Best movies & TV Shows like Mother and Lover
A unique, carefully handpicked, selection of the best movies like Mother and Lover Starring Ryoko Shinohara, Asami Mizukawa, Keiko Matsuzaka, Shin Yazawa, and more. If you liked Mother and Lover then you may also like: Violet Tendencies, Rainbow Song, Dot the I, Living on Tokyo Time, Evergreen Love and many more popular movies featured on this list. You can further filter the list even more or get a random selection from the list of similar movies, to make your selection even easier.
Shingo Okazaki is a young man devoted to his mother to a degree that's rare in Japan. He's a young fellow who treats his mother with respect, but his tendency to overdo it makes his filial devotion look more like a little fault to those around him. Then, a young woman falls in love with him. She finds it very admirable that he takes such good care of his mother, but is also a bit confused by this fellow who seems to care more for his mother than for his girlfriend.
You may filter the list of movies on this page for a more refined, personalized selection of movies.
Still not sure what to watch click the recommend buttun below to get a movie recommendation selected from all the movies on this list
Rainbow Song
Tomoya Kishida is working as a staffer in a television studio when he hears about the death of his close friend, Aoi Sato. This sparks his recollection of the events in life they shared from meeting at a record store, shooting a short film as part of their university film club, to saying their last goodbyes. Though in love with each other, neither had the courage to confess their feelings before it was too late.
Dot the I
Young lovers in London are wrapped up in a love triangle that may not be exactly what it seems. Carmen, a beautiful Spanish woman with a tendency to lose her temper at the drop of a hat, is about to be married to Barnaby, a caring, wealthy, but slightly boring Englishman. While out with friends on her 'hen night' she encounters a stranger who suddenly sparks a passion that has been sleeping within her. As her wedding date approaches, she finds herself struggling to put this newcomer out of her mind, but his effect on her keeps growing stronger. What is it that he sees in her, and why does she feel like she's being pushed inevitably into his arms?
Living on Tokyo Time
When her visa expires, a young Japanese immigrant in San Francisco agrees to marry a Japanese-American boy to avoid being deported back to Japan.
Evergreen Love
Sayaka works at a office. She's not very good at her job or with love. One night, she finds a man, Itsuki, collapsed in front of her home. She takes him inside and they begin to live together. Itsuki teaches Sayaka about cooking wild herbs and collecting wild herbs, but he has a secret.
A Little Bit of Heaven
A guarded woman finds out she's dying of cancer but, when she meets her match, the threat of falling in love is scarier than death.
Kaze no Tayori
Kurumi suddenly gave up opening a cafe with her friend. She hears that her grandfather Takeshi collapsed and goes to visit him in her hometown of Sendai. Takeshi entrusts Kurumi to open a cafe which closed temporarily due to the earthquake, but Kurumi doesn't know what to do. Takeshi hopes Kurumi finds her own way to live. There's not much time left for Takeshi and Kurumi.
My Korean Teacher
Young-Ung was dumped by his girlfriend. While he is in Okinawa, Japan on a business trip, the company he works for goes bankrupt. Sakura is a single mother and works for a travel agency. She needs to learn Korean for her job. At a Korean language institute, Sakura meets Young-Ung and their romance begins.
Christmas Cupid's Arrow
Holly, a professor at a small college, has had a long history of finding the wrong guy. She’s accomplished quite a bit in her life, but after her younger sister announces she is pregnant, Holly decides she is going to make an effort to meet Mr. Right. Meanwhile, David, another professor, is a single father, very smart and kind, but not the type that Holly takes notice of when the two are assigned to plan the Christmas Formal. At the insistence of her best friend, Holly signs up for the dating website “Cupid’s Arrow,” where she meets Josh, an attorney just hired by the school. He’s everything she wants on the surface, but has little to say beyond his work and good looks. Josh and David were roommates in college, so Josh recruits David to write poetic messages in an attempt to win Holly over.
Hearts of Spring
A famous mommy blogger faces an empty nest as her daughter prepares to go away to college. When she turns to her blog for advice, she finds herself on the attack by a reader who has conflicting opinions. While she deals with him online, offline she finally meets a great single dad and sparks start to fly. What she doesn’t know is that the confrontational reader and the adorable single dad are, in fact, the same person.
