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Life Is Beautiful poster

Movies that feel likeLife Is Beautiful (1997)

A touching story of an Italian book seller of Jewish ancestry who lives in his own little fairy tale. His creative and happy life would come to an abrupt halt when his entire family is deported to a concentration camp during World War II. While locked up he tries to convince his son that the whole thing is just a game.

If you loved Life Is Beautiful, the closest films we have are Johnny Stecchino (1991), La Dolce Vita (1960) and Good Bye, Lenin! (2003). All three share Life Is Beautiful's witty and playful feel, which is what we rank on before quality.

Seen the big three already? The under-the-radar pick below is The Girl on the Bridge (1999).

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If Life Is Beautiful hit the spot, these will too

Johnny Stecchino poster
Johnny Stecchino
1991 · dir. Roberto Benigni
🍅 46%★ 7.2comedy

Benigni's clowning at full tilt — the same sweet fool energy

The difference: Pure farce with no shadow — nothing at stake but laughs

Good hearted but not very wordly-wise, Dante is happy driving the school bus for a group of mentally handicapped children, while feeling he is somehow missing out on life and love. So he is very excited when after nearly being knocked down by her car he meets Maria, who seems immediately enamoured of him. He is soon invited to her sumptuous Palermo villa, little suspecting that this is part of a plot. He bears an amazing likeness to Maria's stool-pigeon gangster husband and it would be convenient for them if the mobster, in the shape of Dante, was seen to be dead and buried.

La Dolce Vita poster
La Dolce Vita
1960 · dir. Federico Fellini
🍅 95%★ 8comedy · drama

The Italian gift for making sadness look like a party

The difference: Aimless by design — episodic drift with no fable to hold it

Episodic journey of journalist Marcello who struggles to find his place in the world, torn between the allure of Rome's elite social scene and the stifling domesticity offered by his girlfriend, all the while searching for a way to become a serious writer.

Good Bye, Lenin! poster
Good Bye, Lenin!
2003 · dir. Wolfgang Becker
🍅 91%★ 7.7comedy · drama

A loving lie built to shield family from a brutal reality

The difference: Cozy satire — the regime is history, not a death camp

Alex Kerner's mother was in a coma while the Berlin wall fell. When she wakes up he must try to keep her from learning what happened (as she was an avid communist supporter) to avoid shocking her which could lead to another heart attack.

Sleepless in Seattle poster
Sleepless in Seattle
1993 · dir. Nora Ephron
🍅 75%★ 6.8comedy · drama · romanceNetflix

Grief softened by warmth and an almost fairy-tale faith in love

The difference: Fizzy romcom stakes — loss is the setup, not the story

After the death of his mother, a young boy calls a radio station in an attempt to set his father up on a date. Across the country, an engaged woman becomes convinced that they belong together, despite their never having met. Will their paths collide despite the odds?

Patch Adams poster
Patch Adams
1998 · dir. Tom Shadyac
🍅 22%★ 6.9comedy · drama

Both land wit and play at once

The difference: The scrappier of the two with critics

The true story of Dr. Hunter "Patch" Adams, who in the 1970s found that humor is the best medicine, and was willing to do just anything to make his patients laugh—even if it meant risking his own career.

The Girl on the Bridge poster
The Girl on the Bridge
1999 · dir. Patrice Leconte
🍅 88%★ 7.4drama · comedy · romance

Contemplative where it counts, melancholy underneath

The difference: Sits closer to romance than Life Is Beautiful does

It's night on a Paris bridge. A girl leans over Seine River with tears in her eyes and a violent yearning to drown her sorrows. Out of nowhere someone takes an interest in her. He is Gabor, a knife thrower who needs a human target for his show. The girl, Adele, has never been lucky and nowhere else to go. So she follows him. They travel along the northern bank of the Mediterranean to perform.

Sunshine Cleaning poster
Sunshine Cleaning
2009 · dir. Christine Jeffs
🍅 74%★ 6.8comedy · dramaMax

Both lean on wit more than on comedy

The difference: Takes it somewhere less romantic than Life Is Beautiful does

A single mother and her slacker sister find an unexpected way to turn their lives around in this off-beat dramatic comedy. In order to raise the tuition to send her young son to private school the mom starts an unusual business – a biohazard removal/crime scene clean-up service.

Secretary poster
Secretary
2002 · dir. Steven Shainberg
🍅 78%★ 6.9romance · drama · comedyPrime Video

Drama with a pulse of romance, in both cases

A young woman, recently released from a mental hospital, gets a job as a secretary to a demanding lawyer, where their employer-employee relationship turns into a sexual, sadomasochistic one.

Captain Fantastic poster
Captain Fantastic
2016 · dir. Matt Ross
🍅 82%★ 7.8drama · comedy

A father inventing a whole worldview to raise his kids inside

The difference: The threat is only social — no history bearing down on the family

Deep in the forests of the Pacific Northwest, a father devoted to raising his six kids with a rigorous physical and intellectual education is forced to leave his paradise and enter the world, beginning a journey that challenges his idea of what it means to be a parent.

August: Osage County poster
August: Osage County
2013 · dir. John Wells
🍅 67%★ 7.2comedy · dramaPrime Video

Comedy built on play, twice over

An intense look at the lives of the strong-willed daughters of the Weston family, whose paths have diverged until a family crisis brings them back to the Midwest house they grew up in, and to the dysfunctional mother who raised them.

Life As We Know It poster
Life As We Know It
2010 · dir. Greg Berlanti
🍅 29%★ 6.5comedy · romance · drama

A child left behind pulls unlikely grown-ups into becoming a family

The difference: Standard-issue romcom machinery under the grief

After a disastrous first date for caterer Holly and network sports director Messer, all they have in common is a dislike for each other and their love for their goddaughter Sophie. But when they suddenly become all Sophie has in this world, Holly and Messer must set their differences aside. Juggling careers and social calendars, they'll have to find common ground while living under the same roof.

Toni Erdmann poster
Toni Erdmann
2016 · dir. Maren Ade
🍅 93%★ 7.3comedy · drama

Contemplative drama in both cases

Convinced that his daughter has forgotten how to laugh, a father shows up unannounced while she's living abroad and bombards her with outrageous jokes.

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The best-reviewed films that share Life Is Beautiful’s defining feeling.