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Movies like Lilting

Key Features:
Grief, Loss, Cultural differences, Mother-son relationship, Homosexuality, Language barrier, Intergenerational, Intimacy, Isolation, China, Melancholy, LGBTQ+
Tone:
restrained, poetic, serious
Target Audience:
Drama viewers, LGBTQ+ audience, Independent film enthusiasts, Introspective viewers
Emotional Arc:
Grief → Connection → Understanding

Lilting

2014-08-08
Lilting Poster - Find Similar Movies

A young man of Chinese-Cambodian descent dies, leaving behind his isolated mother and his lover of four years. Though the two don't share a language, they grow close through their grief.

Genres
Drama
Cast
Ben Whishaw, Cheng Pei-Pei, Andrew Leung, Morven Christie, Naomi Yang, Peter Bowles, Shane Salter, Leila Wong
Crew
Hong Khaou, Hong Khaou
Rating
6.921(126 votes)
LiltingLilting
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Chinese Box
5.773

The story of Hong Kong, from New Year's Day to June 30th, 1997, when the British left their colony and turned it over to the People's Republic of China.



All of Us Strangers
7.412

One night in his near-empty tower block in contemporary London, Adam has a chance encounter with a mysterious neighbor Harry, which punctures the rhythm of his everyday life.



Mad World
Mad World(2016)
6.95

An absentee father and his bipolar son are forced to live together as they struggle with a recent family tragedy. The tension and anxiety boil as they live and try to cope in a tiny apartment. As time passes, they realize their shared pain is not their only source of grief, as they find the outside world is a cruel and unjust place.



Lan Yu
Lan Yu(2001)
6.9

A love story between a country boy in Beijing to study and a wealthy businessman set against the backdrop of the 1989 Tiananmen Square incident.



London River
6.7

After traveling to London to check on their missing children in the wake of the 2005 terror attacks on the city, two strangers come to discover their respective children had been living together at the time of the attacks



Mother and Son
6.7

A man goes for a walk through the countryside with his dying mother.



Little Big Women
7.1

A story about a karaoke-addicted old woman struggling with her self-worth and a sense of betrayal at her long-lost husband's funeral where she encounters his younger and more sophisticated girlfriend while she finds out her kids might have been secretly in touch with her late husband all these years.



Sad Movie
Sad Movie(2005)
6.5

These intertwining stories about romance and separation follow a firefighter who can't find the right time to propose, a shy theme park worker who falls for an artist, an estranged mother and son, and a man seeking to regain his lost love.



Just Friends
7.027

Joris is trying to come to terms with his broken family relationships on the 10th anniversary of his father’s death when he meets the free-spirited, Yad. Also dealing with family issues, Yad has returned home to The Netherlands after living on his own. Joris and Yad spark an instant connection and decide they want to be more than “just friends,” but fear their families could threaten their relationship.



Teddy Bear
6.777

After failing to find love in Denmark, a painfully shy bodybuilder sets off for Thailand to escape from his overbearing mother and search for a bride.



So Long, My Son
7.694

Two married couples adjust to the vast social and economic changes taking place in China from the 1980s to the present.



Restless
Restless(2011)
6.506

Two outsiders, both shaped by the circumstances that have brought them together, forge a deep and lasting love.



Dearest
Dearest(2014)
7.1

A story centered around a divorced couple living in a southern Chinese city Shenzhen and dealing with the disappearance of their missing son.



Chinese Puzzle
6.571

Xavier is a 40-year-old father of two who still finds life very complicated. When the mother of his children moves to New York, he can't bear them growing up far away from him and so he decides to move there as well.



Other People
6.347

David, a struggling comedy writer fresh off from breaking up with his boyfriend, moves from New York City to Sacramento to help his sick mother. Living with his conservative father and much-younger sisters for the first time in ten years, he feels like a stranger in his childhood home. As his mother’s health declines, David frantically tries to extract meaning from this horrible experience and convince everyone (including himself) that he's "doing okay.”



Only You
Only You(2019)
6.607

A madly-in-love young couple's relationship begins to suffer when they struggle to conceive a child.



My Life Without Me
6.069

A fatally ill mother with only two months to live creates a list of things she wants to do before she dies without telling her family of her illness.



A Man Amidst Bees
6.807

Bruno is a young film editor who has just broke up his marriage with Regina, and returned living in his mother's house. Drowned in deep sorrow, something very weird happens in his life: people around him are gradually disappearing. But only for him. Some kind of blindness.



