Best movies like Show Boat

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A unique, carefully handpicked, selection of the best movies like Show Boat Starring Irene Dunne, Allan Jones, Charles Winninger, Paul Robeson, and more. If you liked Show Boat then you may also like: 3 Men and a Little Lady, Yes Sir, Mr. Bones, Walking My Baby Back Home, One Potato, Two Potato, The River 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.

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Know any good movies to watch like Show Boat 1936. With a similar plot or stoyline. Suggest it.

3 Men and a Little Lady

Sylvia's work increasingly takes her away from the three men who help bring up Mary, her daughter. When she decides to move to England and take Mary with her, the three men are heartbroken at losing the two most important females in their lives.

Yes Sir, Mr. Bones

A young boy finds himself in a home for retired minstrel acts. He's anxious to find out as much as he can about them, and flashbacks show what it was like back in the days of the minstrel shows.

Walking My Baby Back Home

A young man from a wealthy New York family pursues a career as the leader of a dance band.

One Potato, Two Potato

Study of interracial marriage in the 1960s. A white divorcée falls in love with and marries an African-American man. When her ex-husband sues for custody of her child, arguing that a mixed household is an improper place to raise the girl, the new husband fights for his parental rights in court, fighting against a judge who represents the prejudices of the era.

The River

This short Depression-era documentary describes the importance of the Mississippi River to the United States and laments the environmental destruction committed in the name of progress, particularly farming and timber practices and their impact on impoverished farmers.

Riverboat Rhythm

A financially-strapped showboat captain struggles to stay in business.

Broadway Melody of 1938

Steve Raleight wants to produce a show on Broadway. He finds a backer, Herman Whipple and a leading lady, Sally Lee. But Caroline Whipple forces Steve to use a known star, not a newcomer. Sally purchases a horse, she used to train when her parents had a farm before the depression and with to ex-vaudevillians, Sonny Ledford and Peter Trott she trains it to win a race, providing the money Steve needs for his show.

Father Is a Bachelor

Johnny Rutledge is a drifter who comes to and discovers a cabin in the forest where five kids: January, February, March, April, and May are living without parents. Their parents died a while ago, and they want to keep that secret from the townspeople, especially the young school teacher, Prudence Millett, to avoid being sent to a children's home and eventual separation. Johnny moves in with the kids and poses as their uncle to take care of them while romancing Prudence. But in order to keep the children, he has to get married.

An Ideal Husband

Sir Robert Chiltern is a successful government minister, well-off and with a loving wife. All this is threatened when Mrs Cheveley appears in London with damning evidence of a past misdeed. Sir Robert turns for help to his friend Lord Goring, an apparently idle philanderer and the despair of his father. Goring knows the lady of old, and, for him, takes the whole thing pretty seriously.

The Color Purple

A decades-spanning tale of love and resilience and of one woman's journey to independence. Celie faces many hardships in her life, but ultimately finds extraordinary strength and hope in the unbreakable bonds of sisterhood.

Mudbound

In the post–World War II South, two families are pitted against a barbaric social hierarchy and an unrelenting landscape as they simultaneously fight the battle at home and the battle abroad.

Girls! Girls! Girls!

When he finds out his boss is retiring to Arizona, a sailor, Ross Carpenter, has to find a way to buy the Westwind, a boat that he and his father built. He is also caught between two women: insensitive club singer Robin and sweet Laurel.

Holiday Inn

Lovely Linda Mason has crooner Jim Hardy head over heels, but suave stepper Ted Hanover wants her for his new dance partner after fickle Lila Dixon gives him the brush. Jim's supper club, Holiday Inn, is the setting for the chase by Hanover and his manager.

Lady Windermere's Fan

A society woman believes her husband is having an affair, a misconception which may have dire personal consequences for all involved.

Mad at the Moon

A young woman on the frontier marries a meek farmer who has an annoying habit of going through a rather drastic change every full moon.

Mr. and Mrs. Loving

A moving and uplifting drama about the effects of interracial marriage in the 1960s. Friends since childhood, and loved by both families, this couple are exiled after their wedding and have to wage a courageous battle to find their place in America as a loving family.

