Movies Like The Perks of Being a Wallflower

If you liked The Perks of Being a Wallflower (2012), a drama movie directed by Stephen Chbosky, 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
Joe Bell (2020)
★ 6.5/10Also drama
The true story of a small town, working class father who embarks on a solo walk across the U.S. to crusade against bullying after his son is tormented in high school for being gay.
2
Brave the Dark (2025)
★ 6.7/10Also drama
When Mr. Deen discovers one of his students has been living out of his car and thrown into jail, he decides to bail him out. Determined to curb Nate’s self-destructive behavior, Deen quickly discovers a host of dark…
3
Beautiful Boy (2018)
★ 7.6/10Also drama
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.
4
Bully (2001)
★ 6.7/10Also drama
A group of teenagers in South Florida enact a murder plot against their mutual bully, Bobby, who has emotionally, physically, and sexually abused them for years.
5
Midnight Cowboy (1969)
★ 7.5/10Also drama
Joe Buck is a wide-eyed hustler from Texas hoping to score big with wealthy New York City women; he finds a companion in Enrico "Ratso" Rizzo, an ailing swindler with a bum leg and a quixotic fantasy of escaping to…
6
Moonlight (2016)
★ 7.4/10Also drama
The tender, heartbreaking story of a young man’s struggle to find himself, told across three defining chapters in his life as he experiences the ecstasy, pain, and beauty of falling in love, while grappling with his…
7
The Crush (1993)
★ 6.7/10Also drama
A precocious and obsessive teenager develops a crush on a naive writer with harrowing consequences.
8
The Boys in the Band (1970)
★ 7/10Also drama
Harold is celebrating a birthday, and his friend Michael has drafted some other friends to help commemorate the event. As the evening progresses, an unexpected guest shows up, the alcohol flows, the knives come out…
9
We the Animals (2018)
★ 6.5/10Also drama
Manny, Joel and Jonah tear their way through childhood and push against the volatile love of their parents. As Manny and Joel grow into versions of their father and Ma dreams of escape, Jonah, the youngest, embraces an…
10
The Basketball Diaries (1995)
★ 7.4/10Also drama
A high school basketball player’s life turns upside down after free-falling into the harrowing world of drug addiction.
11
The Hate U Give (2018)
★ 8.1/10Also drama
Raised in a poverty-stricken slum, a 16-year-old girl named Starr now attends a suburban prep school. After she witnesses a police officer shoot her unarmed best friend, she's torn between her two very different worlds…
12
Luckiest Girl Alive (2022)
★ 6.5/10Also drama
A successful woman in New York City finds her life upended when she is forced to confront a dark truth that threatens to unravel her meticulously crafted life.
13
My Friend Dahmer (2017)
★ 6.5/10Also drama
Jeffrey Dahmer struggles with a difficult family life as a young boy. During his teenage years he slowly transforms, edging closer to the serial killer he was to become.
14
Apt Pupil (1998)
★ 6.5/10Also drama
One day in 1984, Todd Bowden, a brilliant high school boy fascinated by the history of Nazism, stumbles across an old man whose appearance resembles that of Kurt Dussander, a wanted Nazi war criminal. A month later…
15
The Boys in the Band (2020)
★ 6.8/10Also drama
At a birthday party in 1968 New York, a surprise guest and a drunken game leave seven gay friends reckoning with unspoken feelings and buried truths.
16
I'm Not Ashamed (2016)
★ 7.1/10Also drama
Based on the journal entries of Rachel Joy Scott, the first student killed in the Columbine High School shooting in 1999.
17
Super Dark Times (2017)
★ 6.5/10Also drama
Teenagers Zach and Josh have been best friends their whole lives, but when a gruesome accident leads to a cover-up, the secret drives a wedge between them and propels them down a rabbit hole of escalating paranoia and…
18
Speak (2004)
★ 7.1/10Also drama
Freshman high-school student Melinda has refused to speak ever since she called the cops on a popular summer party. With her old friends snubbing her for being a rat, and her parents too busy to notice her troubles…
19
White Bird in a Blizzard (2014)
★ 6.2/10Also drama
In 1988, a teenage girl's life is thrown into chaos when her mother disappears.
20
The Fallout (2021)
★ 7.5/10Also drama
In the wake of a school tragedy, Vada, Mia and Quinton form a unique and dynamic bond as they navigate the never linear, often confusing journey to heal in a world that feels forever changed.