The Best Emotional Movies to Watch on Hulu
Looking for a movie that will give you all the feels? If you’re looking to get in touch with your emotions, here are the best movies to stream for getting those sentiments going, from sympathy tears to laugh-cries,
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The Seed of the Sacred Fig bravely takes on the increasingly violent patriarchy and theocracy in modern-day Iran. It follows a family of four—Iman, Najmeh (Soheila Golestani), Rezvan (Mahsa Rostami), and Sana (Setareh Maleki)—and reveals how the political can creep into the personal. Iman, the father, has just been promoted at work (he’s one step […]
“The healing power of art” sounds cheesy, but it’s a statement made beautiful and true in Ghostlight. It’s the sensitively told and wonderfully performed story of an ordinary man who, up until this point, doesn’t even know how Romeo and Juliet ends. That’s how detached he is from art. But when Rita (Dolly de Leon) […]
As in his previous films, Director Andrew Haigh explores the delicate nature of loneliness, grief, and love in All of Us Strangers, except this time he does so through a supernatural lens. The result is mesmerizing: amid the tenderness the film draws from its characters, there’s a swirl of mystery too: how is it possible […]
Based on the bestselling book of essays by Cheryl Strayed, Tiny Beautiful Things is, well, made of many tiny beautiful things. It’s at once a meditation on grief, a coming-of-age tale, a contemplation of family ties, a sobering look at a midlife crisis, a romance, a comedy, and an absolute tearjerker of a drama. It’s […]
Nothing about Saint Omer is easy. A female Senegalese migrant (Guslagie Malanga) is put to trial for committing infanticide, but throughout the film, it becomes clear how much of a victim she is too, of an uncaring and deeply prejudiced society. “What drove her to madness?” Her attorney asks at one point. We’re not sure. […]
You’ll have to trust us on this: it’s best to know absolutely nothing about this show before you start watching. There’s a reason all the promos you see on it say near to nothing about it, and it’s a reason you’ll be thankful for at the end of the first episode. What we will say […]
With the anonymity of the internet, it’s hard to trust that the stranger on the other side would be a good person. There’s catfishers and scammers and trolls, oh my! Once in a while, however, you do meet someone cool. Bob Trevino Likes It was inspired by a real life friendship writer-director Tracie Laymon had, […]
Adapted from the Japanese film Ikiru, which in turn was adapted from the Russian story The Death of Ivan Ilyich, Living is a parable about, well, living. Specifically, it’s about the importance of wonder and the magic of the mundane. It’s also about legacy and the stories we leave in our wake, which live on […]
Plenty of things go on between love and separation, marriage and divorce. There is the pleasant high of intimacy, the devastating low of heartbreak, the frustration of misunderstanding, and the bliss of friendship. Fleishman is in Trouble explores all this from the point of view of recent divorcees Toby and Rachel Fleishman, but interestingly, this […]
A Real Pain is a deceptively simple film. There’s not a lot going on on the surface, but Eisenberg’s smart script and tight direction, coupled with Culkin’s firecracker performance fuel the film with heart and infectious energy. A Real Pain shines when it focuses on the cousins’ bondat once pained and precious—but it also works […]
Everything about Sugarcane is arresting, whether it’s the epic shots of the sweeping reservation (“Canada is our land,” one native announces), the emotional moments shared by survivors of the abusive residential schools, or the damning discoveries they find in an investigation into the Catholic priests. Every second of it is sure to shock and infuriate. […]
With the number of murder mysteries popping up since Knives Out, Death and Other Details can seem like a copy. However, the latest mystery show on Hulu has a few twists up its sleeve, as Detective Coteworth and Imogene Scott aim to solve two cases at once– the first, of course, being the luxury liner […]
The author of the much-loved New York Times bestseller, Sally Rooney, is among the writers of this TV dramatisation, directed by Irish compatriot and indie director Lenny Abrahamson. Abrahamson, who also gave us Frank and the film adaptation of Emma Donoghue’s Room, builds on Rooney’s fantastic source material and an evocative soundtrack to create an […]
