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Movies like Opening Night

Key Features:
Existential crisis, Alcoholism, Method acting, Inner turmoil, Show business, Mortality, Grief, Spiritual journey, Female protagonist, Psychological drama, Live performance, Director-driven
Tone:
serious, gritty, dramatic
Target Audience:
Cinephiles, Character-driven drama enthusiasts, Independent film viewers, Arthouse cinema fans
Emotional Arc:
Anxiety → Despair

Opening Night

1977-12-22
Opening Night Poster - Find Similar Movies

Actress Myrtle Gordon is a functioning alcoholic who is a few days from the opening night of her latest play, concerning a woman distraught about aging. One night a car kills one of Myrtle's fans who is chasing her limousine in an attempt to get the star's attention. Myrtle internalizes the accident and goes on a spiritual quest, but fails to finds the answers she is after. As opening night inches closer and closer, fragile Myrtle must find a way to make the show go on.

Genres
Drama
Cast
Gena Rowlands, John Cassavetes, Ben Gazzara, Joan Blondell, Paul Stewart, Zohra Lampert, Laura Johnson, John Tuell, Ray Powers, John Finnegan
Crew
John Cassavetes, John Cassavetes
Rating
7.6(249 votes)
Opening NightOpening Night
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Opening Night
5.663

A failed Broadway singer who now works as a production manager must save opening night on his new production by wrangling his eccentric cast and crew.



Faces
Faces(1968)
7.086

Middle-aged suburban husband Richard abruptly tells his wife, Maria, that he wants a divorce. As Richard takes up with a younger woman, Maria enjoys a night on the town with her friends and meets a younger man. As the couple and those around them confront a seemingly futile search for what they've lost -- love, excitement, passion -- this classic American independent film explores themes of aging and alienation.



A Woman Under the Influence

Mabel Longhetti, desperate and lonely, is married to a Los Angeles municipal construction worker, Nick. Increasingly unstable, especially in the company of others, she craves happiness, but her extremely volatile behavior convinces Nick that she poses a danger to their family and decides to commit her to an institution for six months. Alone with a trio of kids to raise on his own, he awaits her return, which holds more than a few surprises.



Minnie and Moskowitz

Depressed and jaded after being dumped by her married boyfriend, aging beauty Minnie Moore wonders if she'll ever find love. After shaggy-haired parking lot attendant Seymour Moskowitz comes to her defense from an angry and rebuffed blind date, he falls hopelessly in love with her despite their myriad differences. Minnie reluctantly agrees to a date with Moskowitz, and, slowly but surely, an unlikely romance blossoms between the two.



Open 24 Hours
5.523

After setting her serial killer boyfriend on fire, a paranoid delusional woman gets a job at an all-night gas station. The isolation triggers her anxiety and hallucinations, with devastatingly gory results.



Love Streams
7.186

Two closely-bound, emotionally wounded siblings reunite after years apart.



The Party's Just Beginning

In a bleak Inverness midwinter, Luisaidh is careening off the rails after the suicide of her best friend. She medicates her misery with joyless sex, chips and a belief in the power of positive drinking. Surrounded by bittersweet memories, she struggles to find someone to talk to or some reason to make life worthwhile at the most stressful time of the year.



The Country Girl
6.901

An actor on the skids is given one more chance to regain his stardom, as well as his self-respect, yet his alcoholism may prevent that from happening.



Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance)

A fading actor best known for his portrayal of a popular superhero attempts to mount a comeback by appearing in a Broadway play. As opening night approaches, his attempts to become more altruistic, rebuild his career, and reconnect with friends and family prove more difficult than expected.



The Morning After
5.895

Failed actress Alex Sternbergen wakes up hungover one morning in an apartment she does not recognize, unable to remember the previous evening -- and with a dead body in bed next to her. As she tries to piece together the events of the night, Alex cannot totally rely on friends or her estranged husband, Joaquin, for assistance. Only a single ally, loner ex-policeman Turner Kendall, can help her escape her predicament and find the true killer.



Eternal Beauty
6.2

When Jane is rejected by life, she spirals into a chaotic, schizophrenic world where love and normality collide with humorous consequences.



