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Winter Light poster

Movies that feel likeWinter Light (1963)

A Swedish pastor fails a loving woman, a suicidal fisherman and God.

If you loved Winter Light, the closest films we have are Autumn Sonata (1978), Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (1958) and Places in the Heart (1984). All three share Winter Light's contemplative and melancholy feel, which is what we rank on before quality.

Seen the big three already? The under-the-radar pick below is Sick: The Life and Death of Bob Flanagan, Supermasochist (1997).

🍅 77% Rotten Tomatoes★ 8 IMDb ↗TMDB ↗dir. Ingmar Bergmancontemplativemelancholy
9 of 12 streaming nowHBO Max · Paramount Plus Essential · Criterion Channel

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If Winter Light hit the spot, these will too

Autumn Sonata poster
Autumn Sonata
1978 · dir. Ingmar Bergman
🍅 85%★ 8.1dramaMax

Ingmar Bergman working the same nerve twice

After a seven-year absence, Charlotte Andergast travels to Sweden to reunite with her daughter Eva. The pair have a troubled relationship: Charlotte sacrificed the responsibilities of motherhood for a career as a classical pianist. Over an emotional night, the pair reopen the wounds of the past. Charlotte gets another shock when she finds out that her mentally impaired daughter, Helena, is out of the asylum and living with Eva.

Cat on a Hot Tin Roof poster
Cat on a Hot Tin Roof
1958 · dir. Richard Brooks
🍅 97%★ 7.9drama

Both are built on the same subject: suicide

An alcoholic ex-football player drinks his days away, having failed to come to terms with his sexuality and his real feelings for his football buddy who died after an ambiguous accident. His wife is crucified by her desperation to make him desire her: but he resists the affections of his wife. His reunion with his father—who is dying of cancer—jogs a host of memories and revelations for both father and son.

Places in the Heart poster
Places in the Heart
1984 · dir. Robert Benton
🍅 90%★ 7.4drama

Contemplative and melancholy in the same breath

The difference: Made in the 1980s, in a different era of the craft

In 1935 rural Texas, recently widowed Edna Spaulding struggles to survive with two small children, a farm to run, and very little money in the bank - not to mention a deadly tornado and the unwelcome presence of the Ku Klux Klan. Edna is aided by her beautician sister, Margaret; a blind boarder, Mr. Will; and a would-be thief, Moze, who decides to teach Edna how to plant and harvest cotton.

8½ poster
8½
1963 · dir. Federico Fellini
🍅 97%★ 8dramaMax

Both lean on stillness more than on drama

Guido Anselmi, a film director, finds himself creatively barren at the peak of his career. Urged by his doctors to rest, Anselmi heads for a luxurious resort, but a sorry group gathers—his producer, staff, actors, wife, mistress, and relatives—each one begging him to get on with the show. In retreat from their dependency, he fantasizes about past women and dreams of his childhood.

Taste of Cherry poster
Taste of Cherry
1997 · dir. Abbas Kiarostami
🍅 82%★ 7.7dramaMax

Both keep coming back to the same thing: suicide

A middle-aged Tehranian man, Mr. Badii is intent on killing himself and seeks someone to bury him after his demise. Driving around the city, the seemingly well-to-do Badii meets with numerous people, including a Muslim student, asking them to take on the job, but initially he has little luck. Eventually, Badii finds a man who is up for the task because he needs the money, but his new associate soon tries to talk him out of committing suicide.

City of Men poster
City of Men
2007 · dir. Paulo Morelli
🍅 74%★ 7.2dramaParamount+

Melancholy drama, and it commits to that

Best buddies Acerola and Laranjinha, about to turn 18, discover things about their missing fathers' pasts which will shatter their solid friendship, in the middle of a war between rival drug gangs from Rio's favelas.

Nobody Knows poster
Nobody Knows
2004 · dir. Hirokazu Kore-eda
🍅 92%★ 8drama

Drama with a pulse of stillness, in both cases

In a small Tokyo apartment, twelve-year-old Akira must care for his younger siblings after their mother leaves them and shows no sign of returning.

Silent Heart poster
Silent Heart
2014 · dir. Bille August
★ 7.1drama

Both work the same melancholy

Three generations of a family gather over a weekend. The sisters Sanne and Heidi have accepted their terminally-ill mother’s desire to die before her disease worsens; but, as the weekend progresses, their mother's decision becomes harder and harder to deal with, and old conflicts come to the surface.

Central Station poster
Central Station
1998 · dir. Walter Salles
🍅 94%★ 8drama

Both play drama straight

An emotional journey of a former school teacher, who writes letters for illiterate people, and a young boy, whose mother has just died, as they search for the father he never knew.

The Passion of Anna poster
The Passion of Anna
1969 · dir. Ingmar Bergman
🍅 100%★ 7.6drama

Ingmar Bergman directing both, with the same fingerprints on each

A recently divorced man and an emotionally devastated widow begin a love affair.

Three Colors: Blue poster
Three Colors: Blue
1993 · dir. Krzysztof Kieślowski
🍅 98%★ 7.8dramaMax

The same drama instincts

The wife of a famous composer survives a car accident that kills her husband and daughter. Now alone, she shakes off her old identity and explores her newfound freedom but finds that she is unbreakably bound to other humans, including her husband’s mistress, whose existence she never suspected.

Sick: The Life and Death of Bob Flanagan, Supermasochist poster
🍅 92%★ 7.5documentary

A 1990s cousin in spirit

The difference: Leans harder into documentary than Winter Light does

The story of Robert Flanagan, a man who was born with cystic fibrosis and told he wouldn't live past 20, who through a unique odyssey of masochism, art and love found a way to live decades past his expiration date.

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The best-reviewed films that share Winter Light’s defining feeling.