Movies like It's a Hard Life (1919)
The best movies like It's a Hard Life (1919) are My Wife's Relations (1922), Police (1916) and Shanghaied (1915). If It's a Hard Life hooked you with its comedy, these 30 similar films are what to watch next, and every pick says why it matches.
It's a Hard Life
Quick picks
- Highest ratedOne Week (1920)7.9/10 from 348 votes
- NewestThe Most Normal Dude (2025)Released 2025
My Wife's Relations (1922)
Buster and a woman are mistakenly married and her initially unfriendly family begins to treat him nicely when they come to believe he has a large inheritance awaiting him.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both comedy
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisPolice (1916)
Charlie is released from prison and immediately swindled by a fake parson. A fellow ex-convict convinces Charlie to help burglarize a house.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both comedy
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisShanghaied (1915)
A shipowner intends to scuttle his ship on its last voyage to get the insurance money. Charlie, a tramp in love with the owner's daughter, is grabbed by the captain and promises to help him shanghai some seamen. The daughter stows away to follow Charlie. Charlie assists in the galley and attempts to serve food during a gale.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both comedy
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisConvict 13 (1920)
A young golfer is mugged by an escaped convict and finds himself in a prison where he foils a jailbreak.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both comedy
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisLiberty (1929)
While changing clothes in a getaway car, escaped convicts Stan and Ollie mistakenly put on each other's pants. They spend the rest of the film trying to exchange pants in various unlikely settings.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both comedy
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisOne Week (1920)
Newlyweds receive a build-it-yourself house as a wedding gift—and the house can, supposedly, be built in "one week". A rejected suitor secretly re-numbers packing crates, and the husband struggles to assemble the house according to this new 'arrangement' of its parts.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both comedy
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisA Woman (1915)
Mother, father and daughter go to the park. The women doze off on a bench while the father plays a hide-and-seek game with a girl, blindfolded. Charlie leads him into a lake. Both dozing ladies on the bench fall for Charlie and invite him for dinner. The father returns home with a friend. Charlie rushes upstairs and dresses like a woman, shaving his mustache. Both men fall for Charlie.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both comedy
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Chaplin Revue (1959)
Three Chaplin silent comedies "A Dog's Life", "Shoulder Arms", and "The Pilgrim" are strung together to form a single feature length film. Chaplin provides new music, narration, and a small amount of new connecting material. "Shoulder Arms" is now described as taking place in a time before "the atom bomb".
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both comedy
Worth the HypeMovies like thisA Night in the Show (1915)
Two disruptive theater patrons, the wealthy drunk Mr. Pest (played by Charlie Chaplin) and the rowdy working-class Mr. Rowdy (also played by Chaplin), attend a live vaudeville theater production. Their constant antics, seat-hopping, and physical altercations quickly overshadow the acts on stage and plunge the entire theater into absolutely hilarious chaos.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both comedy
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisFrom Soup to Nuts (1928)
Inexperienced waiters (Laurel & Hardy) are hired for a swank dinner party.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both comedy
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisWhy Worry? (1923)
A hypochondriac vacations in the tropics for the fresh air - and finds himself in the middle of a revolution instead.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both comedy
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Blacksmith (1922)
Buster clowns around in a blacksmith's shop until he and the smithy get in a fight which sends the smithy to jail. Buster helps several customers with horses, then destroys a Rolls Royce while fixing the car parked next to it.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both comedy
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisMabel's Married Life (1914)
Mabel goes home after being humiliated by a masher whom her husband won't fight. The husband goes off to a bar and gets drunk.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both comedy
SnoozefestMovies like thisHard Luck (1921)
A down on his luck young man makes several attempts at committing suicide but fails them too. He then finds himself becoming more confident through a series of petty adventures, to such an extent that this becomes his undoing.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both comedy
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisDough and Dynamite (1914)
Pierre and Jacques are working as waiters at a restaurant where the cooks go on strike. When the two are forced to work as bakers, the striking cooks put dynamite in the dough, with explosive results.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both comedy
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Frozen North (1922)
A mix of guns and mistaken identity leads to chaos in this satirical parody of William S. Hart's melodramatic westerns, finding Buster in the frozen north - "the last stop on the subway".