Comrades, Almost a Love Story

Jun arrives in Hong Kong from mainland China, hoping to be able to earn enough money to marry his girlfriend back home. He meets the streetwise Qiao and they become friends. As friendship turns into love, problems develop, and although they seem meant for each other they somehow keep missing out.



The Road Home
7.5

Prompted by the death of his father and the grief of his mother, a man recalls the story of how they met in flashback.



Misunderstood
7.521

The story of a widower and his two sons, focusing on their complex and sometimes difficult relationships.



1:54
1:54(2016)
6.6

Tim, a shy 16-year-old athlete with a natural gift for running, is dealing with the loss of his mother, as well as his sexuality. After a personal video is posted to social media, Tim's private life is about to explode into the public eye.



Vinyan
Vinyan(2008)
5.1

Six months after losing her only child in the Southeast Asia tsunami, Jeanne is convinced she sees him in a film about orphans living in the jungles.



Saving Face
7.262

A Chinese-American lesbian and her traditionalist mother are reluctant to go public with secret loves that clash against cultural expectations.



Mother
Mother(2019)
6.73

Ten years have gone by since Elena's six-year old son has disappeared. The last thing she heard of him was a phone call he gave her, saying that he was lost on a beach in France and couldn't find his father. Nowadays, Elena lives on this same beach and manages a restaurant. She is finally beginning to emerge from this tragic episode when she meets a French teenager who strongly reminds her of her lost son. The two of them will embark on a relationship which will sow chaos and distrust around them.



The Levelling
6.2

Clover is finishing a veterinary course when her brother dies and she is called home to her family's struggling Somerset farm.



What Time Is It There?

A street vendor with a grim home-life forges a connection with a young woman on her way to Paris.



James White
6.574

James White is a troubled twentysomething trying to stay afloat in a frenzied New York City. As he retreats further into a hedonistic lifestyle, his mother's battle with a serious illness faces a series of setbacks that force him to assume more responsibility. With the pressure on him mounting, James must find new reserves of strength or risk imploding completely.



Another Year
6.987

During a year, a very content couple approaching retirement are visited by friends and family less happy with their lives.



Close
Close(2022)
7.785

Two 13-year-old boys spend an idyllic summer together, but their connection is put to the test when they become the subject of speculation at school.



Separation
5.692

A young girl finds solace in her artist father and the ghost of her dead mother.



Hesher
Hesher(2010)
6.799

A young boy has lost his mother and is losing touch with his father and the world around him. Then he meets Hesher who manages to make his life even more chaotic.



Holding the Man
7.691

Tim and John fell in love while teenagers at their all-boys high school. John was captain of the football team, Tim an aspiring actor playing a minor part in Romeo and Juliet. Their romance endured for 15 years in the face of everything life threw at it – the separations, the discrimination, the temptations, the jealousies and the losses – until the only problem that love can't solve tried to destroy them.



Her Story
Her Story(2024)
7.534

Wang Tiemei, a single mother, loses her job and moves, befriending neighbor Xiaoye who appears cheerful but is depressed. Their bond grows as Tiemei navigates relationships with her ex-husband causing trouble.



The In Between
7.333

After surviving a car accident that took the life of her boyfriend, a teenage girl believes he's attempting to reconnect with her from the after world.



Be with You
7.459

Takumi and his six-year-old son, Yuji, haven't come to terms with their wife and mother's death. One day, they meet a woman with an uncanny resemblance to her sheltering from the rain near their home.



Kolya
Kolya(1996)
7.3

After a fictitious marriage with a Russian emigrant, Cellisten Louka, a Czech man, must suddenly take responsibility for her son. However, it’s not long before the communication barrier is broken between the two new family members.



The Secret Life of Words

A solitary nurse bonds with a badly burned patient who survived an accident on an oil rig.



Xenia
Xenia(2014)
6.13

Strangers in their own birthplace, 16-year-old Danny and 18-year-old Odysseus cross the entire country in search of their Greek father, after their Albanian mother passes away.



You Are Not Alone
7.4

Young teenager Bo is too sensitive for the hothouse atmosphere of a boarding school run by a cold, unfeeling would-be man of the cloth. Lonely and scared, he finds a soulmate in the headmaster's son Kim with whom he forms a bond of friendship... that slowly grows into something more.



Mammoth
Mammoth(2009)
6.1

While on a trip to Thailand, a successful American businessman tries to radically change his life. Back in New York, his wife and daughter find their relationship with their live-in Filipino maid changing around them. At the same time, in the Philippines, the maid's family struggles to deal with her absence.



Love Is a Many-Splendored Thing

A widowed doctor of both Chinese and European descent falls in love with a married American correspondent in Hong Kong during China's Communist revolution.



