Movies Like Something Wonderful May Happen: New York School of Poets and Beyond

If you liked Something Wonderful May Happen: New York School of Poets and Beyond, a movie directed by Lars Movin, here are 20 movies with a similar feel, based on TMDB's recommendations. Each one links to its cast, trailer and where it's streaming.

1
Sophie's Choice (1982)
★ 7.3/10
Stingo, a young writer, moves to Brooklyn in 1947 to begin work on his first novel. As he becomes friendly with Sophie and her lover Nathan, he learns that she is a Holocaust survivor. Flashbacks reveal her harrowing…
2
Dead Poets Society (1989)
★ 8.3/10
At an elite, old-fashioned boarding school in New England, a passionate English teacher inspires his students to rebel against convention and seize the potential of every day, courting the disdain of the stern…
3
Metropolitan (1990)
★ 7/10
A radical student is adopted by a group of young New Yorkers, serves as a catalyst to alter his and their lives. Gathering in a Manhattan apartment, the group of friends meet to discuss social mobility, Fourier's…
4
The Front (1976)
★ 7.1/10
A cashier poses as a writer for blacklisted talents to submit their work through, but the injustice around him pushes him to take a stand.
5
The Kindergarten Teacher (2018)
★ 6.5/10
Lisa Spinelli is a Staten Island teacher who is unusually devoted to her students. When she discovers one of her five-year-olds is a prodigy, she becomes fascinated with the boy, ultimately risking her family and…
6
Art School Confidential (2006)
★ 6.1/10
Starting from childhood attempts at illustration, the protagonist pursues his true obsession to art school. But as he learns how the art world really works, he finds that he must adapt his vision to the reality that…
7
Passing (2021)
★ 6.3/10
In 1920s New York City, a Black woman finds her world upended when her life becomes intertwined with a former childhood friend who's passing as white.
8
Genius (2016)
★ 6.5/10
New York in the 1920s. Max Perkins, a literary editor is the first to sign such subsequent literary greats as Ernest Hemingway and F. Scott Fitzgerald. When a sprawling, chaotic 1,000-page manuscript by an unknown…
9
Triangle of Sadness (2022)
★ 7/10
A celebrity model couple are invited on a luxury cruise for the uber-rich, helmed by an unhinged, alcoholic captain. What first appears Instagrammable ends catastrophically, leaving the survivors stranded on a desert…
10
Mona Lisa Smile (2003)
★ 6.9/10
Katherine Watson is a recent UCLA graduate hired to teach art history at the prestigious all-female Wellesley College, in 1953. Determined to confront the outdated mores of society and the institution that embraces…
11
The Mouse That Roared (1959)
★ 6.4/10
The Duchy of Grand Fenwick decides that the only way to get out of their economic woes is to declare war on the United States, lose and accept foreign aid. They send an invasion force (in chain mail, armed with bows…
12
Frances Ha (2013)
★ 7.3/10
An aspiring dancer moves to New York City and becomes caught up in a whirlwind of flighty fair-weather friends, diminishing fortunes and career setbacks.
13
Indignation (2016)
★ 6.3/10
In 1951, Marcus Messner, a working-class Jewish student from New Jersey, attends a small Ohio college, where he struggles with anti-Semitism, sexual repression, and the ongoing Korean War.
14
Cradle Will Rock (1999)
★ 6.5/10
A true story of politics and art in the 1930s USA, centered around a leftist musical drama and attempts to stop its production.
15
Little Ashes (2008)
★ 5.8/10
About the young life and loves of artist Salvador Dalí, filmmaker Luis Buñuel and writer Federico García Lorca.
16
Finding Forrester (2000)
★ 7.1/10
Gus Van Sant tells the story of a young African American man named Jamal who confronts his talents while living on the streets of the Bronx. He accidentally runs into an old writer named Forrester who discovers his…
17
The Penguin Lessons (2025)
★ 7.1/10
In 1976, as Argentina descends into violence and chaos, a world-weary English teacher regains his compassion for others thanks to an unlikely friendship with a penguin.
18
The Sweet East (2023)
★ 6.5/10
A picaresque journey through contemporary America, undertaken by a young woman granted access to the strange sects and cults that proliferate in this country by a series of gatekeepers eager to win her over.
19
The Onion Movie (2008)
★ 6.1/10
Venerable newscaster Norm Archer reports the latest news in politics, health, culture and entertainment - such as an automotive recall of decapitation-inducing "Neckbelts" and a study finding that "depression hits…
20
The Believer (2001)
★ 6.9/10
A hardcore US racist skinhead who, because of his intelligence, leads a gang dedicated to fighting the enemy: the supposed American-Jewish conspiracy for domination. However, he's hiding a secret: he's Jewish-born, a…