Open at Night
6.1

One night to change everything. One night to save a theater, one night to change one's perspective about life. Luigi will push and pull Faeza with him everywhere around Paris an entire night to save his theater.



Here and Now
5.29

On the eve of a major performance, singer Vivienne receives life-altering news that causes her to reevaluate her priorities. Crisscrossing the busy streets of New York City, she tries to balance her upcoming tour, family, and friends. Through interaction with her overbearing mother, Jeanne, her long-time manager, Ben, and her ex-husband, Nick, Vivienne strives to make peace with the decisions and sacrifices she's made along the way.



Anatomy of Hell
4.8

A woman employs a gay man to spend four nights at her house to watch her when she's "unwatchable".



Showing Up
5.8

In the days leading up to a possibly career-changing exhibition, a sculptor navigates her relationships with family, friends, and colleagues.



Morvern Callar
6.6

After her boyfriend commits suicide, a young woman attempts to use the unpublished manuscript of a novel and a sum of money he left behind to reinvent her life.



Last Night
6.64

Various citizens of Toronto anxiously await the end of the world, which is occurring at the stroke of midnight on New Year's Day.



Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?

A history professor and his wife entertain a young couple who are new to the university's faculty. As the drinks flow, secrets come to light, and the middle-aged couple unload onto their guests the full force of the bitterness, dysfunction, and animosity that defines their marriage.



Family Life
7.2

A young woman, Janice, is living with her restrictive and conservative parents, who lead a dull working-class life and consider their daughter to be “misbehaving” whenever she’s trying to find her own way in life.



Tales of Ordinary Madness

Poet/lecturer Charles Serking awakens from his alcoholic haze long enough to take a bus back to L.A. and plunge into an orgy of drink and sexual depravity.



Being Julia
6.413

Julia Lambert is a true diva: beautiful, talented, weathly and famous. She has it all - including a devoted husband who has mastermined her brilliant career - but after years of shining in the spotlight she begins to suffer from a severe case of boredom and longs for something new and exciting to put the twinkle back in her eye. Julia finds exactly what she's looking for in a handsome young American fan, but it isn't long before the novelty fling adds a few more sparks than she was hoping for. Fortuately for her, this surprise twist in the plot will thrust her back into the greatest role of her life.



The Greatest
6.218

Teenagers Rose and Bennett were in love, and then a car crash claimed Bennett's life. He left behind a grieving mother, father and younger brother, and Rose was left all alone. She has no family to turn to for support, so when she finds out she's pregnant, she winds up at the Brewer's door. She needs their help, and although they can't quite admit it, they each need her so they can begin to heal.



The Humbling
5.1

Following a breakdown and suicide attempt, an aging actor becomes involved with a much younger woman but soon finds that it's difficult to keep pace with her.



Playing the Victim
6.4

A young man drops out of university and goes to the police. He's done nothing wrong he just wants a job. A particular job. Playing the victim in murder reconstructions. Maybe by getting close to death he can manage to cheat on his own.



Concussion
5.134

After a blow to the head, Abby decides she can't do it anymore. Her life just can't be only about the house, the kids and the wife. She needs more: she needs to be Eleanor.



Amateur
Amateur(1994)
6.192

A man wakes up in an alley, bleeding and with no memory of who he is. He stumbles into a coffee shop and is befriended by a charitable ex-nun who is failing in her attempts to write marketable pornography.



Dementia
Dementia(1955)
6.7

In a shadowy world stitched from nightmares, a young woman's harrowing journey in a seedy hotel unveils her traumatic past. Haunted by violence and stalked through desolate streets, her psyche unravels as she confronts an abusive husband and unsettling memories.



Stage Fright
6.799

A struggling actress tries to help a friend prove his innocence when he's accused of murdering the husband of a high-society entertainer.



Mikey and Nicky
6.8

Nick is desperate, holed up in a cheap hotel, suffering from an ulcer and convinced that a local mob boss wants him killed. Desperate and terrified, he calls Mikey, his friend since childhood and a fellow gangster. So begins a long night…



Barfly
Barfly(1987)
6.9

Downtrodden writer Henry and distressed goddess Wanda aren't exactly husband and wife: they're wedded to their bar stools. But, they like each other's company—and Barfly captures their giddy, gin-soaked attempts to make a go of life on the skids.



