Movies like Hard to Place (2019)
The best movies like Hard to Place (2019) are Sleepwalking (2008), The Inevitable Defeat of Mister & Pete (2013) and Short Term 12 (2013). If Hard to Place hooked you, these 30 similar films are what to watch next, and every pick says why it matches.
Quick picks
- Highest ratedShort Term 12 (2013)7.7/10 from 1,474 votes
- NewestShe Rides Shotgun (2025)Released 2025
Sleepwalking (2008)
When her boyfriend is arrested for marijuana possession, Joleen Reedy and her 11-year-old daughter, Tara, take refuge with Joleen's aimless brother, James. Joleen soon runs off with a truck driver, and James is unable to meet his responsibilities. After Child Protective Services takes possession of Tara, James abducts her from a foster home, and the two travel from California to Utah, where his abusive father lives.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Inevitable Defeat of Mister & Pete (2013)
Coming of age story about two inner city youths, who are left to fend for themselves over the summer after their mothers are taken away by the authorities.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Worth the HypeMovies like thisShort Term 12 (2013)
Grace, a compassionate young supervisor at a foster care facility, helps at-risk teens. But when a new charge dredges up memories of her own troubled past, Grace's tough exterior begins eroding.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Worth the HypeMovies like thisA Home of Our Own (1993)
In 1960s Los Angeles an energetic widow and her six children try to make a dream of theirs come true: to have a home of their own. They leave L.A. and head for the countryside, all the while facing numerous difficulties and obstacles during their journey.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Worth the HypeMovies like thisStanding Up (2013)
Based on one of the most beloved Young Adult novels of all time: Two kids are stripped naked and left together on an island in a lake - victims of a vicious summer camp prank; But rather than have to return to camp and face the humiliation, they decide to take off, on the run together. What follows is a three day odyssey of discovery and self-discovery.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisGimme Shelter (2013)
After running away from her abusive mother, a streetwise teen seeks refuge with her father, but he rejects her when he learns that she's pregnant.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisPlease Don't Feed the Children (2025)
After a viral outbreak ravaged the country’s adult population, a group of orphans heads south in search of a new life, only to find themselves at the mercy of a deranged woman harboring a dangerous secret.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisProblem Child (1990)
Ben Healy and his social climbing wife Flo adopt fun-loving seven year old Junior. But they soon discover he's a little monster as he turns a camping trip, a birthday party and even a baseball game into comic nightmares.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Popcorn FlickMovies 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
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisLike Dandelion Dust (2009)
Rip Porter is sentenced to seven years in prison for beating his wife, Wendy. When he is released, he discovers that Wendy gave up their child, and the privileged Campbell family adopted him. The two families are soon in a legal battle for the child they both love.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Worth the HypeMovies like thisRocks (2020)
15-year-old Rocks fears that she and her little brother Emmanuel will be taken into care and forced apart if anyone finds out that their mother has left them. Against all odds, and with the help of her loyal friends, she evades the authorities and navigates the most defining days of her young life.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisWuthering Heights (1992)
Young orphan Heathcliff is adopted by the wealthy Earnshaw family and moves into their estate, Wuthering Heights. Soon, the new resident falls for his compassionate foster sister, Cathy. The two share a remarkable bond that seems unbreakable until Cathy, feeling the pressure of social convention, suppresses her feelings and marries Edgar Linton, a man of means who befits her stature. Heathcliff vows to win her back.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisShe Rides Shotgun (2025)
Newly released from prison and marked for death by unrelenting enemies, Nate must now protect his estranged 11-year-old daughter, Polly, at all costs. With scant resources and no one to trust, Nate and Polly forge a bond under fire as he shows her how to fight and survive—and she teaches him the true meaning of unconditional love.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Worth the HypeMovies like thisEvelyn (2002)
Desmond Doyle is devastated when his wife abandons their family on the day after Christmas. His unemployment, and the fact that there is no woman in the house to care for the children—Evelyn, Dermot and Maurice—make it clear to the authorities this is an untenable situation. The Catholic Church and the Irish courts decide to put the Doyle children into Church-run orphanages.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisLosing Isaiah (1995)
Khaila Richards, a crack-addicted single mother, accidentally leaves her baby in a dumpster while high and returns the next day in a panic to find he is missing. In reality, the baby has been adopted by a warm-hearted social worker, Margaret Lewin, and her husband, Charles. Years later, Khaila has gone through rehab and holds a steady job. After learning that her child is still alive, she challenges Margaret for the custody.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisOliver Twist (1948)
When 9-year-old orphan Oliver Twist dares to ask his cruel taskmaster, Mr. Bumble, for a second serving of gruel, he's hired out as an apprentice. Escaping that dismal fate, young Oliver falls in with the street urchin known as the Artful Dodger and his criminal mentor, Fagin. When kindly Mr. Brownlow takes Oliver in, Fagin's evil henchman Bill Sikes plots to kidnap the boy.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Worth the HypeMovies like thisHunt for the Wilderpeople (2016)
Ricky is a defiant young city kid who finds himself on the run with his cantankerous foster uncle in the wild New Zealand bush. A national manhunt ensues, and the two are forced to put aside their differences and work together to survive.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Worth the HypeMovies like thisPhilomena (2013)
A woman searches for her adult son, who was taken away from her decades ago when she was forced to live in a convent.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Worth the HypeMovies like thisGardens of the Night (2008)
After being abducted as children, and suffering years of abuse, a teenage boy and girl find themselves living on the street.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisTransamerica (2005)
A transgender woman takes an unexpected journey when she learns that she had a son, now a teenage runaway hustling on the streets of New York.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe Butterfly Effect (2004)
A young man struggles to access sublimated childhood memories. He finds a technique that allows him to travel back into the past, to occupy his childhood body and change history. However, he soon finds that every change he makes has unexpected consequences.