Genova
Genova(2009)
5.623

A man moves his two daughters to Italy after their mother dies in a car accident, in order to revitalize their lives. Genoa changes all three of them as the youngest daughter starts to see the ghost of her mother, while the older one discovers her sexuality.



...ing
...ing(2003)
6.741

Follows the life of a young woman who has become reserved and indifferent to the world as a result of her chronic illness deformed hand and quietly portrays the unconventional, yet endearing relationship between mother and daughter as well as the development of Min-ah as she is befriended by the high spirited and carefree photographer Young-jae who moves into their apartment complex.



Jack & Sarah
6.718

Jack always lands on his feet. He lands on his feet when he marries the beautiful Sarah. He lands on his feet when he buys a luxurious new home. However, when Sarah goes into labour, he takes a tumble down the stairs and lands on his head. When he comes around he discovers he is the proud father of a baby girl, but deficient in the spouse department to the tune of 1.



Womb
Womb(2010)
6

A woman's consuming love forces her to bear the clone of her dead beloved. From his infancy to manhood, she faces the unavoidable complexities of her controversial decision.



Mr. Blake at Your Service!

Since his wife's death, Andrew Blake is depressed. In an ultimate impetus, he leaves London to go back to France, in the house he met her. This journey through happy days memories won't go as planned.



Love of Siam
7.3

Best friends as children, Mew and Tong run into each other years later as young men and find they have unexpected feelings for each other.



Identifying Features

Magdalena makes a journey to find her son, who has disappeared on his way to the Mexican border with the United States. Her odyssey takes her to meet Miguel, a man recently deported from the US. They start to travel together, Magdalena looking for her son, and Miguel hoping to see his mother again.



Love Everlasting
7.456

Bridger is a young outsider who's always wanted more. He and his mother flee an abusive home, eventually finding a small town in the middle of nowhere. Once there, Bridger finds true acceptance with another misfit.



Riding Alone for Thousands of Miles

Takada, a Japanese fisherman has been estranged from his son for many years, but when the son is diagnosed with terminal cancer his daughter-in-law, Rie, summons him to the hospital. Through a series of obstacles and relationships, he is brought unexpectedly closer to both an understanding of himself and of his son.



A Simple Life
7.463

The relationship between a middle-aged man and the elderly woman who has been the family's helper for sixty years.



Poetry
Poetry(2010)
7.555

A South Korean woman in her sixties enrolls in a poetry class as she grapples with her faltering memory and her grandson's appalling wrongdoing.



Past Lives
7.718

After decades apart, childhood friends Nora and Hae Sung are reunited in New York for one fateful weekend as they confront notions of destiny, love, and the choices that make a life.



Winter Boy
6.7

Lucas is a 17-year-old gay teenager coping with the sudden and unexpected death of his father in an accident that may or may not have been suicide. He views his life as a wild animal in need of taming. Between a brother settled in Paris and a mother with whom he now lives alone, Lucas will have to fight to rediscover hope and love.



The Living and the Dead

Lord Donald and Lady Nancy reside in the magnificent but run-down Longleigh House with James, their mentally disabled adult son. Nancy has fallen seriously ill and Donald is preparing to sell the house to raise enough money to pay for an operation. He arranges for the family nurse, Mary, to take care of Nancy while he leaves to tend to the sale. However, James wants to prove to his father that he can look after his mother on his own and decides to lock Mary out of the house. It isn't long before James starts mixing his mother's pills and forgetting to take his own medication, and as the stress of looking after his mother increases, so too does the severity of his own condition.



Nicostratos the Pelican

After his wife died a man refuses to go out and doesn't want to talk to his only son. Life has no meaning for him. One day his son finds a baby pelican and decides to leave the bird at home. Pelican helps the boy find his father again and revive him back to life ...



Nell
Nell(1994)
6.554

In a remote woodland cabin, a small town doctor discovers Nell — a beautiful young hermit woman with many secrets.



Lola and the Sea
6.4

Just when Lola, 18 years old and transgender, learns that she can finally have surgery, her mother, who is her only financial support, passes away. Abiding by her mother’s last wishes, Lola and her father, who are permanently in conflict and have not seen each other for two years, undertake a journey all the way to the Belgian coast. They realize the outcome of the journey may not be the one they were both expecting...



All of You
6.216

Laura and Simon have been best friends since college. Over the years, they've realized their bond is more than platonic. Can they—and should they—risk everything to explore a love that has existed all along?



