Movies like Tatsumi (2011)
The best movies like Tatsumi (2011) are March Comes In Like a Lion (2017), Miss Hokusai (2015) and Black Jack: The Movie (1996). If Tatsumi hooked you with its animation and history, these 30 similar films are what to watch next, and every pick says why it matches.
Quick picks
- Highest ratedNeon Genesis Evangelion: The End of Evangelion (1997)8.3/10 from 2,002 votes
- Newestcocoon - One Summer of Girlhood (2026)Released 2026
- In JapaneseMarch Comes In Like a Lion (2017)Also in Japanese
March Comes In Like a Lion (2017)
Rei Kiriyama is a 17-years-old shogi (Japanese chess) player. He debuted as a professional shogi player when he was in middle school. He lives by himself in Tokyo, because his parents and younger sister died in an traffic accident when he was little. One day, Rei Kiriyama meets three sisters who are his neighbors. The three sisters are Akari Kawamoto, Hinata Kawamoto and Momo Kawamoto. This is his first meeting with someone outside of the shogi world in many years. Having meals with the Kawamoto family brings warm feelings to Rei Kiriyama. As Rei Kiriyama continues his shogi career, his interactions with his neighbors allows him to grow as a shogi player and as a person.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Miss Hokusai (2015)
A daughter is constantly overshadowed by her famous father, but she is determined to make her own mark in the world.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both animation & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisBlack Jack: The Movie (1996)
Black Jack is a master surgeon who possesses impeccable skills, enabling him to perform operations that are impossible for even the finest surgeons. He now is faced with his most difficult task to date and must challenge the limits of medical science...before it's too late!
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both animation & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisTomorrow's Joe The Movie (1980)
An abridged remake of the first Ashita no Joe TV series, released in 1980 to provide back-story for the second TV series to new fans who were not familiar with the first TV series or the manga.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both animation & drama
Only Yesterday (1991)
In lyrical switches between the present and the past, Taeko contemplates the arc of her life, and wonders if she has been true to the dreams of her childhood self.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both animation & drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisFrom Up on Poppy Hill (2011)
Yokohama, 1963. Japan is picking itself up from the devastation of World War II and preparing to host the 1964 Olympics—and the mood is one of both optimism and conflict as the young generation struggles to throw off the shackles of a troubled past. Against this backdrop of hope and change, a friendship begins to blossom between high school students Umi and Shun—but a buried secret from their past emerges to cast a shadow on the future and pull them apart.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both animation & drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisNasu: A Migratory Bird with Suitcase (2007)
Legendary bicycle racer Marco Rondanini dies as team Pao Pao Beer is set to race in Japan. Team member Ciocci, close friend of Marco, starts to think about quitting. Under heavy rain, Ciocci and Pepe must put that aside as Team Pao Pao struggles to reach another victory. Pepe continues to ride his bicycle both in competition and training. He often spends time with his other team mates while they train in beautiful scenery in Japan. While in Japan a local girl helps out the team before and during the race.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both animation & drama
cocoon - One Summer of Girlhood (2026)
San and Mayu attend an all-girls school on a warm and tranquil island. When war reaches their shores, they are ordered to help nurse the wounded in a military hospital hidden away in a cave. Amidst escalating death and brutality, the friends struggle to find solace in their fragile lives.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both animation & drama
Tekkonkinkreet (2006)
Two penniless orphans, Black and White, struggle to survive on the mean streets of Treasure Town. When a megacorporation threatens to tear down the town to build an amusement park, Black and White engage in the fight of their life.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both animation
Worth the HypeMovies like thisBuddha 2: The Endless Journey (2014)
2500 years ago, in India, Siddhartha was born as a prince of the Shakya clan, but he gives up his position as a prince to see the world. He meets a strange boy named Assaji, who can predict the future, a monk with only one eye and Depa. Siddhartha continues traveling. Siddhartha is overwhelmed by the sufferings he witnesses around him. Meanwhile, Prince Ruri of Kosara begins his attack on the Shakya clan. Second Buddha movie from Tezuka Productions.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both animation & drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisGrandfather's Lamp (2011)
A boy finds a strange object while playing hide-and-seek. His grandfather tells him the story of his own youth, and the important role the old lamp played. This story is about the modernization of Japan and the changes that came with it.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama & animation
Giovanni's Island (2014)
In the aftermath of the most devastating conflict mankind had ever experienced, the tiny island of Shikotan became part of the Sakhalin Oblast... and on the unhealed border in this remote corner of the world, friendship among children from two different countries timidly blossomed, striving to overcome language barriers and the waves of history. Inspired by true events.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both animation & drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe Wind Rises (2013)
A lifelong love of flight inspires Japanese aviation engineer Jiro Horikoshi, whose storied career includes the creation of the A-6M World War II fighter plane.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both animation & drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisIn This Corner of the World (2016)
Japan, 1943, during World War II. Young Suzu leaves her village near Hiroshima to marry and live with her in-laws in Kure, a military harbor. Her creativity to overcome deprivation quickly makes her indispensable at home. Inhabited by an ancestral wisdom, Suzu impregnates the simple gestures of everyday life with poetry and beauty. The many hardships, the loss of loved ones, the frequent air raids of the enemy, nothing alters her enthusiasm…
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both animation & drama
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisLa Maison en Petits Cubes (2008)