Clouds of Sils Maria

A veteran actress comes face-to-face with an uncomfortable reflection of herself when she agrees to take part in a revival of the play that launched her career 20 years earlier.



Soap Opera
5.546

When the kooky tenants of an apartment block experience a sudden and shocking situation, they let their private lives, past secrets and crazy passions intervene as the confessions and absurd twists come thick and fast. Previous lovers, wild accusations, a possible murder and more boil to the surface days before New Year’s Eve, but can they even make it until then?



Being Maria
6.4

A young, struggling actress lands her dream role in a film by an emerging Italian director, starring alongside an American superstar. What begins as her big breakthrough quickly turns into a living hell.



Intersection
5.067

During a car accident, Vincent Eastman watches his whole life flash before his eyes, and he doesn't like what he sees. While maintaining the semblance of a marriage with his wife, Sally, Vincent has been carrying on with a mistress, Olivia. She's everything Sally isn't -- warm, passionate, carefree. So why can't he choose between the two, especially when his indecision is taking its toll on his daughter?



Dead Night
4.661

A caring mother loses her sanity, setting off a chain of events resulting in tragedy and murder. The story of Casey Pollack unfolds from two very different perspectives when one night in the woods culminates in absolute terror.



I'll See You in My Dreams

A sudden loss disrupts Carol’s orderly life, propelling her into the dating world for the first time in 20 years. Finally living in the present tense, she finds herself swept up in not one, but two unexpected relationships that challenge her assumptions about what it means to grow old.



Stoker
Stoker(2013)
6.638

After India's father dies in an auto accident, her uncle Charlie, whom she never knew existed, comes to live with her and her emotionally unstable mother Evelyn. Soon after his arrival, she comes to suspect this mysterious, charming man has ulterior motives, but instead of feeling outrage or horror, this friendless girl becomes increasingly infatuated with him.



Daphne
Daphne(2017)
5.7

Daphne is a young woman negotiating the tricky business of modern life. Caught in the daily rush of her restaurant job and a nightlife kaleidoscope of new faces, she is witty, funny, the life of the party. Too busy to realise that deep down she is not happy. When she saves the life of a shopkeeper stabbed in a failed robbery, the impenetrable armour she wears to protect herself begins to crack, and Daphne is forced to confront the inevitability of a much-needed change in her life.



Providence
6.8

On the eve of his 78th birthday, the ailing, alcoholic writer Clive Langham spends a painful and sleepless night mentally composing and recomposing scenes for a novel in which characters based on his own family are shaped by his fantasies and memories, alongside his caustic commentary on their behaviour.



The Good Night
5.292

Gary, a musician, is trapped in an unhappy relationship with his live-in lover, Dora. He becomes enthralled with a beautiful seductress who enters his dreams, and tries to control his dream-state so he can spend more and more time with her. When Gary sees his mystery woman's face on a bus billboard, he discovers she is real, and fate brings him an opportunity to meet her.



Christmas Encore
5.9

A struggling actress is cast in her last off (off) Broadway show - a modern take on “A Christmas Carol” - before giving up her dream and moving home. Instead, she finds romance with her director and a renewed passion for her craft and the city. But when the historic theater loses its lease and the show is set to fold, she and her cast mates are need of a Christmas miracle.



Coda
Coda(2013)
7.3

A lost soul stumbles drunken through the city. In a park, Death finds him and shows him many things.



Stage Fright
6.5

While a group of young actors rehearse a new musical about a mass murderer, a notorious psychopath escapes from a nearby insane asylum.



Synecdoche, New York
7.545

A theater director struggles with his work, and the women in his life, as he attempts to create a life-size replica of New York inside a warehouse as part of his new play.



Alice in Wonderland

On a golden afternoon, wildly curious young Alice tumbles into the burrow and enters the merry, madcap world of Wonderland full of whimsical escapades.



A Streetcar Named Desire

A disturbed, aging Southern belle moves in with her sister for solace — but being face-to-face with her brutish brother-in-law accelerates her downward spiral.



