Movies Like Paula
If you loved Paula'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
The Safety of Objects
In a suburban landscape, the lives of several families interlace with loss, despair and personal crisis. Esther Gold has lost focus on all but caring for her comatose son, Paul, and neglects her daughter and husband. Lawyer Jim Train is devoted to his career, not his family. Helen Christianson wants to find a new spark in life, while Annette Jennings tries to rebuild hers.
Bastard Out of Carolina
A poor, struggling South Carolinian mother and daughter face painful choices with their resolve and pride. Bone, the eldest daughter, and Anney her tired mother, grow both closer and farther apart: Anney sees Glen as her last chance.
The German Lesson
In a small North German village a drama played out during and shortly after the Second World War about duty versus individual conscience and morality.
El Chicano
A pair of twin brothers from East L.A. choose to live their lives differently and end up on opposite sides of the law.
My Neighbor Adolf
South America, 1960. A lonely and grumpy Holocaust survivor convinces himself that his new neighbor is none other than Adolf Hitler. Not being taken seriously, he starts an independent investigation to prove his claim, but when the evidence still appears to be inconclusive, Polsky is forced to engage in a relationship with the enemy in order to obtain irrefutable proof.
The Girl in the Book
The story of a young writer's transformation when her past invades her present.
Gracie
A teenager faces an uphill battle when she fights to give women the opportunity to play competitive soccer.
More Movies Like Paula
The Trials of Cate McCall
In order to be reinstated to the bar and recover custody of her daughter, a hotshot lawyer, now in recovery and on probation, must take on the appeal of a woman wrongfully convicted of murder.
Herself
Struggling to provide her daughters with a safe, happy home, Sandra decides to build one - from scratch. Using all her ingenuity to make her ambitious dream a reality, Sandra draws together a community to lend a helping hand to build her house and ultimately recover her own sense of self.
Hellion
When motocross and heavy metal obsessed, 13-year-old Jacob's delinquent behavior forces CPS to place his little brother Wes with his aunt, Jacob and his emotionally absent father must finally take responsibility for their actions and each other in order to bring Wes home.
XX/XY
Three friends begin a dangerous three-way relationship that spirals out of control, leading to dire consequences that haunt them ten years later.
Mayerling
Crown Prince Rudolf of Austria clashes with his father, Emperor Franz Joseph I of Austria, over implementing progressive policies for their country. Rudolf soon feels he is a man born at the wrong time in a country that doesn't realize the need for social reform. The Prince of Wales, later to become Britain's King Edward VII, provides comic relief. Rudolf finds refuge from a loveless marriage with Princess Stéphanie by taking a mistress, Baroness Maria Vetsera. Their untimely demise at Mayerling, the imperial family's hunting lodge, is cloaked in mystery.
The Truth About Emanuel
A troubled young woman becomes obsessed with her mysterious new neighbor, who bears a striking resemblance to the girl's dead mother.
Ashes in the Snow
The coming-of-age tale of 16-year-old Lina Vilkas who is deported to Siberia amid Stalin's reign of terror in the Baltic region during WWII. An aspiring artist, she secretly documents her harrowing journey with her drawings.
Blackbird
A terminally ill mother invites her family to their country house for one final gathering, but tensions quickly boil over between her two daughters.
Lucky Them
More interested in partying and flirting with young musicians than work, veteran rock journalist Ellie Klug has one last chance to prove her value to her magazine’s editor: a no-stone-unturned search to discover what really happened to long lost rock god, Matt Smith, who also happens to be her ex-boyfriend. Teaming up with an eccentric amateur documentary filmmaker, Ellie hits the road in search of answers.
Come Sunday
Evangelist Carlton Pearson is ostracized by his church for preaching that there is no Hell.
The Tasters
In autumn 1943, in Gross-Partsch, 26-year-old Rosa, who had come from Berlin to stay with the parents of her husband Gregor, who was fighting on the Russian front, was taken by the SS to a mysterious place. Forced to taste a dish, she joins the group of tasters responsible for checking that the food destined for Hitler is not poisoned.
Remembrance
Hannah, a young Jewish girl, is rescued from a concentration camp by her Polish boyfriend, and believes he died after their perilous escape. More than 30 years later, the married Hannah faces an emotional crisis when she learns he's alive.
Why These Movies Are Similar
These recommendations share core qualities with Paula (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 Paula.
See full details for Paula (2016)