Why it matches: Similar story and style
Worth the HypeMovies like thisTrapped in Silence (1986)
A compelling drama about a silent, violent teenager. Kevin suffers from elective mutism and no one has ever heard him utter a word.
Why it matches: Similar story and style
Antwone Fisher (2002)
A sailor prone to violent outbursts is sent to a naval psychiatrist for help. Refusing at first to open up, the young man eventually breaks down and reveals a horrific childhood. Through the guidance of his doctor, he confronts his painful past and begins a quest to find the family he never knew.
Why it matches: Similar story and style
Worth the HypeMovies like thisPorcelain (2024)
A woman returns to her childhood home following her father's death, and begins to remember the horrors of her past.
Why it matches: Similar story and style
The People Under the Stairs (1991)
Trapped inside a fortified home owned by a mysterious couple, a young boy quickly learns the true nature of the homicidal inhabitants, and secret creatures hidden deep within the walls.
Why it matches: Similar story and style
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisSound of Hope: The Story of Possum Trot (2024)
Led by Donna and Reverend W.C. Martin, 22 families from a rural Black church in the small East Texas town of Possum Trot adopt 77 of the most difficult-to-place kids in the foster system and kickstart a movement in the process.
Why it matches: Similar story and style
Worth the HypeMovies like thisAn American Crime (2007)
The true story of suburban housewife Gertrude Baniszewski, who kept a teenage girl locked in the basement of her Indiana home during the 1960s.
Why it matches: Similar story and style
Worth the HypeMovies like thisElizabeth's Gift (2012)
When a precious little girl dies tragically of a rare heart condition, her grieving parents are left to pick up the pieces of their once perfect life. In a sequence of events influenced by faith (and perhaps miracles), they are guided to a homeless girl on the streets, and a battle ensues to reunite as a family and heal their broken hearts.
Why it matches: Similar story and style
Cape Fear (1991)
Sam Bowden is a small-town corporate attorney. Max Cady is a tattooed, cigar-smoking, Bible-quoting, psychotic rapist. What do they have in common? 14 years ago, Sam was a public defender assigned to Max Cady's rape trial, and he made a serious error: he hid a document from his illiterate client that could have gotten him acquitted. Now, the cagey Cady has been released, and he intends to teach Sam Bowden and his family a thing or two about loss.
Why it matches: Similar story and style
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe Devil's Advocate (1997)
Aspiring Florida defense lawyer Kevin Lomax accepts a job at a New York law firm. With the stakes getting higher every case, Kevin quickly learns that his boss has something far more evil planned.
Why it matches: Similar story and style
Worth the HypeMovies like this
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Frequently asked questions
What are the best movies like Hard to Place?
The closest matches to Hard to Place are Sleepwalking (2008), The Inevitable Defeat of Mister & Pete (2013) and Short Term 12 (2013). Below are 27 more, each with the reason it matches.
What should I watch after Hard to Place?
Start with Sleepwalking (2008), the closest match to Hard to Place.
What is the highest-rated movie like Hard to Place?
Short Term 12 (2013), rated 7.7/10 by 1,474 TMDB users.
What is the newest movie like Hard to Place?
She Rides Shotgun (2025) is the most recent release on this list.
Are there English movies like Hard to Place?
Yes: Sleepwalking (2008), The Inevitable Defeat of Mister & Pete (2013) and Short Term 12 (2013).
How are movies similar to Hard to Place chosen?
First come films that Trakt’s viewers watch alongside Hard to Place, then TMDB’s recommendations and films it rates as similar in story and genre. Each pick says which signal put it there.