Movies like The Deterioration (1985)
The best movies like The Deterioration (1985) are Honey Boy (2019), Embattled (2020) and I'll Be Home for Christmas (2016). If The Deterioration hooked you with its drama, these 30 similar films are what to watch next, and every pick says why it matches.
Quick picks
- Highest ratedBeautiful Boy (2018)7.6/10 from 3,009 votes
- NewestOphelia (2026)Released 2026
Honey Boy (2019)
The story of a child star attempting to mend his relationship with his law-breaking, alcohol-abusing father over the course of a decade, loosely based on Shia LaBeouf’s life.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisEmbattled (2020)
The eldest son of a ruthlessly tough MMA champion must fight his way out of the abusive cycle his father has continued.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisI'll Be Home for Christmas (2016)
Jackie Foster, a dynamic Assistant District Attorney and single mom, is looking forward to wrapping up her latest case and spending Christmas with Gracie, her adorable and precocious, eight-year old daughter. But when Jackie’s estranged dad, Jack , a gruff retired police officer, unexpectedly shows up at her door, they will be forced to confront old wounds.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Starling Girl (2023)
17-year-old Jem Starling struggles with her place within her Christian fundamentalist community. But everything changes when her magnetic youth pastor Owen returns to their church.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisDaddy Longlegs (2010)
After months of living a solitary existence, Lenny, 34, picks up his kids from school. Every year he spends a couple of weeks with his sons Sage, 9, and Frey, 7. Lenny hosts his kids within a midtown studio apartment in New York. During these two weeks, he must figure out if he wants to act as their father or be their friend. Ultimately, their trip upstate results in complete lawlessness taking over their lives.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisClean and Sober (1988)
Hotshot real estate salesman Daryl has a bad cocaine habit. After embezzling his company's money, he wakes up next to a girl who overdosed. To hide from the police, he checks into a rehabilitation program guaranteeing anonymity. Under the mentorship of counselor Craig, Daryl accepts that he has a substance abuse problem. As he falls in love with fellow patient Charlie, Daryl begins committing to a newly sober life.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisMost (2003)
A poetic and powerful story of a father forced to choose between love and duty.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisWhere the Red Fern Grows (2003)
Set in the Ozark Mountains during the Great Depression, Billy Coleman works hard and saves his earnings for 2 years to achieve his dream of buying two coonhound pups. He develops a new trust in God as he faces overwhelming challenges in adventure and tragedy roaming the river bottoms of Cherokee country with "Old Dan" and "Little Ann."
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisBeautiful Boy (2018)
After he and his first wife separate, journalist David Sheff struggles to help their teenage son, who goes from experimenting with drugs to becoming devastatingly addicted to methamphetamine.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisBroken (2012)
Three suburban English families' lives intertwine with tragic consequences.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Beautiful Country (2004)
After reuniting with his mother in Ho Chi Minh City, a family tragedy causes Binh to flee from Viet Nam to America. Landing in New York, Binh begins a road trip to Texas, where his American father is said to live.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisBigger Than Life (1956)
A friendly, successful suburban teacher and father grows dangerously addicted to cortisone, resulting in his transformation into a household despot.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe Way Back (2020)
A former basketball all-star, who has lost his wife and family foundation in a struggle with addiction, attempts to regain his soul and salvation by becoming the coach of a disparate ethnically mixed high school basketball team at his alma mater.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisBoyhood (2014)
The film tells a story of a divorced couple trying to raise their young son. The story follows the boy for twelve years, from first grade at age 6 through 12th grade at age 17-18, and examines his relationship with his parents as he grows.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisDeath of a Salesman (1985)
Willy Loman, an aging, failing salesman, struggles to accept reality and his failure to achieve the American Dream.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisHellion (2014)
When motocross and heavy metal obsessed, 13-year-old Jacob's delinquent behavior forces CPS to place his little brother Wes with his aunt, Jacob and his emotionally absent father must finally take responsibility for their actions and each other in order to bring Wes home.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
SnoozefestMovies 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 thisKen Park (2003)