Love Life
Love Life(2022)
7.2

Taeko and her husband, Jirō, are living a peaceful existence with her young son, Keita, when a tragic accident brings the boy's long-lost father, Park, back into her life. To cope with the pain and guilt, Taeko throws herself into helping this deaf and homeless man.



Deep Sea
Deep Sea(2023)
6.94

Shenxiu has felt a deep sadness since her mother left. A storm plunges her into a dreamlike world of swirling colour. Led by the Hyjinx, and joined by inventive underwater chef Nanhe, she embarks on a quest to find solace in the Eye of the Deep Sea.



Departure
Departure(2016)
6.385

An English mother and her teenage son spend a week preparing the sale of their remote holiday house in the South of France. Fifteen-year-old Elliot struggles with his dawning sexuality and an increasing alienation from his mother, Beatrice. She in turn is confronted by the realisation that her marriage to his father, Philip, has grown loveless and the life she knows is coming to an end. When an enigmatic local teenager, Clément, quietly enters their lives, both mother and son are compelled to confront their desires and, finally, each other.



Secret Sunshine
7.203

Shin-ae moves to her recently late husband’s hometown. Despite her efforts to settle in this unfamiliar and too-normal place, she finds that she can’t fit in. After a sudden tragedy, Shin-ae turns to Christianity to relieve her pain, but when even this is not permitted, she wages a war against God.



Shortcomings
6

When his girlfriend leaves for New York City on a 3-month-long internship, a strongly opinionated Berkeley arthouse movie theater manager begins exploring life as a bachelor.



So Young 2: Never Gone

A wealthy young man pursues a young woman of modest means, but circumstances often separate them as the years pass.



Digging to China
6.4

Precocious young Harriet and her older sister Gwen live at their mother's motel in small-town New Hampshire. Harriet dreams of a life beyond her inattentive family and the stultifying town. A mentally disabled man named Ricky comes to stay at the motel, and Harriet finds him kinder and more interesting than anyone she has ever met. After tragedy strikes, Harriet and Ricky cling to each other ever more tightly.



Hope Gap
Hope Gap(2019)
6.301

Grace lives an idyllic life in a British seaside town, but her world soon comes crashing down when her husband of 29 years tells her he's leaving her for another woman. Through stages of shock, disbelief and anger -- and with support from her son -- Grace ultimately regains her footing while learning it's never too late to be happy.



My Mother
My Mother(2015)
6.6

Margherita, a director in the middle of an existential crisis, has to deal with the inevitable and still unacceptable loss of her mother.



Closer
Closer(2004)
6.823

The relationships of two couples become complicated and deceitful when the man from one couple meets the woman of the other.



Drawing Closer
8.346

With only a year left to live, 17-year-old Akito finds new meaning in life by bringing joy to a terminally ill girl who has just six months remaining.



Still Life
7.496

A council case worker looks for the relatives of those found dead and alone.



American Son
6.134

Time passes and tension mounts in a Florida police station as an estranged interracial couple awaits news of their missing teenage son.



White Frog
5.8

Story of a neglected teen with mild Asperger’s syndrome whose life is changed forever when tragedy hits his family.



Dear Mother
5.8

One day, Jean-Louis discovers that his heart has stopped. He is not dead, can walk and talk, but his heart is no longer beating. With the help of his wife and a friend, he tries to understand the origin of this mystery.



Peaceful
Peaceful(2021)
7.1

A son in denial of a serious illness. A mother facing the unbearable. And between them a doctor fighting to do his job and bring them to acceptance. The three of them have one year and four seasons to come together and understand what it means to die while living.



Fatima
Fatima(2015)
6.2

Fatima, an Algerian-born woman who now lives in France with her two teenage daughters, with whom she is barely able to communicate.



Master Cheng
7.008

Cheng, 45, a restaurant owner from China, has travelled with his young son halfway around the world to a remote village in Finland. His wife died recently in an accident, and Cheng wanted to have a break from everything by traveling with his son to see an old Finnish friend who lives on a farm in the countryside of Finland. It’s the most remote place Cheng can imagine with endless forests, thousands of lakes, a country with entire population of one-fifth of Cheng’s home town, Shanghai.



Vive L'Amour
7.25

Three lonely young denizens of Taipei unknowingly share an apartment: May, a real estate agent who uses it for her sexual affairs; Ah-jung, her current lover; and Hsiao-kang, who's stolen the key and uses the apartment as a retreat.



The Mudge Boy
6.58

Chronicling the troubled existence of Duncan Mudge, a 14-year-old misfit who—while vying for the attention of his vacant father—struggles to fill the void brought on by his mother's sudden death.



