Best movies like In Search of Mother

Out on parole after 8 years inside Bill Hayward returns home to find his now 11 and 15 year old sons abandoned by their mother and fending for themselves. Unwilling to play Dad, an uncaring Bill is determined to move on.

The story of Margaret Humphreys, a social worker from Nottingham, who uncovers one of the most significant social scandals in recent times – the forced migration of children from the United Kingdom to Australia and other Commonwealth countries. Almost singlehandedly, Margaret reunited thousands of families, brought authorities to account and worldwide attention to an extraordinary miscarriage of justice.

When Mary and her teenage son, Fergal, move to yet another new home, it soon becomes clear they live their lives on the run, hiding from someone or something, terrified of being found. Their hunter, Cathal, soon picks up the trail. Intent on tracking Mary and Fergal, he will go to any lengths to succeed in his quest, often using dark arts to aid him. Mary’s only defence is to use an ancient form of her own magic to protect her only son. When local residents begin to be brutally murdered by an unknown life force, the sense of fear escalates. Is Cathal the beast responsible for the killing? Or is it the beast that he is trying to destroy?

The mother of a large family is abandoned by her children and faces consignment to the poorhouse. But one of her offspring, the one no one had faith in, returns to rescue her.

Stranded at a summer camp when aliens attack the planet, four teens with nothing in common embark on a perilous mission to save the world.

A strange and tragic tale of a young boy who is able to predict race winners at the horse track by riding his own rocking horse to aid his parents out of their endless round of debts.

While exploring the neighboring woods, 13-year-old John discovers an unfinished bunker — a deep hole in the ground. Seemingly without provocation, he drugs his affluent parents and older sister and drags their unconscious bodies into the bunker, where he holds them captive. As they anxiously wait for John to free them from the hole, the boy returns home, where he can finally do what he wants.

In northern Canada, a young boy sets a goal for himself to to reunite an abandoned polar bear cub with its mother. Goran Visnjic joins the cast as Muktuk, a half Inuit and half Canadian, who knows the terrain where the polar bears live and who agrees to help the boy.

A young boy, determined to make money enough to buy his mother a birthday present, finds a variety of odd jobs and finally starts up a makeshift circus.

A tramp cares for a boy after he's abandoned as a newborn by his mother. Later the mother has a change of heart and aches to be reunited with her son.

In "America," Dr. Maureen Brennan, a psychiatrist at a youth treatment center, encounters her newest patient, a bi-racial boy named America. Through their sessions, Dr. Brennan helps America come to terms with his roller-coaster life, which began when he was taken by authorities from his crack-addicted mother, and placed into foster care as an infant. The short time of stability in his life occurred when America lived with Mrs. Harper, the elderly nanny to one of his foster families. Later reunited with his mother, she soon abandons America and he is again placed into foster care. Lagging behind in school and full of anger, America retreats further away from society after years of sexual abuse. After attempting suicide, America is placed in a treatment center where Dr. Brennan helps him open up about his painful past and discover the support and courage he needs to get his life back on track.

After reuniting with his mother in Ho Chi Minh City, a family tragedy causes Binh to flee from Viet Nam to America. Landing in New York, Binh begins a road trip to Texas, where his American father is said to live.

Marion Taylor is secretary to Edward Mallory, a wealth Wall Street businessman. She supports her invalid brother Tommy, who has been told by his doctors that he has to go to the mountains for his health. Marion doesn't have the money for that, but Mallory, who has made no secret of his intentions towards her, does. She resigns herself to submitting to his advances in order to get the money in order to keep her brother alive. However, circumstances arise in which she may possibly get the money without having to debase herself with her boss.

Professor Griggs, teaching at the college, doesn't get paid a living wage; his next door neighbor, successful shoemaker Olsen, has money and plentiful food, while the Griggses have hardly any. When the professor's rich student Phil West falls for beautiful Griggs daughter Amelia and also befriends the poor Reverend Gates (a young man who is also in love with Amelia), he observes the difference in his life and theirs and tries to help make a difference.

Elizabeth Cheney has a wealthy husband, social prominence and everything she could want in life . . . except Ted Lutton, the man she loves. She must decide whether to give everything up to follow her heart and run off with Ted.

Successful and married with children, paper-mill owner Jihei knows better than to contradict the strict social and moral codes of 18th-century Japan. But when he meets the lovely courtesan Koharu, he becomes a man obsessed. Koharu returns his love, even foregoing other customers while Jihei schemes to somehow buy her freedom. His efforts yield ruinous consequences for his business and his family life, and Koharu is meanwhile purchased by another client.

Attracted by his wealth, avaricious Germaine marries D'Artois, then leaves him for a more sophisticated man. D'Artois retaliates by moving to the city and learning the proper social graces. His new life style proves to be too expensive for him, and at the end he is left with nothing but one suit of evening clothes and his now contrite wife.

In Imperial Russia, Anna Karenina falls in love with the dashing military officer Count Vronsky and abandons her husband and child to become his mistress.

Gwen's family is rich, but her parents ignore her and most of the servants push her around, so she is lonely and unhappy. Her father is concerned only with making money, and her mother cares only about her social position. But one day a servant's irresponsibility creates a crisis that causes everyone to rethink what is important to them.

In 19th century New Orleans creole Henriette must choose between love and devotion to the church. Neither choice is going to be easy, as there is great opposition to her ideas of breaking traditions.