As the third instalment in Paul Schrader’s “man in a room” trilogy after First Reformed (2017) and The Card Counter (2021), Master Gardner rounds up the issues at stake in a most profound way. For anyone who’s seen a film either scripted by Schrader (such as Taxi Driver) or directed by him, there will be […]
With years of films depicting Italian crime syndicates, most focus on their leaders – the Dons, the Capos, and the Consiglieres. Most of them focus on the mafia’s men. However, in this series, it’s the women who are the stars of the show. Based on the novel of the same name, The Good Mothers is […]
We don’t really know our parents the same way they know about us. Black Cake recognizes this, and takes that discrepancy to create a compelling mystery, expanding on that hidden world with themes of generational trauma, intercultural dynamics, and lost heritage. With the show doing justice to the book’s moments, the mystery of Eleanor Bennett’s […]
Strange things are happening in the sleepy cul-de-sac where Cameron Edwin (comic Jim Gaffigan) lives: cars are falling from the sky, space rockets are crash-landing in his backyard, and his doppelgänger has just moved in next door and stolen his job. Unnerved by all these weird occurrences and feeling like a failure in light of […]
In fantasy worlds, races with different lifespans are a given, but rarely does a work actually contemplate how these variations would affect relationships between them. Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End starts after a great war, at the moment of peace, and to the titular elf, her shared journey with the human Himmel and their party feels […]
Growing up in multiple foster homes to an absentee mother and imprisoned father, Paige Alexander (Kerry Washington) has had a tough life, but you wouldn’t know from the way she carries herself. She’s bright, cheerful, and constantly buoyed by her ambitious hopes for upward mobility. But there are cracks to her facade, and all the […]
Feminism has made plenty of strides in multiple areas, but even in the era of free love, talking about sex was difficult, and certain figures were dismissed just because of it. The Disappearance of Shere Hite reexamines the titular forgotten feminist figure that simply focused on the female orgasm, giving a second look at her […]
Romantic relationships can come and go, but sometimes, one partner comes along and irrevocably changes your life forever. Tell Me That You Love Me depicts one such relationship. The Korean adaptation of the trailblazing Japanese deaf romance drama has plenty of the same charms, though this rendition makes certain changes that better reflects this current […]
Romantic melodramas are expected in plenty of Korean shows, but Call It Love still feels surprisingly unexpected. The premise feels like a modern day Cinderella story, except the leading lady here, Shim Woo-joo (Lee Sung-kyung), takes nothing from nobody, not without planning corporate revenge. That being said, the show doesn’t unfold into a corporate sitcom, […]
After titles like Tár (2022) and the Dutch film The Conductor (2018), Western female conductors continue to intrigue audiences as they strive to succeed in the last glass ceiling in music. But classical music isn’t restrained to the West, and South Korea’s orchestral world is now showcased in Maestra: Strings of Truth. A remake of […]
Will Trent is a crime procedural that tackles a new mystery every few episodes. It doesn’t differ from other detective shows in that way, but what makes Will Trent interesting is that the intrigue of each case never takes away from the intrigue of the personal lives of the lead characters. Will Trent, in particular, […]
Using the documentary form with supreme clarity and righteous fury, Lakota Nation vs. United States distills hundreds of years of American history into two powerful, consistently engaging hours of film. The information presented in this movie has always been available to the public, but directors Jesse Short Bull and Laura Tomaselli do an excellent job […]
There are only two main characters in Good Luck to You, Leo Grande: Nancy, a retired teacher who was recently widowed, and Leo, an adept sex worker with a mysterious past. They’re almost always in one place and work on a single goal: pleasure. But despite the seeming monotony, the movie is crackling with wit […]