Dead of Night
6.3

A young soldier who was thought to be killed in Vietnam returns home and exhibits disturbing behavior, much to the confusion of his family.



The Night of the Iguana

A defrocked Episcopal clergyman leads a bus-load of middle-aged Baptist women on a tour of the Mexican coast and comes to terms with the failure haunting his life.



Ellie Parker
5

Ellie Parker, an aspiring actress from Australia, lives a hectic Hollywood lifestyle, perpetually trying to land the role that will elevate her career. Living with her lothario musician boyfriend, Justin, Ellie is far from happy, finding support primarily from her friend Sam. But when Ellie meets Chris after a minor traffic accident, she sees new potential for both romance and her life in general.



Aftermath
Aftermath(2021)
6.2

Desperate to save their marriage, a young couple takes a deal to move into their dream home, but disturbing events reveal the house's troubled history.



Day for Night
7.755

A committed film director struggles to complete his movie while coping with a myriad of crises, personal and professional, among the cast and crew.



Entertainment
5.594

Set in the Mojave Desert, the film follows a broken-down comedian playing clubs across the Southwest, working his way to Los Angeles to meet his estranged daughter.



Vanya on 42nd Street
6.523

An uninterrupted rehearsal of Chekhov's 'Uncle Vanya' plays out by a company of actors. The setting: their run-down theater with an unusable stage and crumbling ceiling. The play is shown act by act with the briefest of breaks to move props or for refreshments. The lack of costumes, real props and scenery is soon forgotten.



About Last Night

Bernie and Joan are two fiery flirters who are passionate about everything from hookups to breakups and each other. When he sets up his best friend, Danny, with her roommate, Debbie, the sparks soon fly as they try to navigate the relationship minefields from the bar to the bedroom and are eventually put to the test in the real world.



Welcome to the Rileys

Years after their teenage daughter’s death, Lois and Doug Riley, an upstanding Indiana couple, are frozen by estranging grief. Doug escapes to New Orleans on a business trip. Compelled by urgencies he doesn’t understand, he insinuates himself into the life of an underage hooker, becoming her platonic guardian.



Inland Empire
6.988

When actress Nikki Grace gets the lead role in a cursed film, her world becomes more and more surreal, blending realities and ideas of infidelity, reincarnation, and supernatural forces.



Madeline's Madeline
5.857

Madeline has become an integral part of a prestigious physical theater troupe. When the workshop's ambitious director pushes the teenager to weave her rich interior world and troubled history with her mother into their collective art, the lines between performance and reality begin to blur. The resulting battle between imagination and appropriation rips out of the rehearsal space and through all three women's lives.



Body Shots
4.8

The Los Angeles club scene is a place of booze-fueled decadence and debauchery. In a night full of possibilities, eight 20-somethings take to the clubs seeking good times, companionship and maybe a little sex. But in the harsh light of the morning after, their worlds are thrown into a spin of confusion when hungover Sara accuses hard-partying Mike of date rape. Loyalties are tested as each among them is forced to take sides.



The Fire Within
7.6

Depressed Alain Leroy leaves the clinic where he was detoxified. He meets friends, acquaintances and women, trying to find a reason to continue living.



Being Charlie
6.1

Charlie is a troublesome 18-year-old who breaks out of a youth drug treatment clinic, but when he returns home to Los Angeles, he's given an intervention by his parents and forced to go to an adult rehab. There, he meets a beautiful but troubled girl, Eva, and is forced to battle with drugs, elusive love and divided parents.



Harold and Maude
7.598

The young Harold lives in his own world of suicide-attempts and funeral visits to avoid the misery of his current family and home environment. Harold meets an 80-year-old woman named Maude who also lives in her own world yet one in which she is having the time of her life. When the two opposites meet they realize that their differences don’t matter and they become best friends and love each other.



Vortex
Vortex(2021)
7.1

Lui, a struggling author with a heart condition, and his wife Elle, a retired psychiatrist, find their idyllic life shattered when Elle begins to succumb to the effects of dementia.



Heart of Midnight
5.6

A young woman who is getting back on her feet after a mental breakdown, Carol Rivers discovers that her late uncle has left her a rundown nightclub. Carol decides to renovate the venue, but, in the process, uncovers dark secrets about the club and her dead relative. After a series of disturbing events, Carol becomes increasingly unstable, but she finds some measure of comfort in Sharpe, an enigmatic older detective.



