Movies Like Pather Panchali

If you liked Pather Panchali (1955), a drama and history movie directed by Satyajit Ray, 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
Things We Lost in the Fire (2007)
★ 6.6/10Also drama
A recent widow invites her husband's troubled best friend to live with her and her two children. As he gradually turns his life around, he helps the family cope and confront their loss.
2
The Shack (2017)
★ 7.5/10Also drama
A grieving man receives a mysterious, personal invitation to meet with God at a place called 'The Shack'.
3
Mr. Church (2016)
★ 7.4/10Also drama
A unique friendship develops when a little girl and her dying mother inherit a cook - Mr. Church. What begins as an arrangement that should only last six months, instead spans fifteen years.
4
Belfast (2021)
★ 7/10Also drama and history
Buddy is a young boy on the cusp of adolescence, whose life is filled with familial love, childhood hijinks, and a blossoming romance. Yet, with his beloved hometown caught up in increasing turmoil, his family faces a…
5
Dead Poets Society (1989)
★ 8.3/10Also drama
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…
6
Loving Vincent (2017)
★ 8/10Also drama and history
A young man arrives at the last hometown of painter Vincent van Gogh to deliver the troubled artist's final letter and ends up investigating his final days there.
7
At Eternity's Gate (2018)
★ 7/10Also drama and history
Famed but tormented artist Vincent van Gogh spends his final years in Arles, France, painting masterworks of the natural world that surrounds him.
8
It's a Wonderful Life (1946)
★ 8.3/10Also drama
George Bailey has spent his entire life giving to the people of Bedford Falls. All that prevents rich skinflint Mr. Potter from taking over the entire town is George's modest building and loan company. But on Christmas…
9
Doubt (2008)
★ 7.2/10Also drama
In 1964 Bronx, two Catholic school nuns question the new priest's ambiguous relationship with a troubled African-American student.
10
The Left Hand of God (1955)
★ 6.3/10Also drama
A man in priestly robes, seemingly the long-awaited Father O'Shea, arrives at a little-frequented Catholic mission in 1947 China. Though the man seems curiously uncomfortable with his priestly duties, his tough tactics…
11
War Horse (2011)
★ 7.3/10Also history and drama
On the brink of the First World War, Albert's beloved horse Joey is sold to the Cavalry by his father. Against the backdrop of the Great War, Joey begins an odyssey full of danger, joy, and sorrow, and he transforms…
12
Train Dreams (2025)
★ 7.3/10Also drama
A logger leads a life of quiet grace as he experiences love and loss during an era of monumental change in early 20th-century America.
13
Dancer in the Dark (2000)
★ 7.8/10Also drama
Selma, a Czech immigrant on the verge of blindness, struggles to make ends meet for herself and her young son, who has inherited the same genetic disorder and will suffer the same fate without an expensive operation…
14
Origin (2023)
★ 6.2/10Also drama and history
While investigating the global phenomenon of caste and its dark influence on society, a journalist faces unfathomable personal loss and uncovers the beauty of human resilience.
15
The Help (2011)
★ 8.2/10Also drama
Aibileen Clark is a middle-aged African-American maid who has spent her life raising white children and has recently lost her only son; Minny Jackson is an African-American maid who has often offended her employers…
16
Tenzing (2026)
★ 8.2/10Also drama and history
A determined man embarks on a high-stakes quest—and defies seemingly impossible odds—to fulfill his dream of being the first to reach the summit of Mount Everest.
17
Cassandra's Dream (2007)
★ 6.3/10Also drama
The tale of two brothers with serious financial woes. When a third party proposes they turn to crime, things go bad and the two become enemies.
18
Hereafter (2010)
★ 6.2/10Also drama
Three people — a blue-collar American, a French journalist and a London school boy — are touched by death in different ways.
19
The Banker (2020)
★ 7.6/10Also drama
In the 1960s, two entrepreneurs hatch an ingenious business plan to fight for housing integration—and equal access to the American Dream.
20
Seven Years in Tibet (1997)
★ 7.2/10Also drama and history
Austrian mountaineer Heinrich Harrer journeys to the Himalayas without his family to head an expedition in 1939. But when World War II breaks out, the arrogant Harrer falls into Allied forces' hands as a prisoner of…