The Wedding

Shelby Coles (Halle Berry) is engaged to marry talented white jazz musician Meade Howell, but the pair face opposition from both Meade's family, who object to an inter-racial marriage, and Shelby's parents, who want her to marry a professional. As Shelby is afflicted by pre-marital doubts, handsome Lute McNeil arrives on the scene, determined to make Shelby his at any cost.

Show Boat

This film sticks very closely to the Edna Ferber novel, rather than the musical based on the novel. There are only two major changes from Ferber's book : *Julie in this version is a white woman, not a racially mixed one; therefore she and her husband are not unlawfully married. * Ravenal returns at the end, instead of dying as in the novel

Show Boat

A dashing Mississippi river gambler wins the affections of the daughter of the owner of the Show Boat.

Steamboat Round the Bend

A Louisiana con man enters his steamboat into a winner-take-all race with a rival while trying to find a witness to free his nephew, about to be hanged for murder.

Dixie Jamboree

A medicine man on the last show boat on the Mississippi is mistaken by two gangsters as a bootleger, and has to envade them.

Out in the Silence

There may not be any secrets in a small town, but there is an expectation of silence. In A Town Called Oil City, the return of a native son to announce his same sex wedding and help a gay teen who is being tormented at school offers a chance to change the way things have always been done.

The Lady Consents

Civilized wife doesn't protest when husband runs off with uncivilized professional golfer pretending to be civilized.

Lullaby of Broadway

Pretty Melinda Howard has been abroad singing with a musical troupe. She decides to return home to surprise her mother whom she thinks is a successful Broadway star with a mansion in Manhattan. She doesn't know that her mother is actually a burnt-out cabaret singer with a love for whiskey. When she arrives at the mansion, she is taken in by the two servants who are friends of her mother's. The house actually belongs to Adolph Hubbell, a kind-hearted Broadway producer who also gets drawn into the charade. Hubbell takes a shine to Melinda and agrees to star her in his next show. Melinda also finds romance with a handsome hoofer who's also in the show. All is going well for Melinda except that she wants to see her mother who keeps putting off their reunion.

One Sunday Afternoon

The third film version of James Hagan's play, this time with songs added, starring Dennis Morgan as a dentist who marries patient and loyal Dorothy Malone despite his constant infatuation with sexy flirt Janis Paige. Filmed previously in 1933 ("One Sunday Afternoon") and 1941 ("The Strawberry Blonde").

It Nearly Wasn't Christmas

Feeling unneeded, a disillusioned Santa Claus (Charles Durning) quits Christmas. Through the selflessness of a little girl looking to reunite her parents for Christmas (and the help of his bumbling chief elf, Philpot (Bruce Vilanch), Santa and the child travel across America and Santa discovers that people really do need him and care about other people.

Shine on Harvest Moon

Biographical movie about the early 20th century broadway stars Nora Bayes and Jack Norworth.

Mississippi

A young pacifist after refusing on principle to defend her sweetheart's honor and being banished in disgrace, joins a riverboat troupe as a singer, acquires a reputation as a crackshot after a saloon brawl in which the villain of the piece accidentally kills himself with his own gun, falls in love with his former fianceé's sister and finally bullies an apprehensive family into accepting him.

Mississippi Rhythm

On board a riverboat bound for Creek City, singer Jimmie Davis, who is going to become half-owner of a land development company willed to him by his uncle, shares a cabin with traveling salesman Dixie Dalrymple. After Dixie invites Jimmie to perform in a concert he is putting on for the other passengers, Jimmie is persuaded to participate in a crooked card game run by Judge Homer Kenworthy and his associates. However, with Dixie's intervention, Jimmie wins handsomely, then accuses the gamblers of trying to cheat him.

Doll Face

Burlesque queen Doll Face Carroll is dismissed from an audition for a legitimate Broadway show because she lacks culture. Her boss/manager Mike decides that she can get both culture and plenty of publicity by writing her autobiography. He hires a ghost writer to do all the work, but doesn't count on the possibility that Doll Face and her collaborator might have more than a book on their minds.

Banjoes, Fiddles & Riverboats: John Hartford and the General Jackson

Steamboatin' stories from those who lived them, river history, authentic footage and stills, along with music and narration by John Hartford.

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