Downhill Willie
Willie is a young man who has everything that he wants. He lives on a mountain, goes skiing whenever he wants and has a simple job working for an old man. But when the old man’s business is threatened, Willie signs up for the first Kamikaze run, a downhill skiing race where only the very best and craziest person will win. And Willie is a little bit crazy, only he doesn’t know it or care. In the competition, he meets a young woman named Annie, whom he falls a little bit in love with, but Willie also needs to fend off the schemes of Spider Bolton, a man who will do whatever it takes to win.
Rampaging Dragon of the North
The son of a prominent member of a fishing community returns home after a stint with the yakuza to find his father has died under orders of a local gang leader. He sets out to avenge his father, keeping his plans secret from his mother who is cold to him since his perceived abandonment of the family. This wonderful, if little-seen, Fulasaku gem deals with family, community and what it means to do right by both.
Yakuza G-Men
34th year of Meiji (1901). Japanese gangster Shuntaro Hibiki is forced to work for the police to find out who robbed a truck full of gold.
Come Kiss Me at 0:00AM
A stern young girl who yearns for romance, finds herself involved with a celebrity whose image reveals a hidden persona.
Internes Can't Take Money
Dr. Kildare treats and falls for impoverished ex-con Janet Healy, widow of a bank robber, who can't find her baby. Later she helps Kildare sew up gangster Hanlon in a tavern back room. Kildare pursues Janet and enlists Hanlon to help her; the gangster's solution, not surprisingly, is violent.
Nobody's Child
Fact-based drama about the life of Marie Balter, who spent most of her young life in mental institutions. At age 16, she first attempted suicide and the next 20 years she spent in and out of the institutions. At last, a caring doctor started treating her for extreme depression and panic disorder. Weened from strong medications she had taken all her life, at age 36, she emerged for the last time and started a rehabilitation program in the home of a volunteer married couple. There she met a fellow patient with whom she developed a romantic relationship. She also started a college degree. This followed with a long-term professional success in the field of mental health.
The Locket
A bereaved man takes a job at a health care center, where he befriends an elderly and embittered woman - and as time passes, he becomes obsessed with reuniting her with her long-lost true love.
Raining Fire
Based on accounts of the firebombing of Fukuoka. The year is 1945. Everything as usual in the Fukuoka city. Some places in Japan have already been scorched by the fire of war, but here it is relatively peaceful and calm. The school still working, and the boys play war in their spare time. Daichi and his friend are the commanders of rival squads. One day a newcomer appears in the class - Yoriko, a girl evacuated from Tokyo. Yoriko takes life very seriously, she has good reasons - her childhood ended after the loss of loved ones in the bombing. Children get to know each other and become friends. They, as the rest of the city, do not yet know that on June 19 their life will be divided into "before" and "after".
The Adolescent
A 13-year-old girl, just beginning to realize her own sexuality, comes home one day and finds her mother having sex with a stranger. Horrified, she runs away from home and heads towards her aunt's house in the country, only to be sexually assaulted along the way by a brutish local man. When she arrives at her aunt's house, she discovers that her aunt and cousin are not quite what she thought they were.
A Madder Red
7 years ago, Yoichi died in a traffic accident. His wife Ryoko did not receive compensation from her husband's death. She has since raised her son Junpei by herself. Junpei is now a middle school student. Ryoko also cares for her father-in-law, who lives in a nursing home and she also runs a cafe. Her care is in a difficult situation due to Covid-19, while Junpei experiences bullying at school.
The Flame of Devotion
The tragic tale of Kiyono, a young woman from the mountain who fell in love with Takuji, a fisherman's son, and her devotion to him during a time of war.
Build It Bigger
Architect Danny Forster takes you inside some of the most head-scratching builds in the world. Join Danny as he meets the men and women tackling the unique challenges of constructing the tallest buildings, the most effective military tanks, the largest luxury cruise ships, and the most extreme thrill rides. How do you build a 3,113-foot-long wooden roller coaster in winter temperatures of minus 40 degrees? Or get your workers safely to and from a worksite on a skyscraper that's 1,614 feet above street level? Or dig a water tunnel - along the San Adreas Fault and 1,000 feet below the earth's surface - without it collapsing on itself ... or flooding? Our intrepid host answers these puzzles and more. Don't miss the big stories behind these even bigger engineering marvels.
