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Movies that feel like Make Way for Tomorrow (1937)

If you loved Make Way for Tomorrow, the closest films we have are Casablanca (1943), Brief Encounter (1945) and Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans (1927). All three share Make Way for Tomorrow's contemplative and romantic feel, which is what we rank on before quality. 8 of the 12 picks below are included with a subscription right now on HBO Max Amazon Channel, TCM and HBO Max and others, checked against today's data.

An elderly couple are forced to separate themselves from each other after their children refuse to take both into one house.

🍅 100% Rotten Tomatoes8.2 IMDb ↗TMDB ↗dir. Leo McCareycontemplativeromantictender

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If Make Way for Tomorrow hit the spot, these will too

Looking for the series itself? Also in this series: Odds Against Tomorrow (1959) · A Better Tomorrow (1986) · The Day After Tomorrow (2004) · Edge of Tomorrow (2014)

Casablanca poster
Casablanca
1943 · dir. Michael Curtiz
🍅 99%8.5drama · romance

Contemplative and romantic in the same breath

In Casablanca, Morocco in December 1941, a cynical American expatriate meets a former lover, with unforeseen complications.

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Brief Encounter poster
Brief Encounter
1945 · dir. David Lean
🍅 95%8drama · romance

Drama with a pulse of tenderness, in both cases

Returning home from a shopping trip to a nearby town, bored suburban housewife Laura Jesson is thrown by happenstance into an acquaintance with virtuous doctor Alec Harvey. Their casual friendship soon develops during their weekly visits into something more emotionally fulfilling than either expected, and they must wrestle with the potential havoc their deepening relationship would have on their lives and the lives of those they love.

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Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans poster
Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans
1927 · dir. F. W. Murnau
🍅 98%8.1drama · romance

Contemplative romance, and it commits to that

A married farmer falls under the spell of a slatternly woman from the city, who tries to convince him to drown his wife.

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Letter from an Unknown Woman poster
Letter from an Unknown Woman
1948 · dir. Max Ophüls
🍅 100%7.8drama · romance

Both trade on romance more than on being drama

A pianist about to flee from a duel receives a letter from a woman he cannot remember. As she tells the story of her lifelong love for him, he is forced to reinterpret his own past.

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The Earrings of Madame de... poster
The Earrings of Madame de...
1953 · dir. Max Ophüls
🍅 97%7.9drama · romance

Romance built on tenderness, twice over

In late 19th century France, the Countess Louise, wife of a wealthy general, sells the earrings her husband gave her on their wedding day to pay off her secret debts, then claims to have lost them. Her husband quickly learns of the deceit, which is the beginning of many tragic misunderstandings, all involving the earrings, the general, the countess, and her new lover, the Italian Baron Donati.

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Marty poster
Marty
1955 · dir. Delbert Mann
🍅 96%7.7drama · romance

Contemplative drama in both cases

Marty, a butcher who lives in the Bronx with his mother, is unmarried at 34. Good-natured but socially awkward, he faces constant badgering from family and friends to get married but has reluctantly resigned himself to bachelorhood. He then meets Clara, an unattractive school teacher. Realising their emotional connection, Marty promises to call, but family and friends try to convince him not to.

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Journey to Italy poster
Journey to Italy
1954 · dir. Roberto Rossellini
🍅 96%7.3drama · romance

Romance built on romance, twice over

Married for eight years with no children, Brits Katherine and Alex Joyce are driving to Italy, their ultimate destination just outside of Naples to sell the villa they have just inherited from his uncle, the villa where they will be staying during their time there. On the drive, they come to the realization that this trip marks the first time that they have truly been alone together, and as such don't really know one another in the true sense.

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Splendor in the Grass poster
Splendor in the Grass
1961 · dir. Elia Kazan
🍅 75%7.7drama · romance

A streak of tenderness through both

The difference: Reviewed a good deal more coolly

A fragile Kansas girl's unrequited and forbidden love for a handsome young man from the town's most powerful family drives her to heartbreak and madness.

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The Umbrellas of Cherbourg poster
The Umbrellas of Cherbourg
1964 · dir. Jacques Demy
🍅 97%7.8drama · romance

Both are drama through and through

The difference: 27 years apart, and the 1960s show

This simple romantic tragedy begins in 1957. Guy Foucher, a 20-year-old French auto mechanic, has fallen in love with 17-year-old Geneviève Emery, an employee in her widowed mother's chic but financially embattled umbrella shop. On the evening before Guy is to leave for a two-year tour of combat in Algeria, he and Geneviève make love. She becomes pregnant and must choose between waiting for Guy's return or accepting an offer of marriage from a wealthy diamond merchant.

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Titanic poster
Titanic
1997 · dir. James Cameron
🍅 88%8drama · romance

Romance approached the same way

101-year-old Rose DeWitt Bukater tells the story of her life aboard the Titanic, 84 years later. A young Rose boards the ship with her mother and fiancé. Meanwhile, Jack Dawson and Fabrizio De Rossi win third-class tickets aboard the ship. Rose tells the whole story from Titanic's departure through to its death—on its first and last voyage—on April 15, 1912.

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A Man and a Woman poster
A Man and a Woman
1966 · dir. Claude Lelouch
🍅 75%7.5drama · romance

The same drama instincts

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.

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Slumdog Millionaire poster
Slumdog Millionaire
2008 · dir. Danny Boyle
🍅 92%8drama · romance

Cut from the same romance cloth

A teenager reflects on his life after being accused of cheating on the Indian version of "Who Wants to be a Millionaire?".

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In the mood for more contemplative?

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The best-reviewed films that share Make Way for Tomorrow's defining feeling.