Movies Like To Pen a Book

If you liked To Pen a Book (2024), a movie directed by Tetsuo Shinohara, 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
Not Another Happy Ending (2013)
★ 5.8/10
When a struggling publisher discovers his only successful author is blocked, he knows he has to unblock her or he's finished. With her newfound success, she's become too happy and she can't write when she's happy. The…
2
Deconstructing Harry (1997)
★ 7.2/10
Writer Harry Block draws inspiration from people he knows, and from events that happened to him, sometimes causing these people to become alienated from him as a result.
3
The Vanishing of Sidney Hall (2018)
★ 6.7/10
Over the course of 12 years, and three stages of life, Sidney Hall falls in love, writes the book of a generation and then disappears without a trace.
4
Stranger Than Fiction (2006)
★ 7.3/10
Harold Crick is a lonely IRS agent whose mundane existence is transformed when he hears a mysterious voice narrating his life.
5
Shadows in the Sun (2005)
★ 6.2/10
An aspiring young writer tracks a literary titan suffering from writers block to his refuge in rural Italy and learns about life and love from the irascible genius and his daughters.
6
The Magic of Belle Isle (2012)
★ 7/10
In an effort to tap into his original talent, a wheelchair-bound author moves to a rural town, where he befriends a single mother and her three kids, who help reignite his passion for writing.
7
Maborosi (1995)
★ 7.5/10
A tragedy strikes a young woman's life without warning or reason. She continues living while searching for meaning in a lonely world.
8
Lonely Planet (2024)
★ 6.1/10
At an idyllic writers retreat in Morocco, a newly single novelist finds an unexpected connection with a younger man who's reevaluating his life choices.
9
Grace (2018)
★ 6.1/10
A famous writer begins suffering from a crippling case of writer's block. His agent sends him a strange, belligerent woman to be his new assistant, hoping the change will inspire him.
10
Norwegian Wood (2010)
★ 6.4/10
Toru recalls his life in the 1960s, when his friend Kizuki killed himself and he grew close to Naoko, Kizuki's girlfriend, and another woman, the outgoing, lively Midori.
11
Oh Lucy! (2018)
★ 6.7/10
A lonely, chain-smoking office lady in Tokyo falls for her teacher when she decides to take English lessons. When her teacher disappears, she sets out on a journey to find him.
12
Romancing the Stone (1984)
★ 6.8/10
Though she can spin wild tales of passionate romance, novelist Joan Wilder has no life of her own. Then one day adventure comes her way in the form of a mysterious package. It turns out that the parcel is the ransom…
13
Drawing Closer (2024)
★ 8.4/10
With only a year left to live, 17-year-old Akito finds new meaning in life by bringing joy to a terminally ill girl who has just six months remaining.
14
Along for the Ride (2022)
★ 6.6/10
The summer before college, Auden meets the mysterious Eli, a fellow insomniac. While the seaside town of Colby sleeps, the two embark on nightly quests to help Auden experience the fun, carefree teen life she never…
15
As Good as It Gets (1997)
★ 7.4/10
A misanthropic author, a single mother and waitress, and a gay artist form an unlikely friendship after the artist is assaulted in a robbery.
16
Kamikaze Girls (2004)
★ 7.2/10
Momoko, a strange and seemingly emotionless girl obsessed with 18th century France, befriends a Yanki biker and the two experience the ups and downs of their unusual lives in a rural Japanese town.
17
Beautiful Boy (2018)
★ 7.6/10
After he and his first wife separate, journalist David Sheff struggles to help their teenage son, who goes from experimenting with drugs to becoming devastatingly addicted to methamphetamine.
18
Road to Paloma (2014)
★ 5.8/10
While Native American Wolf is being pursued by the FBI for having taken the law into his own hands, when his mother was raped and killed on their reservation he crosses paths with Cash, a down and out musician who is…
19
Suspect X (2008)
★ 7.6/10
A male corpse is discovered with a smashed face and burned hands. Strangely, the cause of death is determined to be strangulation. When Detective Kaoru Utsumi attempts to corroborate the victim’s ex-wife’s alibi she…
20
Earthquake Bird (2019)
★ 5.9/10
Tokyo, Japan, 1989. Lucy Fly, a foreigner who works as a translator, begins a passionate relationship with Teiji, a mysterious man obsessed with photography.