NoBadPicks

Movies Like After the Storm

If you loved After the Storm's Drama storytelling, these films deliver a similar experience — carefully selected for tone, themes, and emotional depth. Each pick includes where to watch it right now.

Top Picks

MOTHER
7.0

MOTHER

2020

Shuhei is leading a tough life. His alcoholic mother Akiko can only hook up with bad guys and order Shuhei to go get money from his disapproving grandparents instead of going to school. Except raising the little half-sister, his rock-bottom life seems to have no end.

A Man
7.1

A Man

2022

Akira works as a lawyer. One day, he meets with his former client Rie, who asks Akira to perform a background check on her late husband Daisuke.

Nobody Knows
8.0

Nobody Knows

2004

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.

Bunny Drop
7.1

Bunny Drop

2011

Daikichi learns that his recently deceased grandfather has an illegitimate daughter with an unknown mother. The girl's name is Rin and she is just 6 years old. Everybody in Daikichi's family looks at the girl as an embarrassment and wants no part of her. Daikichi, annoyed by his family's attitude, decides to raise Rin by himself. Even though Daikichi himself has no experience raising a child and is still single.

Kakegurui: The Movie
7.3

Kakegurui: The Movie

2019

Hyakkaou Private Academy. An institution for the privileged with a very peculiar curriculum. You see, when you're the sons and daughters of the wealthiest of the wealthy, it's not athletic prowess or book smarts that keep you ahead. It's reading your opponent, the art of the deal. What better way to hone those skills than with a rigorous curriculum of gambling? At Hyakkaou Private Academy, the winners live like kings, and the losers are put through the wringer. But when Yumeko Jabami enrols, she's gonna teach these kids what a high roller really looks like!

The Bad Sleep Well
7.7

The Bad Sleep Well

1960

In this loose adaptation of "Hamlet," illegitimate son Kôichi Nishi climbs to a high position within a Japanese corporation and marries the crippled daughter of company vice president Iwabuchi. At the reception, the wedding cake is a replica of their corporate headquarters, but an aspect of the design reminds the party of the hushed-up death of Nishi's father. It is then that Nishi unleashes his plan to avenge his father's death.

The Taste of Tea
7.5

The Taste of Tea

2004

A spell of time in the life of a family in rural Tochigi prefecture. Yoshiko is not an ordinary housewife, instead working on an animated film project. Uncle Ayano, a successful music producer, is looking to get his head together after living in Tokyo. Meanwhile, Sachiko is concerned with why she seems to be followed by a giant version of herself. As the lazy days pass by, each member of the family is followed in a series of episodic vignettes.

Good Morning
7.7

Good Morning

1959

A lighthearted take on director Yasujiro Ozu’s perennial theme of the challenges of inter­generational relationships, Good Morning tells the story of two young boys who stop speaking in protest after their parents refuse to buy a television set. Ozu weaves a wealth of subtle gags through a family portrait as rich as those of his dramatic films, mocking the foibles of the adult world through the eyes of his child protagonists. Shot in stunning color and set in a suburb of Tokyo where housewives gossip about the neighbors’ new washing machine and unemployed husbands look for work as door-to-door salesmen, this charming comedy refashions Ozu’s own silent classic I Was Born, But . . . to gently satirize consumerism in postwar Japan.

More Movies Like After the Storm

Before We Vanish
6.5

Before We Vanish

2017

Narumi is on bad terms with her husband, Shinji, when, one day, Shinji goes missing. He comes back a couple of days later, but he seems like a totally different person, and he is now gentle and tender. He goes for a walk every day. Meanwhile, journalist Sakurai covers the story of a family that was brutally murdered, when an unexplained phenomenon takes place.

Our Little Sister
7.6

Our Little Sister

2015

After the death of their estranged father, 3 adult sisters invite their teenaged half-sister to live with them.

Lost in Translation
7.4

Lost in Translation

2003

Two lost souls visiting Tokyo -- the young, neglected wife of a photographer and a washed-up movie star shooting a TV commercial -- find an odd solace and pensive freedom to be real in each other's company, away from their lives in America.

An Autumn Afternoon
7.9

An Autumn Afternoon

1962

Shuhei Hirayama is a widower with a 24-year-old daughter. Gradually, he comes to realize that she should not be obliged to look after him for the rest of his life, so he arranges a marriage for her.

My Happy Marriage
7.2

My Happy Marriage

2023

An unhappy young woman from an abusive family is married off to a fearsome and chilly army commander. But the two learn more about each other, love may have a chance.

Madea's Big Happy Family
6.8

Madea's Big Happy Family

2011

When Shirley, Madea's niece, receives distressing news about her health, the only thing she wants is her family gathered around her. However, Shirley's three adult children are too preoccupied with their own troubled lives to pay attention to their mother. It is up to Madea, with the help of rowdy Aunt Bam, to bring the clan together and help Shirley deal with her crisis.

Her Love Boils Bathwater
7.4

Her Love Boils Bathwater

2016

After being diagnosed with a terminal illness, Futaba resolves to spend her remaining time reuniting her broken family, reopening the long-closed bathhouse, and helping her shy daughter Azumi learn to stand on her own.

Tokyo Story
8.2

Tokyo Story

1953

The elderly Shukishi and his wife, Tomi, take the long journey from their small seaside village to visit their adult children in Tokyo. Their elder son, Koichi, a doctor, and their daughter, Shige, a hairdresser, don't have much time to spend with their aged parents, and so it falls to Noriko, the widow of their younger son who was killed in the war, to keep her in-laws company.

Record of a Tenement Gentleman
7.2

Record of a Tenement Gentleman

1947

An errant salaryman's son gets lost until a man from the Tokyo tenements brings him to vendor Tane, who's reluctant to let the kid board.

Maquia: When the Promised Flower Blooms
8.2

Maquia: When the Promised Flower Blooms

2018

Fleeing the war, the immortal Machia, graced with eternal youth, finds a baby abandoned in the forest and decides to raise it as her own child, sparking a moving story between a mortal and a being who does not age.

The Insect Woman
7.2

The Insect Woman

1963

A woman, Tome, is born to a lower class family in Japan in 1918. The title refers to an insect, repeating its mistakes, as in an infinite circle. Imamura, with this metaphor, introduces the life of Tome, who keeps trying to change her poor life.

The Glass Castle
7.1

The 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 These Movies Are Similar

These recommendations share core qualities with After the Storm (2016): Drama themes, similar narrative structure, and comparable emotional depth. NoBadPicks uses a combination of TMDB collaborative filtering, genre matching, and AI analysis to surface films most likely to resonate with fans of After the Storm.

See full details for After the Storm (2016)

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