Big George Foreman ticks all the boxes of what a biopic should be. It shows us his troubled childhood, his bumpy rise to the top, and his eventual reconciliation with fame and boxing. It’s also nicely shot and polished, an accurately dressed period piece that looks and feels the part. But nothing about the film […]
What seems like The Good Mother’s biggest asset is actually its downfall. Yes, the three main actors (Swank, Cooke, and Jack Reynor as the civil servant son, Toby) are all good at what they do, but they’re incapable of resuscitating a script that’s never truly come to life. These casting choices, obviously made to give […]
Directed by Japanese filmmaker Hirokazu Koreeda, the Korean film Broker is a simple but tender story about chosen family. It follows Moon So-young (IU), a young mother who decides to drop her baby off at a church, seemingly for good. But when So-young decides to return for the child, she discovers that he’s been stolen […]
This Fool is a half-hour, 10-part series following Julio Lopez (played by co-creator Chris Estrada) a self-proclaimed “punk-ass bitch” and pushover who’s still in the process of learning to stand up for himself. Julio works for a gang rehab center called Hugs Not Thugs, where he also helps his cousin Luis (Frankie Quiñones) get back […]
Focusing squarely on two families and a select few health workers, The First Wave gets intimate access to the fears and anxieties of individuals trying to contend with the effects of the initial outbreak of the coronavirus in New York. That these characters also tend to belong to already vulnerable sectors in the United States […]
In 1961, Francisco de Goya’s portrait of the Duke of Wellington was stolen from London’s National Gallery, but the theft was no slick heist pulled off by international art thieves. No, the improbable culprit was (the improbably named) Kempton Bunton, a retired bus driver and aspiring playwright who pinched the painting — which the gallery […]
In the hands of a lesser artist, something like The Choe Show might have come off as a vanity project or an excuse to show off one’s art and one’s thoughts about art. But David Choe seems to want the opposite: together with an eclectic mix of guests, he lays bare his most shameful feelings […]
Pitting two powerhouse performers against one another guarantees a gripping watch. Who wouldn’t want to see Reese Witherspoon and Kerry Washington (fresh off their respective stints in Big Little Lies and Scandal) go head to head? But Little Fires Everywhere is more than just a fiery soap opera. It’s packed with themes like race, motherhood, […]
On-screen, we’ve seen downtrodden Cinderella-esque leads, we’ve seen humans transform into animals, and we’ve seen whole families cursed, but Fruits Basket takes all these plot devices and transforms them into something completely different. As Tohru Honda gets to learn about the mysterious Sohma family, and she and friends gets into fun and wacky hijinks with […]
A masterpiece in every possible way: its striking balance between simplicity and effectiveness, its innovative value, the commitment of its maker, and just overall beauty. Boyhood was filmed over a span of 12 years, something never attempted before in film. The result is a captivating, breathtaking tale with almost unparalleled plausibility. The emotions it incites […]
How is it possible to fit a whole lifetime into a movie? Mira Nair’s The Namesake, an adaptation of Jhumpa Lahiri’s beloved novel, excels in doing so, gliding through the book’s plot with ease, but it’s done in a subtle and straightforward way that makes it feel less complex than it really is. The scenes […]
Sixteen-year-old Rae Earl struggles with many things, among them: severe mental illness, a distorted body image, and less-than-ideal home life. In an attempt to redefine herself and pursue the teenage dream she’s always wanted, she reconnects with her estranged friend Chloe and the cool new people she’s met in Rae’s absence. As Rae gets to […]
Coming-of-age shows are not hard to come by these days. If anything, there might be too many, with a majority of them being hit-or-miss in terms of quality. But before all this, there was one show that tested the waters and bravely went where no teen show had gone: it was called My So-Called Life, […]
In this ensemble cast directed by Wes Anderson, we see a very dysfunctional family with three very unique siblings who grow apart from each other due to their father, a charismatic and ever-absent grifter. However, when he announces his immanent death, the whole family is forced to confront each other, themselves and their childhoods as […]