feelsalike.comSign in
The Deer Hunter poster

Movies that feel likeThe Deer Hunter (1978)

Three steelworkers enlist in the army and are sent to Vietnam, one leaving behind a rushed marriage, the others a shared love. What they encounter during the war changes their lives forever.

If you loved The Deer Hunter, the closest films we have are Full Metal Jacket (1987), Doctor Zhivago (1965) and The Tin Drum (1979). All three share The Deer Hunter's contemplative and bleak feel, which is what we rank on before quality.

Seen the big three already? The under-the-radar pick below is Autumn Sonata (1978).

🍅 86% Rotten Tomatoes★ 8.1 IMDb ↗TMDB ↗dir. Michael Ciminocontemplativebleakromanticmelancholy
11 of 12 streaming nowNetflix · HBO Max · Amazon Prime Video

Can't choose? Answer three questions and get one movie for tonight.

Stream it:Netflix ↗
See it on the Mood Map

When is The Deer Hunter streaming? →

If The Deer Hunter hit the spot, these will too

Full Metal Jacket poster
Full Metal Jacket
1987 · dir. Stanley Kubrick
🍅 89%★ 8.2drama · warMax

Two things both keep coming back to: vietnam war and suicide

The difference: Easier on the romance than The Deer Hunter

A pragmatic U.S. Marine observes the dehumanizing effects the U.S.-Vietnam War has on his fellow recruits from their brutal boot camp training to the bloody street fighting in Hue.

Doctor Zhivago poster
Doctor Zhivago
1965 · dir. David Lean
🍅 82%★ 7.9drama · romance · war

Contemplative where it counts, bleak underneath

The difference: Sits closer to romance than The Deer Hunter does

The life of a Russian physician and poet who, although married to another, falls in love with a political activist's wife and experiences hardship during World War I and then the October Revolution.

The Tin Drum poster
The Tin Drum
1979 · dir. Volker Schlöndorff
🍅 84%★ 7.4drama · history · warMax

Both are built on the same subject: suicide

The difference: Takes it somewhere less romantic than The Deer Hunter does

In 1924, Oskar Matzerath is born in the Free City of Danzig. At age three, he falls down a flight of stairs and stops growing. In 1939, World War II breaks out.

Das Boot poster
Das Boot
1981 · dir. Wolfgang Petersen
🍅 98%★ 8.4drama · history · war

Drama built on melancholy, twice over

A German submarine hunts allied ships during the Second World War, but it soon becomes the hunted. The crew tries to survive below the surface, while stretching both the boat and themselves to their limits.

Gone with the Wind poster
Gone with the Wind
1939 · dir. Victor Fleming
🍅 90%★ 8.2drama · war · romanceMax

Both lean on romance more than on war

The difference: 39 years apart, and the 1930s show

The spoiled daughter of a Georgia plantation owner conducts a tumultuous romance with a cynical profiteer during the American Civil War and Reconstruction Era.

Apocalypse Now poster
Apocalypse Now
1979 · dir. Francis Ford Coppola
🍅 91%★ 8.4drama · warParamount+

The same preoccupation in both: vietnam

At the height of the Vietnam war, Captain Benjamin Willard is sent on a dangerous mission that, officially, "does not exist, nor will it ever exist." His goal is to locate - and eliminate - a mysterious Green Beret Colonel named Walter Kurtz, who has been leading his personal army on illegal guerrilla missions into enemy territory.

Valkyrie poster
Valkyrie
2008 · dir. Bryan Singer
🍅 62%★ 7.1drama · thriller · warPrime Video

Drama with a pulse of stillness, in both cases

Wounded in Africa during World War II, Nazi Col. Claus von Stauffenberg returns to his native Germany and joins the Resistance in a daring plan to create a shadow government and assassinate Adolf Hitler. When events unfold so that he becomes a central player, he finds himself tasked with both leading the coup and personally killing the Führer.

The Last Samurai poster
The Last Samurai
2003 · dir. Edward Zwick
🍅 65%★ 7.8drama · action · warMax

Bleak war, and it commits to that

Nathan Algren is an American hired to instruct the Japanese army in the ways of modern warfare, which finds him learning to respect the samurai and the honorable principles that rule them. Pressed to destroy the samurai's way of life in the name of modernization and open trade, Algren decides to become an ultimate warrior himself and to fight for their right to exist.

Brothers poster
Brothers
2009 · dir. Jim Sheridan
🍅 63%★ 7.1drama · thriller · warPrime Video

Melancholy drama in both cases

When his helicopter goes down during his fourth tour of duty in Afghanistan, Marine Sam Cahill is presumed dead. Back home, brother Tommy steps in to look over Sam’s wife, Grace, and two children. Sam’s surprise homecoming triggers domestic mayhem.

Pearl Harbor poster
Pearl Harbor
2001 · dir. Michael Bay
🍅 24%★ 6.3drama · warNetflix

War built on romance, twice over

The difference: The critics' underdog of the pair

The lifelong friendship between Rafe McCawley and Danny Walker is put to the ultimate test when the two ace fighter pilots become entangled in a love triangle with beautiful Naval nurse Evelyn Johnson. But the rivalry between the friends-turned-foes is immediately put on hold when they find themselves at the center of Japan's devastating attack on Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7, 1941.

Autumn Sonata poster
Autumn Sonata
1978 · dir. Ingmar Bergman
🍅 85%★ 8.1dramaMax

Both sit in the same contemplative register

After a seven-year absence, Charlotte Andergast travels to Sweden to reunite with her daughter Eva. The pair have a troubled relationship: Charlotte sacrificed the responsibilities of motherhood for a career as a classical pianist. Over an emotional night, the pair reopen the wounds of the past. Charlotte gets another shock when she finds out that her mentally impaired daughter, Helena, is out of the asylum and living with Eva.

Braveheart poster
Braveheart
1995 · dir. Mel Gibson
🍅 74%★ 8.3drama · history · warParamount+

Both run bleak where it counts

Enraged at the slaughter of Murron, his new bride and childhood love, Scottish warrior William Wallace slays a platoon of the local English lord's soldiers. This leads the village to revolt and, eventually, the entire country to rise up against English rule.

In the mood for more contemplative?

all contemplative movies →

The best-reviewed films that share The Deer Hunter’s defining feeling.