20 best movies like The Whole Wide World (1996)

A romantic comedy centered on Dexter and Emma, who first meet during their graduation in 1988 and proceed to keep in touch regularly. The film follows what they do on July 15 annually, usually doing something together.

The true story of Oscar, a 22-year-old Bay Area resident, who crosses paths with friends, enemies, family, and strangers on the last day of 2008.

In a small Turkish town, two young tuberculous poets try to survive while publishing their poems. As they both fall in love, their life would never be the same.

Simple Italian postman learns to love poetry while delivering mail to a famous poet; he uses this to woo local beauty Beatrice.

C.S. Lewis, a world-renowned writer and professor, leads a passionless life until he meets spirited poet Joy Gresham

Author P.L. Travers travels from London to Hollywood as Walt Disney Pictures adapts her novel Mary Poppins for the big screen.

The Theory of Everything is the extraordinary story of one of the world’s greatest living minds, the renowned astrophysicist Stephen Hawking, who falls deeply in love with fellow Cambridge student Jane Wilde.

The true story of an 84 year-old Kenyan villager and ex Mau Mau freedom fighter who fights for his right to go to school for the first time to get the education he could never afford.

Inspired by a true story, a comedy centered on a 27-year-old guy who learns of his cancer diagnosis, and his subsequent struggle to beat the disease.

Patch Adams is a doctor who doesn't look, act or think like any doctor you've met before. For Patch, humour is the best medicine and he's willing to do just anything to make his patients laugh—even if it means risking his own career.

Leonard Schiller once counted among New York's Literary lions, but illness and ten years of writers block have lowered his profile, almost to the point of obscurity. When Heather Wolfe, an ambitious literature major, asks to interview him for her theses on his work, her interest forces hims to address the issues that have been he has avoided all these years, and stirs in him feelings he has long forgotten, much to his daughter's consternation

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 story, from pre-war prosperity to Auschwitz. In the present, Sophie and Nathan's relationship increasingly unravels as Stingo grows closer to Sophie and Nathan's fragile mental state becomes ever more apparent.

In 1818, high-spirited young Fanny Brawne finds herself increasingly intrigued by the handsome but aloof poet John Keats, who lives next door to her family friends the Dilkes. After reading a book of his poetry, she finds herself even more drawn to the taciturn Keats. Although he agrees to teach her about poetry, Keats cannot act on his reciprocated feelings for Fanny, since as a struggling poet he has no money to support a wife.

The true story of Soldier’s Girl, which takes place in Fort Campbell, KY, tells the heart-wrenching story of the life and tragic death of soldier Barry Winchell. His love for Calpernia Addams, a beautiful transgendered nightclub performer was misunderstood by fellow soldiers and eventually leads to his brutal death.

In 1957, a son and mother flee the East and an abusive boyfriend to find a new life, and end up in Seattle, where the mother meets a polite garage mechanic. The boy continually gets into trouble by hanging out with the wrong crowd. The mom marries the mechanic, but they soon find out that he's an abusive and unreasoning alcoholic, and they struggle to maintain hope in an impossible situation as the boy grows up with plans to escape the small town by any means possible. Based on a true story by Tobias Wolff.

Docudrama about American poet Hart Crane, who committed suicide in April 1932 at the age of 32 by jumping off the steamship SS Orizaba.

The life of celebrated but reclusive author, J.D. Salinger, who gained worldwide fame with the publication of his novel, The Catcher in the Rye.

In December 1941, Czech soldier Jozef Gabčík and Jan Kubiš parachute into their occupied homeland to assassinate Nazi officer Reinhard Heydrich

In an updated contemporary version of the beloved stage play and 1989 film, "Steel Magnolias" chronicles the lives and friendship of six women in Louisiana. Supporting each other through their triumphs and tragedies, they congregate at Truvy’s beauty shop to ponder the mysteries of life and death, husbands and children - and hair and nails - all the important topics that truly unite and celebrate women.

Liz Gilbert had everything a modern woman is supposed to dream of having – a husband, a house and a successful career – yet like so many others, she found herself lost, confused and searching for what she really wanted in life. Newly divorced and at a crossroads, Gilbert steps out of her comfort zone, risking everything to change her life, embarking on a journey around the world that becomes a quest for self-discovery. In her travels, she discovers the true pleasure of nourishment by eating in Italy, the power of prayer in India and, finally and unexpectedly, the inner peace and balance of true love in Bali.

The true story of a brilliant but politically radical debate team coach who uses the power of words to transform a group of underdog African American college students into an historical powerhouse that took on the Harvard elite.

In this film, we see the world through the eyes of main character Justice, a young African-American poet. A mail carrier invites a few friends along for a long overnight delivery run.

After a decade of living in San Francisco, Jesse is forced to move back to his Midwestern roots because he can no longer afford the city. On his final night in the city, friends and ex-lovers gather for a going away party that promises to heighten Jesse's already bittersweet feelings about leaving.

Mitch became caught up with his career as a sport commentator and journalist. He ignored his girlfriend and did not make time to do things in life that are of the most value to a human being. Morrie was one of Mitch's professors in college and a famous scholar. One day Mitch was watching television and saw Morrie giving an interview stating that he is dying of Lou Gehrig disease or ALS.

The controversial true story of a gay activist who rejects his homosexuality and becomes a Christian pastor.

In this biographical drama, Selena Quintanilla is born into a musical Mexican-American family in Texas. Her father, Abraham, realizes that his young daughter is talented and begins performing with her at small venues. She finds success and falls for her guitarist, Chris Perez, who draws the ire of her father. Seeking mainstream stardom, Selena begins recording an English-language album which, tragically, she would never complete.