Noises Off...
7.2

Hired to helm an Americanized take on a British play, director Lloyd Fellowes does his best to control an eccentric group of stage actors. With a star actress quickly passing her prime, a male lead with no confidence, and a bit actor that's rarely sober, chaos ensues in the lead up to a Broadway premiere.



The Guitar
5.5

The life of a woman is transformed after she is diagnosed with a terminal disease, fired from her job and abandoned by her boyfriend. Given two months to live, she throws caution to the wind to pursue her dreams.



Quién te cantará
7.067

Lila, a famous retired singer, loses her memory after suffering an accident, just as she planned her return to the stage.



The Entertainer
6.2

Archie Rice, an old-time British vaudeville performer sinking into final defeat, schemes to stay in show business.



Hurlyburly
5.476

A group of actors and their casting agents try to find a direction in their lives whilst coming to terms with their personal problems and relationship conflicts.



Nuts
Nuts(1987)
6.3

A high-class call girl accused of murder fights for the right to stand trial rather than be declared mentally incompetent.



Demolition
6.8

An emotionally desperate investment banker finds hope through a woman he meets.



After Hours
7.5

Desperate to escape his mind-numbing routine, uptown Manhattan office worker Paul Hackett ventures downtown for a hookup with a mystery woman.



Birth
Birth(2004)
6

It took Anna 10 years to recover from the death of her husband, Sean, but now she's on the verge of marrying her boyfriend, Joseph, and finally moving on. However, on the night of her engagement party, a young boy named Sean turns up, saying he is her dead husband reincarnated. At first she ignores the child, but his knowledge of her former husband's life is uncanny, leading her to believe that he might be telling the truth.



Another Woman
6.8

Marion is a woman who has learned to shield herself from her emotions. She rents an apartment to work undisturbed on her new book, but by some acoustic anomaly she can hear all that is said in the next apartment in which a psychiatrist holds his office. When she hears a young woman tell that she finds it harder and harder to bear her life, Marion starts to reflect on her own life. After a series of events she comes to understand how her unemotional attitude towards the people around her affected them and herself.



The Exorcism
5.003

A troubled actor begins to unravel while shooting a supernatural horror film, leading his estranged daughter to wonder if he's slipping back into his past addictions or if there's something more sinister at play.



That Night
6.3

A coming-of-age story about an eleven-year-old girl who idolizes her troubled sixteen-year-old neighbor.



Maniac
Maniac(2012)
6.03

As he helps a young artist with her upcoming exhibition, the owner of a mannequin shop's deadly, suppressed desires come to the surface.



Chinese Coffee
6.659

When Harry Levine, an aging, unsuccessful Greenwich Village writer, is fired from his job as restaurant doorman, he calls on friend and mentor Jake, ostensibly to collect a long-standing debt.



Dorothy Mills
6.02

When a gloomy, God-fearing island community is rocked by the assault of an infant, a psychiatrist is called in to examine Dorothy Mills, the teenager accused of the crime. Despite the villagers' hostility to her inquiry, she soon comes to suspect that Dorothy suffers from multiple personality disorder...



Bullets Over Broadway
7.078

After young playwright, David Shayne obtains funding for his play from gangster Nick Valenti, Nick's girlfriend Olive miraculously lands the role of a psychiatrist—but not only is she a bimbo who could never pass for a psychiatrist—she's a dreadful actress. David puts up with the leading man who is a compulsive eater, the grand dame who wants her part jazzed up, and Olive's interfering hitman/bodyguard—but, eventually he must decide whether art or life is more important.



Night of the Dark Full Moon

A man investigates the grisly crimes that occurred in a former insane asylum, unsettling the locals who all seem to have something to hide.



A Star Is Born
7.1

A movie star helps a young singer-actress find fame, even as age and alcoholism send his own career into a downward spiral.



Daydream Nation
5.747

Forced to move to a boring backwater town, a teenager embarks on affairs with a teacher and a stoner classmate.