Smile Again
Raised in America by his mentally handicapped mother Anna, Dong Hae dreams of traveling to Korea to propose to the woman he loves.. After qualifying for a speed skating competition, he smuggles his mother to Korea with him, but his undying devotion to her soon begins causing him problems. Finally reconnecting with his lost love Saewa, Dong Hae finds his affections divided when things don’t work out as he planned in this award-winning daily drama.
The Reason I Can't Find My Love
More than half of women in their 20's to 30's admit to "currently lacking a boyfriend." Men, love, sex, work, marriage... All the issues women face today are revealed in truth through this generation, an "ice age of love." "The reason I can't find my love" highlights the lives of three women, Fujii Emi, Ogura Saki and Hanzawa Mako. Emi works for a lighting company as a lighting technician, where she is surrounded by men due to the nature of the profession. She has a straight-forward and generous personality, but is unconcerned about general feminine interests such as fashion. She is often treated like another man by her boss and colleagues, and feels that being in love is tiresome. However, she cannot forget about her ex-boyfriend and hopes to someday fall truly in love. Saki is prideful and determined, but fails in landing a desirable job. As a result, she starts to work at a bar as a hostess, keeping the fact a secret from her parents. Mako is the youngest of all, having attended the same high school following Emi and Saki. She is earnest and responsible, but on the other hand, rather clumsy and afraid of taking chances on a romantic relationship. The three women end up living under the same roof by coincidence, and it is there that they share each other's experiences, bitter or sweet, desperately struggling with their love life. A life-sized unconventional love story ever to air on Fuji TV's prime 9 Monday drama slot! -- Fuji TV
The Full Throttle Girl
Devoted to becoming an international lawyer, Ayukawa Wakaba is full of ambition. Her hard work pays off when she lands a job at an international law firm, but to her disappointment, the first prestigious assignment that is given to her is to babysit the boss' 5 year old daughter, Hinata. Wakaba loathes kids and nursing, but unwillingly takes on the job as she is fixated on wealth and success. One day when she goes to a preschool to pick up Hinata, she meets a man named Yamada Sota. Sota is a man without higher education, wealth, or a future goal, someone that Wakaba absolutely cannot stand, the complete opposite of her ideals. Once again, contrary to her will, she ends up looking after Hinata and a few other kids along with Sota. Despite being exhausted from all the first-time experiences in child care, Wakaba begins to realize what is truly important to her.
Sumika Sumire
Kisaragi Sumi is a 20-year-old university student. But do not be surprised that she is a 65-year-old inside. Under pressure to help out with the family business from a young age, she could not have a youth. Even afterwards, she devoted her entire life to taking care of first her grandmother and then her father and mother. Sumi finds herself turning 65 without ever having had a boyfriend. She takes a little pride in having lived with integrity. But after her mother passes away, she has the sudden thought of regaining her youth once more and making a fresh start in life. A miracle happens to her. One day when Sumi wakes up, she has the appearance of a 20-year-old. Despite being bewildered by this unbelievable reality, she introduces herself as Sumire and gets another try at youth.
My Girlfriend Is Shobitch
Haruka Shinozaki has been interested in the class representative, Akiho Kousaka, since his first year in high school. She is attractive, good at sports, and is an all-around model student. Since they are in the same class this year, Shinozaki decides to confess his feelings—and, to his shock, Kousaka agrees to be his girlfriend! However, he finds that Kousaka is a bit stranger than he first thought: this seemingly perfect girl has never been in a relationship. But even though she is inexperienced, she vows to please Shinozaki in every way she can... such as learning multiple sex positions or his fetishes. Shinozaki tries to assure her that her studies into such subjects aren't necessary, but Kousaka devotes herself to making him happy in more ways than one.