A baseball legend almost finished with his distinguished career at the age of forty has one last chance to prove who he is, what he is capable of, and win the heart of the woman he has loved for the past four years.

For his French-class assignment, a high school student weaves his family history in a news story involving terrorism, and goes on to invite an Internet audience in on the resulting controversy.

Savannah is the true story of Ward Allen, a romantic and bombastic character who rejects his plantation heritage for the freedom of life on a river. Ward navigates the change of early 20th century America on the wrong side of the law and society, his long-time friend, a freed slave named Christmas Moultrie, at his side. Master of Shakespeare, and the shotgun that provides Savannah's markets with fowl, Ward fights for his rights as a hunter. His charisma and eloquent rhetoric win the heart of a society woman who defies her father to marry him. An elderly Moultrie tells the story of life on the river with his friend to a little boy, who passes the legendary Ward Allen down to the next generation.

Will Montgomery (Ben Foster), a U.S. Army Staff Sergeant who has returned home from Iraq, is assigned to the Army’s Casualty Notification service. Montgomery is partnered with Captain Tony Stone (Woody Harrelson), to give notice to the families of fallen soldiers. The Sergeant is drawn to Olivia Pitterson (Samantha Morton), to whom he has delivered news of her husband’s death.

A Hollywood-set romantic tale of a guy who is content to live his life without a job yet with the love of his life, a young actress.

Tod Lubitch is born with a deficient immune system. As such, he must spend the rest of his life in a completely sterile environment. His room is completely hermetically sealed against bacteria and virus, his food is specially prepared, and his only human contact comes in the form of gloved hands. The movie follows his life into a teenager.

After teenage ambulance driver Ernest Hemingway (Chris O'Donnell) takes shrapnel in the leg during World War I, he falls in love with Agnes von Kurowsky (Sandra Bullock), a beautiful older nurse at the hospital where he's sent to recover. Their affair slowly blossoms, until Hemingway boldly asks Agnes to be his wife and journey to America with him. Richard Attenborough directs this drama based on the real-life experiences of the famed novelist.

A coming of age drama following the life of Matt Hamill, the first deaf wrestler to win a National Collegiate Wrestling Championship.

Two Navy fighter pilots find themselves in the midst of a forbidden relationship throwing their lives and careers into disarray.

The story of Beatrix Potter, the author of the beloved and best-selling children's book, "The Tale of Peter Rabbit", and her struggle for love, happiness and success.

Though a childhood bout with polio left him dependent on an iron lung, Mark O'Brien (John Hawkes) maintains a career as a journalist and poet. A writing assignment dealing with sex and the disabled piques Mark's curiosity, and he decides to investigate the possibility of experiencing sex himself. When his overtures toward a caregiver scare her away, he books an appointment with sex surrogate Cheryl Green (Helen Hunt) to lose his virginity.

An ordinary man sees a bright light descend from the sky, and discovers he now has super-intelligence and telekinesis.

Based on the true story of Robin, a handsome, brilliant and adventurous man whose life takes a dramatic turn when polio leaves him paralyzed.

After learning that his terminally ill wife has six months to live, a man welcomes the support of his best friend who moves into their home to help out.

A young widow discovers that her late husband has left her 10 messages intended to help ease her pain and start a new life.

James, a new speech teacher at a school for the deaf, falls for Sarah, a pupil who decided to stay on at the school rather than venture into the big bad world. She shuns him at first, refusing to read his lips and only using signs.

A true story of two men who should never have met – a quadriplegic aristocrat who was injured in a paragliding accident and a young man from the projects.

A romantic-drama, OLD FASHIONED centers on Clay Walsh, a former frat boy who gives up his carousing and now runs an antique shop in a small Midwestern college town. There, he has become notorious for his lofty and outdated theories on love and romance. When Amber Hewson, a free-spirited young woman with a restless soul, drifts into the area and rents the apartment above his shop, she finds herself surprisingly drawn to his noble ideas, which are new and intriguing to her. And Clay, though he tries to fight and deny it, simply cannot resist being attracted to her spontaneous and passionate embrace of life. Ultimately, Clay must step out from behind his relational theories, and Amber must overcome her own fears and deep wounds, as the two of them, together, attempt the impossible: an “old-fashioned” courtship in contemporary America.

Chronicles a single day in the summer of 1989 when the future president of the United States, Barack Obama, wooed his future First Lady on an epic first date across Chicago's South Side.

A young boy fighting cancer writes letters to God, touching lives in his neighborhood and inspiring hope among everyone he comes in contact. An unsuspecting substitute postman, with a troubled life of his own, becomes entangled in the boy's journey and his family by reading the letters. They inspire him to seek a better life for himself and his own son he's lost through his alcohol addiction.

The story of Aung San Suu Kyi as she becomes the core of Burma's democracy movement, and her relationship with her husband, writer Michael Aris.

The true story of the frightening, lonely world of silence and darkness of 7-year-old Helen Keller who, since infancy, has never seen the sky, heard her mother's voice or expressed her innermost feelings. Then Annie Sullivan, a 20-year-old teacher from Boston, arrives. Having just recently regained her own sight, the no-nonsense Annie reaches out to Helen through the power of touch, the only tool they have in common, and leads her bold pupil on a miraculous journey from fear and isolation to happiness and light.

The true story of William Wilberforce and his courageous quest to end the British slave trade. Along the way, Wilberforce meets intense opposition, but his minister urges him to see the cause through.

Georges and Anne are in their eighties. They are cultivated, retired music teachers. Their daughter, who is also a musician, lives abroad with her family. One day, Anne has a stroke, and the couple's bond of love is severely tested.