Here are Cinephile Corner’s 10 recommendations for movies like A Big Bold Beautiful Journey:
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button introduces us to David Fincher in a seemingly softer, more empathetic guise. The movie is a sincere detour to the filmmaker’s career, one that is interesting to look back on years later. Brad Pitt delivers a performance that transcends technological constraints and unlikely subject matter.
Humanist Vampire Seeking Consenting Suicidal Person
Humanist Vampire Seeking Consenting Suicidal Person is just as ridiculous and comical as its English-language title would suggest. The movie is a riff on the vampire genre in a similar way that What We Do in the Shadows is. They both poke fun at the blasé, mundane, and almost emo way in which we consume much of the vampire material that’s been produced this century. Because vampires have become synonymous with counterculture, often because the motifs and iconography of these monsters reflect that of the unimpressed teenage mindset.
Read our full review of Humanist Vampire Seeking Consenting Suicidal Person
Wicked
Monetarily speaking, Wicked is shaping up to be the movie sensation of the fall. Each year, a few family-friendly blockbusters dominate the holiday season box office, drawing in swarms of extended families and raking in massive earnings. In 2024, Wicked is one such standout, serving as a prequel to The Wizard of Oz and kicking off a two-part franchise. The film explores the origins of the Wicked Witch of the West, framed through the eyes of her closest classmate from years prior.
Elemental
Elemental acts as a surprising return to the roots of Pixar. It’s a movie with a host of relevant themes and messages rolled into a sincere and effective love story. It’s been a a minute since Pixar landed an original story with such a clear balance of narrative and comedy.
The Little Mermaid
As far as the collection of Disney live action remakes goes, The Little Mermaid is better than The Lion King, Aladdin, Mulan, and others. But it still has the same problems entrenched in it as the latter movies. There is still little reason for its existence beyond making a few dollars.
Anyone But You
While Anyone But You might offer a few chuckles and some eye candy in the form of Sydney Sweeney and Glen Powell, it’s a mostly forgettable affair that leaves you craving a rom-com with some actual bite and fizz.
Punch-Drunk Love
Paul Thomas Anderson’s Punch-Drunk Love is the rare romantic comedy that hums like a live wire. The movie finds Anderson collapsing love and rage into the same nervous system, paring down the sprawl of Magnolia to something smaller, stranger, and sharper. The film’s scale is modest compared with Boogie Nights or There Will Be Blood, but its voltage is unmistakable—an anxious fairytale painted in glowing blues and reds, propelled by Jon Brion’s jittery, percussive score and bursts of abstract color.
We Live in Time
A movie like We Live in Time really shouldn’t work. The overly sentimental cancer drama is a well-trodden path, with its fair share of genuinely touching entries but even more bogged down by predictability and melodrama. We Live in Time doesn’t completely avoid these familiar pitfalls, as it leans into some of the same cheesy tropes that often plague this subgenre.
Preparation for the Next Life
Bing Liu’s Preparation for the Next Life is a patient, unvarnished drama about two people trying to build a life together with nothing to fall back on. After the nonfiction clarity of Minding the Gap, Liu shifts to narrative without losing the documentary instincts that made his debut so piercing. You feel that in the way the camera lingers on kitchens in Chinatown, cramped rooms, and the small rituals of work and survival. The story is familiar, yet the texture is specific.
The Beast
While The Beast won’t be for everyone, its risks are what make it so compelling. Bertrand Bonello is uninterested in tying up every loose end, but those narrative imperfections feel like deliberate artistic choices rather than missteps. The film constantly shifts shape, feeling at times like an anthology, a love story, a sci-fi thriller, and an existential drama all at once.
READ MORE: A Big Bold Beautiful Journey (2025)