Perfect World
Tsugumi, who works at an interior design firm, has an unexpected encounter with her first love from high school, Itsuki, at a dinner with her client’s whole comp any, an architectural firm. Seeing Itsuki, who is a registered architect with a first-class license and is quite charming, brings back the faint memories from high school. In the middle of dinner, he quietly slips away and begins to head home, getting into a wheelchair. “You didn’t know? Itsuki was in an accident in college, and he can’t walk.” Tsugumi, her pulse racing, takes a step back and thinks to herself, “I can’t love someone in a wheelchair. It’s just not possible to date someone like that.” But when she accepts the reality of the situation and interacts with Itsuki, who struggles but fights to survive each day, she becomes overwhelmed with emotions that she has kept since her youth.
The Escape of the Bride to Be
Kashiwazaki Yu has dated Naoki for the past 7 years and they have lived together for the past 5 years. Nowadays, their relationship has very little romance and Naoki seems to have no interest in marriage. On Kashiwazaki Yu’s birthday, Naoki seems to care more about his new game than celebrating her birthday. Kashiwazaki Yu is unable to control her anger anymore and runs out of their house. Perhaps by fate, she then meets her ex-boyfriend Fukami from her high school days. Kashiwazaki Yu soon finds herself in a love triangle with Naoki and Fukami.
You Don't Know That, Teacher?
When an eager young man gets an elementary school teaching position as his first job, he finds a school staff and student body stricken with apathy. He vows to find a way to invigorate his students and co-workers, but his tendency to burn a straight path toward his goals, while failing to consider any obstacles in his way, may be his biggest fault. Or it may turn out to be his greatest asset.
Etorofu Harukanari
On the eve of the outbreak of war between Japan and the U.S., U.S. Naval Intelligence sent a spy to Japan to spy on the movements of the Japanese Navy. The spy's name was Kenny Saito. He was a second-generation Japanese American who had served as a volunteer soldier on the Spanish front. Meanwhile, on Etorofu Island, Yuki Okatani, whose father was a Russian sailor, had run away from the island five years earlier, only to return home after being abandoned by a man and fired from her job. Saito soon receives information that the Japanese Navy has decided to launch a surprise attack on Pearl Harbor, and that the rendezvous point is Monokan Bay on Etorofu Island, and infiltrates Etorofu Island. Yuki meets Saito and falls in love with him, not knowing that he is a spy...
Time of Distrust ~ Women's Wars
Asai Michiko is a 28-year old housewife. Her husband is 38-year old Yoshio, who works at an advertisement agency. Five years into their marriage, Michiko finds out that Yoshio has been having an affair. Michiko visits the woman and begs her to break up with Yoshio. "Yoshio mentioned that he doesn't see his wife as a woman," she says, bringing Michiko to tears. Nogami Machiko is a 31-year old woman who works at a luxurious nightclub in Ginza. She is told by her lover whose child she bears, "Get an abortion." She too, is brought to tears. Three years later... Since her husband's affair, Michiko, now 31, has put every effort forward to become the adorable wife by studying the latest trends and fashion. Machiko, now 34, is an employed owner of a Ginza nightclub. One day, Okinaka Kazuko moves in across from the Asai family. She is there to take care of the house while her sister and her family are living in Osaka. Alone and lonely, she hopes to become close friends with Michiko. Koyanagi Shingo, Yoshio's client and president of a middle-sized company, takes Shingo to a luxurious Ginza nightclub after dinner. It's Machiko's club. Machiko has had feelings for Yoshio since he started visiting her establishment. When Shingo rises from his seat to leave, Yoshio does the same. But Machiko holds him back. "There's an annoying customer at another table. Can you stay a little longer for me?" After leaving the club, Shingo heads downtown to visit 18-year old Ito Mayumi who sings and plays the guitar. Although Shingo has a wife and a nearly adult-age son, all he can think about is his young lover. After finishing work, Machiko takes a taxi home with Yoshio. Machiko's apartment is just a station away from Yoshio's. In the taxi, Machiko spills coffee on Yoshio's suit. "We should clean this up immediately" she says and invites Yoshio in. Yoshio can't hold back his feelings as Machiko seduces him. Meanwhile, Michiko has reunited with Kondo Kei, a 26-year old calligrapher who was formerly a student of Michiko's father, a master in calligraphy...
Eye Love You
Sparks begin to fly when a telepathic woman who'd given up on love meets a kindhearted Korean student who thinks in a language she can't understand.
Violet Tendencies
A woman tries to distance herself from her gay friends in an effort to land a straight boyfriend.