The Farewell
7.409

A headstrong Chinese-American woman returns to China when her beloved grandmother is given a terminal diagnosis. Billi struggles with her family's decision to keep grandma in the dark about her own illness as they all stage an impromptu wedding to see grandma one last time.



Taipei Story
7.457

A young woman urgently seeks to navigate the maze of contemporary Taipei and find a future. She hopes that her boyfriend Lung is the key to the future, but Lung is stuck in a past that combines baseball and traditional loyalty that leads him to squander his nest egg bailing her father out of financial trouble.



Alps
Alps(2011)
6.2

A nurse, a paramedic, a gymnast and her coach offer a service for hire wherein they stand in for dead people by appointment, hired by relatives, friends or colleagues of the deceased, to assist with the grieving process.



Thi Mai
Thi Mai(2018)
6.2

After losing her daughter in an accident, Carmen loses all incentive to keep going, until she receives an unexpected letter from the adoption agency: her daughter was finally granted the Vietnamese girl she had asked for adoption and whose name is Thi Mai.



Made in China
5.4

François, a young thirty-year-old Asian, has not been back in his family for 10 years after a violent dispute with his father Meng. Since then, he has always tried to avoid questions about his origins, until he lies to believe that he has been adopted. But when he learns that he is going to be a father, he realizes that he will have to reconnect with his past and his origins. Pushed by his companion Sophie, he decides to reconnect with his family and returns to his XIIIth native district to announce the good news, accompanied by his best friend Bruno. François is welcomed with open arms by his family, with the exception of his father and his younger brother. The return to his community is not going to be so simple .



The Son
The Son(2022)
6.716

A successful lawyer, with a new wife and infant, agrees to care for his teenage son from a previous marriage after his ex-wife becomes concerned about the boy's wayward behavior.



Tim
Tim(1979)
6.195

Handsome but backward gardener Tim Melville has a new woman in his life. She is Mary, his widowed employer, a woman who had given up on love until she had found Tim. At first they are friends. But soon they become lovers, as Mary, drawn to Tim's innocence and magnetism, begins to teach him all about life - and love.



Chinese Take-Away
7.2

A comedy that chronicles a chance encounter between Robert and a Chinese named Jun who wanders lost through the city of Buenos Aires in search of his uncle after being assaulted by a taxi driver and his henchmen.



When Did You Last See Your Father?

The story of a son's conflicting memories of his dying father.



Christmas in August
7.742

It's a sweltering summer, but Jung-won, a terminally ill, thirty-something photographer, is already in the winter of his life when he begins a tentative romance with a young traffic cop who doesn't know about his condition. Is their relationship doomed before it even begins?



A Man and a Woman
7.3

A man and a woman meet by accident on a Sunday evening at their childrens' boarding school. Slowly, they reveal themselves to each other, finding that they have something deeply in common.



Bao
Bao(2018)
7.6

An aging Chinese mother suffering from empty nest syndrome gets another chance at motherhood when one of her dumplings springs to life as a lively, giggly dumpling boy.



Coming Home
7.253

Lu and Feng are a devoted couple forced to separate when Lu is arrested and sent to a labor camp as a political prisoner during the Cultural Revolution. He finally returns home only to find that his beloved wife no longer remembers him.



Mommy
Mommy(2014)
8.2

A peculiar neighbor offers hope to a recent widow who is struggling to raise a teenager who is unpredictable and, sometimes, violent.



Yi Yi
Yi Yi(2000)
7.9

Each member of a family in Taipei asks hard questions about life's meaning as they live through everyday quandaries. NJ is morose: his brother owes him money, his mother-in-law is in a coma, his wife suffers a spiritual crisis when she finds her life a blank and his business partners make bad decisions.



Weekend
Weekend(2011)
7.275

After a drunken house party with his straight mates, Russell heads out to a gay club. Just before closing time he picks up Glen but what's expected to be just a one-night stand becomes something else, something special.



Men
Men(2022)
6.094

In the aftermath of a personal tragedy, Harper retreats alone to the beautiful English countryside, hoping to find a place to heal. But someone — or something — from the surrounding woods appears to be stalking her, and what begins as simmering dread becomes a fully-formed nightmare, inhabited by her darkest memories and fears.



Husbands
Husbands(1970)
6.7

A common friend's sudden death brings three men, married with children, to reconsider their lives and ultimately leave the country together. But mindless enthusiasm for regained freedom will be short-lived.



Blue Gate Crossing
7.1

Yueh-chen has an obsession with her classmate Shihao, but is too shy to confess to him directly. She sends in her best friend, Kerou, to act as a go-between, and Shihao ends up falling for Kerou, who is not sure what to think of him.

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