Hypersomnia
5.2

A young actress rehearsing for a play about human trafficking begins to relive terrifying scenes that may be dreams -- or an alternate reality.



Midnight Movie
4.978

At a seedy theater in a sleepy suburban town, a group of friends get together for a midnight screening of an early 1970s horror film, unaware that the director has something more in store for them.



Murder-Rock: Dancing Death

The world of dance can be brutal. The rehearsals are grueling. The competition is fierce. At the Arts for Living Centre in New York City, the best of the best are dying for a part in a major production. But only a select few will be chosen. The selection process seems to be at the hands of mysterious killer who pierces women's bare breasts with a hatpin, puncturing their hearts. Ambition and jealousy appear to be the motive, which makes everybody a suspect!



About Cherry
4.62

A drama centered on a troubled young woman who moves to San Francisco, where she gets involved in pornography and aligns herself with a cocaine-addicted lawyer.



Happiness
Happiness(1998)
7.4

The lives of several individuals intertwine as they go about their lives in their own unique ways, engaging in acts which society as a whole might find disturbing in a desperate search for human connection.



Long Day's Journey Into Night

An Irish miser, his morphine addicted wife, their debauched older son, and a gravely ill younger son. A quiet Connecticut vacation home on one foggy day in August 1912 becomes the backdrop for domestic decline.



Nights in Rodanthe
6.257

Adrienne is trying to decide whether to stay in her unhappy marriage or not, and her life changes when Paul, a doctor who is travelling to reconcile with his estranged son, checks into an inn where she is staying.



I'm Thinking of Ending Things

Nothing is as it seems when a woman experiencing misgivings about her new boyfriend joins him on a road trip to meet his parents at their remote farm.



Marjorie Prime
6.12

A service which creates holographic projections of late family members allows an elderly woman to spend time with a younger version of her deceased husband.



Holy Motors
6.98

We follow 24 hours in the life of a being moving from life to life like a cold and solitary assassin moving from hit to hit. In each of these interwoven lives, the being possesses an entirely distinct identity: sometimes a man, sometimes a woman, sometimes youthful, sometimes old. By turns murderer, beggar, company chairman, monstrous creature, worker, family man.



Una
Una(2017)
6.058

When a young woman unexpectedly arrives at an older man's workplace, looking for answers, the secrets of the past threaten to unravel his new life.



I Saw the TV Glow
6.064

Teenager Owen is just trying to make it through life in the suburbs when his classmate Maddy introduces him to a mysterious TV show — a vision of a supernatural world beneath their own. In the pale glow of the television, Owen’s view of reality begins to crack.



Identity
Identity(2003)
7.174

Complete strangers stranded at a remote desert motel during a raging storm soon find themselves the target of a deranged murderer. As their numbers thin out, the travelers begin to turn on each other, as each tries to figure out who the killer is.



Nurse Betty
6.1

What happens when a person decides that life is merely a state of mind? If you're Betty, a small-town waitress and soap opera fan from Fair Oaks, Kansas, you refuse to believe that you can't be with the love of your life just because he doesn't really exist. After all, life is no excuse for not living. Traumatized by a savage event, Betty enters into a fugue state that allows -- even encourages -- her to keep functioning... in a kind of alternate reality.



Still Alice
7.471

Alice Howland, happily married with three grown children, is a renowned linguistics professor who starts to forget words. When she receives a devastating diagnosis, Alice and her family find their bonds tested.



Interiors
Interiors(1978)
6.8

When Eve, an interior designer, is deserted by her husband of many years, Arthur, the emotionally glacial relationships of the three grown-up daughters are laid bare. Twisted by jealousy, insecurity and resentment, Renata, a successful writer; Joey, a woman crippled by indecision; and Flyn, a budding actress; struggle to communicate for the sake of their shattered mother. But when their father unexpectedly falls for another woman, his decision to remarry sets in motion a terrible twist of fate…



One Dark Night
5.4

A strange man named Karl Rhamarevich dies shortly after discovering a way to become even more powerful in death through telekinesis. On the night of his burial in a crypt, Julie is to spend the night there as part of an initiation rite, supervised by two other girls. The crypt becomes a scene of horror as Raymar returns to life and deploys his horrifying telekinetic powers.

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