Movies like Dress Rehearsal (1989)
The best movies like Dress Rehearsal (1989) are The Souvenir (2019), Ayka (2018) and Little Vera (1988). If Dress Rehearsal hooked you, these 20 similar films are what to watch next, and every pick says why it matches.
Quick picks
- Highest ratedI Swear (2025)8.3/10 from 679 votes
- NewestThe Smashing Machine (2025)Released 2025
The Souvenir (2019)
A shy but ambitious film student falls into an intense, emotionally fraught relationship with a charismatic but untrustworthy older man.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisAyka (2018)
A young Kyrgyz immigrant tries to eke out a living in Moscow after abandoning her newborn and fleeing the hospital.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisLittle Vera (1988)
Vera is a troubled teenager fresh out of school feeling trapped in her provincial port town during the turbulent times of perestroika. Her days and nights are filled with drinking, sex, and family dysfunction.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisCargo 200 (2007)
While returning to Leningrad from a visit to his brother, Professor Artyom's car breaks down and he finds assistance at an isolated farmhouse occupied by Alexey, his wife, a Vietnamese laborer, and a stranger who wanders around the farm. When his car is repaired, Artyom leaves, drunk on moonshine, and students Valera and Angelika arrive. After Valera gets drunk, the stranger abducts Angelika.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisBlinded by the Light (2019)
In 1987, during the austere days of Thatcher’s Britain, a teenager learns to live life, understand his family, and find his own voice through the music of Bruce Springsteen.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisSlums of Beverly Hills (1998)
In 1976, a teenage girl struggles to cope while living with her neurotic lower-middle-class family of nomads on the outskirts of Beverly Hills.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisMagazine Dreams (2025)
Aspiring bodybuilder Killian Maddox struggles to find human connection in an exploration of celebrity and violence. Nothing deters him from his fiercely protected dream of superstardom, not even the doctors who warn him of the permanent damage he causes to himself with his quest.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Worth the HypeMovies like thisI Swear (2025)
Diagnosed with Tourette Syndrome at 15, John Davidson navigates his way against the odds through troubled teenage years and into adulthood, finding inspiration in the kindness of others to discover his true purpose in life.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisA Girl Like Her (2015)
Sophomore year has been a nightmare for Jessica Burns. Relentlessly harassed by her former friend Avery Keller, Jessica doesn't know what she did to deserve the abuse from one of South Brookdale High's most popular and beautiful students. But when a shocking event changes both of their lives, a documentary film crew, a hidden digital camera, and the attention of a reeling community begin to reveal the powerful truth about A Girl Like Her.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe Outrun (2024)
Fresh out of rehab, Rona returns to the Orkney Islands—a place both wild and beautiful, right off the Scottish coast. Now 29 and after more than a decade of living life on the edge in London, where she both found and lost love, Rona attempts to come to terms with her troubled past. As she reconnects with the dramatic landscape where she grew up, memories of her traumatic childhood merge with more recent challenging events that have set her on the path to recovery.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisSight (2023)
Ming Wang is an impoverished Chinese prodigy who flees Communist China to become a pioneering eye surgeon in America. When tasked with restoring the sight of an orphan in India, who was blinded by her stepmother, Wang must confront the trauma of living through the violent uprising in his youth, the Cultural Revolution.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Short History of the Long Road (2019)
Nola grew up living in a van with her father, Clint—two nomads against the world. When tragedy strikes, Nola must confront the reality of life on the road alone, learning to own her grief, her past, and her new destination.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe Smashing Machine (2025)
In the late 1990s, up-and-coming mixed martial artist Mark Kerr aspires to become the greatest fighter in the world. However, he must also battle his opioid dependence and a volatile relationship with his girlfriend Dawn.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisMoscow Does Not Believe in Tears (1980)
Living together in a workers' dorm, Katerina and her friends are determined to make it in Moscow. But when a boorish cameraman forces himself on her, Katerina finds herself pregnant and alone as her friends move on. Twenty years later, Katerina is a factory director, outpacing her old roommates career-wise, yet still alone but for her daughter. Love seems possible again when she meets a genial mechanic.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Worth the HypeMovies like thisAndrey Tarkovsky. A Cinema Prayer (2019)
An account of the life and work of Russian filmmaker Andrey Tarkovsky (1932-86) in his own words: his memories, his vision of art and his reflections on the fate of the artist and the meaning of human existence; through extremely rare audio recordings that allow a complete understanding of his inner life and the mysterious world existing behind his complex cinematic imagery.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisSpeak (2004)
Freshman high-school student Melinda has refused to speak ever since she called the cops on a popular summer party. With her old friends snubbing her for being a rat, and her parents too busy to notice her troubles, she folds into herself.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Worth the HypeMovies like thisReal Women Have Curves (2002)
In East Los Angeles, an 18-year-old struggles between her ambitions of going to college and the desires of her domineering mother for her to get married, have children, and oversee the small, rundown family-owned textile factory.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisCall Me by Your Name (2017)
In the summer of 1983, a 17-year-old Elio spends his days in his family's villa in Italy. One day Oliver, a graduate student, arrives to assist Elio's father, a professor of Greco-Roman culture. Soon, Elio and Oliver discover a summer that will alter their lives forever.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisMan with a Movie Camera (1929)
A cameraman wanders around with a camera slung over his shoulder, documenting urban life with dazzling inventiveness.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisThe Tale (2018)
An investigation into one woman’s memory as she‘s forced to re-examine her first sexual relationship and the stories we tell ourselves in order to survive.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Worth the HypeMovies like this
Like Dress Rehearsal and something else?
Blend two favourites and we’ll find the films in between.
Frequently asked questions
What are the best movies like Dress Rehearsal?
The closest matches to Dress Rehearsal are The Souvenir (2019), Ayka (2018) and Little Vera (1988). Below are 17 more, each with the reason it matches.
What should I watch after Dress Rehearsal?
Start with The Souvenir (2019), the closest match to Dress Rehearsal.
What is the highest-rated movie like Dress Rehearsal?
I Swear (2025), rated 8.3/10 by 679 TMDB users.
What is the newest movie like Dress Rehearsal?
The Smashing Machine (2025) is the most recent release on this list.
How are movies similar to Dress Rehearsal chosen?
First come films that Trakt’s viewers watch alongside Dress Rehearsal, then TMDB’s recommendations and films it rates as similar in story and genre. Each pick says which signal put it there.