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both comedy
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisA Knight for a Day (1946)
By accident, Cedric (Goofy), replaces his master, Sir Loinsteak, in the armor just before the joust with champion Sir Cumference.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both comedy
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Finishing Touch (1928)
Stan and Ollie are hired to build a house in just one day. When they are done, a bird lands on the house and it collapses. Naturally, the owner wants his money back.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both comedy
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisCars Toon Mater's Tall Tales (2008)
Mater the tow truck travels from country to country as he retells his infamous but unbelievable stories.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both comedy
Worth the HypeMovies like thisMe and My Pal (1933)
On the morning of his wedding to oil baron Peter Cucumber's daughter, Ollie receives a jigsaw puzzle from Stan as a wedding gift. The boys soon become absorbed in the puzzle. A taxi driver, butler, policeman and messenger boy join in as well.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both comedy
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Revolt of Mr. Wiggs (1915)
Mr. Wiggs' wife is a militant suffragist, and he is the miserable sufferer left at home to mind their five children and feel that married life is closely approaching Sherman's idea of war. So, he decides to break her spirit with underhanded tricks. He succeeds but they are all poorer for his boorish behavior.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both comedy
YOYO (2017)
Caroline can't stand that she is a virgin...and then the world ends. In post-apocalyptic LA, after a dust storm has wiped out the planet, she is convinced that Francis was sent as the man to pop her cherry. YOYO is a heartfelt, dark comedy about finding meaning in life, even when life ceases to exist.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both comedy
Thousand Year Sleep (2007)
Samantha, Lydia, Isabella, and Lisa. These four young women are about to learn that humanity is just an irrelevant flame burning nowhere in the vastness of space. Their dreams will be shattered and one man will marvel at the evil he has committed.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both comedy
Rules of Reduction (2015)
Billy is a man child who has developed 'The Pedo Instant', a product that acts as a repellent to those unsuspecting individuals who might invade his personal space. He calls his mom to boast about the product's effectiveness and the ensuing riches that are sure to follow. His mother displays grave concern and attempts to explain to her son why this might not be the best idea.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both comedy
I Was a Teenage Werebear (2011)
A repressed gay teen transforms into a beast after being bitten by a hunky classmate.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both comedy
A Joke on Jane (1914)
The roots of modern television situatuation comedy can be seen in this Beauty brand film. As American grew the Beauty brand was developed to feature actress Margarita Fisher. Her husband, Haryy Pollard, directed the Beauty films and occasionally acted in them. He plays the husband in this one.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both comedy
Not Your Average Joe (2016)
When a recently separated Dad attempts to go into a gay club for the first time pandemonium ensues.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both comedy
You're Next (1927)
The three fat boys make the discovery that they are late for the barber school. There they ply their trade on various interesting customers.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both comedy
The Most Normal Dude (2025)
A story about a young man named Joonatan, who seeks closeness and practical physical touch from doctors.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both comedy
Monique Will Not Save the World (2024)
Observations on the life of a boring Belgian transwoman.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both comedy
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Frequently asked questions
What are the best movies like It's a Hard Life?
The closest matches to It's a Hard Life are My Wife's Relations (1922), Police (1916) and Shanghaied (1915). Below are 27 more, each with the reason it matches.
What should I watch after It's a Hard Life?
Start with My Wife's Relations (1922), the closest match to It's a Hard Life.
What is the highest-rated movie like It's a Hard Life?
One Week (1920), rated 7.9/10 by 348 TMDB users.
What is the newest movie like It's a Hard Life?
The Most Normal Dude (2025) is the most recent release on this list.
How are movies similar to It's a Hard Life chosen?
First come films that Trakt’s viewers watch alongside It's a Hard Life, then TMDB’s recommendations and films it rates as similar in story and genre. Each pick says which signal put it there.