichi, a doctor, and their daughter, Shige, a hairdresser, don't have much time to spend with their aged parents, and so it falls to Noriko, the widow of their younger son who was killed in the war, to keep her in-laws company.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisThe Third Murder (2017)
A lawyer tasked with defending a robbery-and-murder suspect begins developing doubts about what truly happened.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama & crime
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisMicrohabitat (2018)
Miso lives from day to day by housekeeping. Cigarettes and whiskey are the two things that get her through the day. As cigarette prices and rent start to rise, Miso decides to give up her house for cigarettes and whiskey, leading her to couch surf with old friends while reconsidering her place in life.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like this
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Frequently asked questions
What are the best movies like Shoplifters?
The closest matches to Shoplifters are Tokyo Sonata (2008), Still Walking (2008) and Like Father, Like Son (2013). Below are 27 more, each with the reason it matches.
What should I watch after Shoplifters?
People who watched Shoplifters most often go on to Tokyo Sonata (2008), Still Walking (2008) and Like Father, Like Son (2013).
What is the highest-rated movie like Shoplifters?
Parasite (2019), rated 8.5/10 by 21,677 TMDB users.
What is the newest movie like Shoplifters?
The Ties That Bind Us (2025) is the most recent release on this list.
Are there Japanese movies like Shoplifters?
Yes: Tokyo Sonata (2008), Still Walking (2008) and Like Father, Like Son (2013).
How are movies similar to Shoplifters chosen?
First come films that Trakt’s viewers watch alongside Shoplifters, then TMDB’s recommendations and films it rates as similar in story and genre. Each pick says which signal put it there.