After one of their shoplifting sessions, Osamu and his son come across a little girl in the freezing cold. At first reluctant to shelter the girl, Osamu’s wife agrees to take care of her after learning of the hardships she faces. Although the family is poor, barely making enough money to survive through petty crime, they seem to live happily together until an unforeseen incident reveals hidden secrets, testing the bonds that unite them.

Eight-year-old Roger Court is in Venice expecting to reunite with his father, British diplomat Major Court (Trevor Howard), whom he hasn't seen in three years. Roger lives with his Aunt Rose since his mother abandoned him.

A family loses its collective head going from rags to riches in this low-budget comedy from also-ran studio Chesterfield. Former slapstick comedian Andy Clyde starred as Grandpa Tom Hopkins who, after selling his junk business, moves in with daughter Molly (Lucille Gleason), her husband Ed (Roger Imhof), and their children Mary (Ann Doran), Edna (Paula Stone), George (Ben Alexander, and Willie (Frank Coghlan Jr.). Ed, who is a member of the town lodge "the Whales," is persuaded by Whitney (Sam Flint) the "Grand Harpoon," to buy $5,000 worth of shares in a promising gold mine, mortgaging the family home to do so. Soon the family is rich and everyone except Molly takes on airs.

Babs Comet is employed by the classified ad department of the daily paper and uses her looks and position to get a husband.

Shoko and Mutsuki get married to satisfy their worried parents, but she is well past the age at which a 'good' Japanese woman should marry, and he is in love with a young male college student. The film is less a realistic exploration of gay life than a fairy tale of three young Japanese trying to construct an alternative to the sexual and familial roles given to them by a society turning increasingly emotionally barren.

A bitter widow and a grumpy widower find themselves stuck in a hotel that is cut off from the outside by a snowstorm. Although both have no intention of getting married again, they begin to fall for each other. Their children, however, are determined to see that the "romance" never gets off the ground and do everything they can to see that they are kept apart.

If You Were Young: Rage highlights the other side of post-war Japanese prosperity, focusing on the throngs of young people who missed out on the boom. We follow a group of young men that can't seem to get ahead, despite their willingness to try. Then one hits upon a plane - to work together to save for a dump truck and thus become independent contractors and be their own bosses at last. Ultimately life presents obstacles: jail for one, violence at the hands of the police for another and a girlfriend and subsequent children for the third. An early Kinji Fukasaku gem that imports the freewheeling style of the French New Wave and the hip detachment of American noir.

The small working-class town of Angels Crest is a tight-knit community resting quietly in one of the vast and stunningly beautiful valleys of the Rocky Mountains. Ethan, one of the town's residents, is a young father but not much more than a kid himself. He has no choice but to look after his three-year-old son Nate, since mom Cindy is an alcoholic. But one snowy day, Ethan's good intentions are thwarted by a moment of thoughtlessness, resulting in tragedy. A local prosecutor haunted by his past goes after Ethan, and the ensuing confusion and casting of blame begins to tear the town apart.

A journalist's wife insists on adopting an abandoned child.

Meet the Japanese Mafia's latest son: a 20 year old named Naoki, part of a surging, decade-long wave of juvenile delinquency in Japan. As Naoki rejects school, jobs and family, his desperate mother decides to take one last chance to save him--by handing him over to the Mafia for one year and letting him choose his own path.

In Osaka, three troubled young kids, Kanako, Atsushi and Kenji, are hanging out together all the time. One day Kenji who lives in an orphanage is sold to a yakuza and their friendship has to come to an end. 25 years later, Kanako is married to Atsushi who is an incompetent yakuza. They have 3 daughters. Kenji is a competent unbeatable yakuza. Atsushi, who sucks at everything, for the first time gets a dangerous mission to kill a thug who has attacked the office of his yakuza group. Kenji, who has advanced to the first lieutenant position, by mistake kills a dumb-ass son of the head of Tokyo Yakuza, which triggers a battle between Osaka and Tokyo Yakuzas. Then, Kenji meets Atsushi in 25 years.

Prince Siddhartha is heir to the Shakya kingdom, which is constantly at war with the more powerful Kosala kingdom. His father tries to raise as him as a warrior leader and to shield him from the miseries of the world. Meeting the young outcast girl Migaila, Siddhartha experiences love for the first time but also witnesses the suffering that afflicts humankind. Meanwhile, in Kosala, Chapra rises through the military, despite his lowly origins, to become a hero and general of the army. A final showdown between the two kingdoms forces Siddhartha to re-evaluate the path he is following.

Sally, a girl of the tenements, is being raised by three bachelor foster-fathers, a pawnbroker, an organ-grinder and a peddler, and is very happy preparing their meals and keeping the house, while the old men bask in the attention she gives them. However, this happy home is broken up when Sally wealthy aunt appears on the scene and takes Sally back to her luxurious penthouse in order to give her the advantages of money and social position. But Sally's heart is back across the river with her plumber sweetheart, Jimmie Adams.

A young man takes a succession of odd jobs in order to save enough money to buy himself and his mother a house. He lands a position in a newspaper office and falls in love with the beautiful society editor, who is secretly having an affair with the married managing editor. She returns the young man's affections in order to make her lover jealous, but finds herself falling for him.

A saloon owner loans her lover the money to buy a house, which he has led her to believe they will live in after they're married. Instead, he takes the money and buys a saloon in another town.