La Maison en Petits Cubes tells the story of a grandfather's memories as he adds more blocks to his house to stem the flooding waters.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both animation & drama
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisRun, Melos! (1992)
The movie tells the story of Melos, a Greek country man that gets arrested and accused of conspiracy against the king. He gets three days to travel to his sister's wedding while Selinentius (Selinae), a genius sculptor that Melos just met stays as a hostage.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both animation & history
Comedy (2002)
During Ireland's War of Independence, a five-year-old girl sets out to save her village from the English army by trying to enlist the help of the rumored Black Swordsman, who only takes books of a certain genre as payment.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama & history
Shenmue: The Movie (2001)
Ryo Hazuki finds himself seeing his father Iwao die at the hands of a mysterious Chinese man named Lan Di, who also steals an item Iwao had called the "Dragon Mirror". Ryo makes it his mission to get revenge on Lan Di, but first he has to find out how to find him, with the warhouse docks & the Mad Angels gang being his best leads.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama & animation
Mai Mai Miracle (2009)
Inspired by her grandfather's stories, young Shinko embarks on wild flights of fancy about the history of the little town she lives in. But dreams can't fend off the realities of growing up.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both animation & drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisRenoir (2025)
In 1987 Tokyo, a quirky and sensitive 11-year-old girl copes with a terminally ill father and stressed-out working mother while encountering various adults dealing with their own struggles.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Steamboy (2004)
In 1860s Britain, a boy inventor finds himself caught in the middle of a deadly conflict over a revolutionary advance in steam power.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both animation
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisAnne Frank's Diary (1995)
During World War II, a teenage Jewish girl named Anne Frank and her family are forced into hiding in the Nazi-occupied Netherlands.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both animation & history
Whisper of the Heart (1995)
Shizuku lives a simple life, dominated by her love for stories and writing. One day she notices that all the library books she has have been previously checked out by the same person: "Seiji Amasawa."
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both animation & drama
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisMillennium Actress (2002)
Documentary filmmaker Genya Tachibana has tracked down the legendary actress Chiyoko Fujiwara, who mysteriously vanished at the height of her career. When he presents her with a key she had lost and thought was gone forever, the filmmaker could not have imagined that it would not only unlock the long-held secrets of Chiyoko’s life... but also his own.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both animation & drama
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisPlanetarian: Hoshi no Hito (2016)
The film adapts and expands the Planetarian visual novel by Key. The story is set in a dystopian future where biological and nuclear warfare has left a once prosperous civilization in complete ruin. The film tells the story of an old man travelling around with a mobile planetarium projector to show people the stars.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both animation & drama
Inu-Oh (2022)
A cursed dancer and a blind musician — both ostracized by society — become business partners and inseparable friends as their larger-than-life concerts propel them to stardom in 14th century Japan.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both animation & drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisKizumonogatari Part 1: Tekketsu (2016)
One day, Koyomi Araragi encounters the horrifying vampire, Kiss-shot Acerola-orion Heart-under-blade A.K.A. the "King of Apparitions." He saves the fatally wounded Kiss-shot by offering his blood at the expense of his own life as a human. Now Koyomi has to face the vampire hunters to retrieve Kiss-shot’s limbs which were taken by these hunters...
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both animation & drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisEVANGELION: DEATH (TRUE)² (1998)
A highly experimental film presenting a story out of chronological order taking place 15 years after a near-apocalyptic catastrophe, about four traumatized 14 year olds who are tasked with piloting massive humanoid decisive weapons called Evangelion, the psychologically maladjusted adults who handle and command them, and the events and forces that affect them or which they take part in as they engage massive hostile invaders known as "Angels."
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both animation & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisGANTZ:O (2016)
After being brutally murdered in a subway station, a teen boy awakens to find himself resurrected by a strange computer named Gantz, and forced to fight a large force of invading aliens in Osaka.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both animation & drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisNeon Genesis Evangelion: The End of Evangelion (1997)
SEELE orders an all-out attack on NERV, aiming to destroy the Evas before Gendo can advance his own plans for the Human Instrumentality Project. Shinji is pushed to the limits of his sanity as he is forced to decide the fate of humanity.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both animation & drama
Absolute CinemaMovies like this
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Frequently asked questions
What are the best movies like Tatsumi?
The closest matches to Tatsumi are March Comes In Like a Lion (2017), Miss Hokusai (2015) and Black Jack: The Movie (1996). Below are 27 more, each with the reason it matches.
What should I watch after Tatsumi?
People who watched Tatsumi most often go on to March Comes In Like a Lion (2017), Miss Hokusai (2015) and Black Jack: The Movie (1996).
What is the highest-rated movie like Tatsumi?
Neon Genesis Evangelion: The End of Evangelion (1997), rated 8.3/10 by 2,002 TMDB users.
What is the newest movie like Tatsumi?
cocoon - One Summer of Girlhood (2026) is the most recent release on this list.
Are there Japanese movies like Tatsumi?
Yes: March Comes In Like a Lion (2017), Miss Hokusai (2015) and Black Jack: The Movie (1996).
How are movies similar to Tatsumi chosen?
First come films that Trakt’s viewers watch alongside Tatsumi, then TMDB’s recommendations and films it rates as similar in story and genre. Each pick says which signal put it there.