Teen skater Ken Park (nicknamed Krap Nek; his name spelled and pronounced backward) kills himself at a Visalia skate park; his death bookends the lives of four other young people who knew him: Shawn, the most conventional; Tate brims with psychotic rage; Claude is habitually harassed by his brutish father and coddled, rather uncomfortably, by his enormously pregnant mother; and Peaches looks after her devoutly religious father, but yearns for freedom. They're all rather tight, or so they claim.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like this180 (2026)
When an unexpected road rage incident puts his son in critical condition, an enraged father spirals down a dark path of emotional turmoil and vengeance.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
SnoozefestMovies like thisThe Glass Castle (2017)
A young girl is raised in a dysfunctional family constantly on the run from the FBI. Living in poverty, she comes of age guided by her drunkard, ingenious father who distracts her with magical stories to keep her mind off the family's dire state, and her selfish, nonconformist mother who has no intention of raising a family, along with her younger brother and sister, and her other older sister. Together, they fend for each other as they mature in an unorthodox journey that is their family life.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisSuposto Fim (2024)
A desperate mind can cling to many things in a tormented effort to compensate for emotional voids. They try to fill them with work, food, passions, alcohol, nicotine. In this way, an addiction is capable of shaking the most promising career and the kindest person. Betty is a young woman with many dreams, but her trajectory is put to the test as her mind begins to revolve around what is inside bottles. For her, it's what would fill the void in her heart, supposedly.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Topper (2025)
Struggling to survive in the cutthroat Los Angeles comedy scene after a devastating fall from grace, a washed-up comedian is forced to return to his Detroit hometown and confront the childhood trauma holding him back before he loses his career and himself.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Addiction (2019)
Estranged from his daughter and disowned by his father, Mike turns to drugs to escape the crushing numbness of his thoughts, while his brother struggles to piece their fractured family back together.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
PLASTIC CHAIRS (2026)
Plastic Chairs follows Dylan, a recovering addict forced back into a support meeting by his sister after a near-fatal overdose. There, he meets Tom — a man further along the same path, who recognises his own past in Dylan and quietly offers understanding rather than judgment. As stories are shared and silences linger, the film observes the difficult, often invisible act of choosing to stay. Plastic Chairs is an intimate short film about relapse, accountability, and the courage it takes to show up for yourself when it feels impossible. Chloe Webb makes her directorial debut.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
23 Years for Three Hours North (2022)
Two siblings are informed that their father has been admitted to a hospital upstate.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
The Bad News Bears (1976)
An aging, down-on-his-luck ex-minor leaguer coaches a team of misfits in an ultra-competitive California little league.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisTea Leaves (2025)
A lonely uber driver picks up an unruly passenger from the bar.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
The Confirmation (2016)
A divorced father reconnects with his son when they track down a stolen toolbox over the course of a weekend.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisBloody Marie (2019)
Marie Wankelmut, once successful comic artist, lives among the prostitutes in Amsterdam's Red Light District. Nowadays drunken and bold, she gets into one conflict after another. A gruesome sobering event at her neighbors, forces her to take action.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Ophelia (2026)
A year after her girlfriend's death, grief-stricken rockstar Ophelia returns to the stage to perform her newly-written magnum opus - one which she hopes will bring her lost love back from the dead, no matter the price.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
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Frequently asked questions
What are the best movies like The Deterioration?
The closest matches to The Deterioration are Honey Boy (2019), Embattled (2020) and I'll Be Home for Christmas (2016). Below are 27 more, each with the reason it matches.
What should I watch after The Deterioration?
Start with Honey Boy (2019), the closest match to The Deterioration.
What is the highest-rated movie like The Deterioration?
Beautiful Boy (2018), rated 7.6/10 by 3,009 TMDB users.
What is the newest movie like The Deterioration?
Ophelia (2026) is the most recent release on this list.
How are movies similar to The Deterioration chosen?
First come films that Trakt’s viewers watch alongside The Deterioration, then TMDB’s recommendations and films it rates as similar in story and genre. Each pick says which signal put it there.