Film

Beginners

Name: Beginners
Genre: Drama, Romance, Comedy
Released: 2011
Cast: Ewan McGregor, Christopher Plummer, Mélanie Laurent, Goran Višnjić, Kai Lennox

A hushed, deadpan romance built from fragments: Oliver's tentative new relationship keeps circling back to his father's last years, spent joyfully and messily out as a gay man after decades of marriage. Mike Mills tells it with subtitled dogs, home-movie flashbacks, and grief that never resolves into neatness. Funny, sad, oddly tender — for anyone who likes love stories a little broken and a lot honest.

TMDb rating

6.8

If you liked this

(500) Days of Summer2009

Tells its romance out of order too, jumping between the swoon and the wreckage so you feel both the ache and the wit at once. If Beginners' fractured timeline worked for you, this plays the same trick with equal charm.

But Its irony can tip into smugness, and the 'nice guy' framing has aged unevenly since 2009.

Little Miss Sunshine2006

A family driving toward disaster, funny and devastated in the same breath — the kind of tonal high-wire act Beginners pulls off, but with a whole van of misfits instead of one grieving son.

But The quirk is louder and more calculated; some find its whimsy try-hard rather than earned.

The Kids Are All Right2010no page yet

Lisa Cholodenko's messy, warm portrait of a family built outside convention, full of the same unglamorous honesty about love and parenthood that makes Beginners feel true rather than tidy.

But Its late-film plot turn leans toward conventional melodrama, tidier than the loose, plotless drift Beginners prefers.

The wildcard

Something you would not have found on your own.

Cabaret1972

Hal's late-life liberation into gay life echoes the decadent, precarious freedom of Weimar Berlin's demimonde — both are about people claiming a self they'd hidden, staged with music and glitter instead of Portland deadpan.

Liza Minnelli lights up a story about people inventing selves nobody told them they were allowed to have, set against a world about to collapse — glamorous, funny, and quietly terrifying.

But It's a full-blown musical with big numbers and 1930s Berlin politics looming over everything — about as far from Beginners' hushed indie register as it gets.

Garden State2004no page yet

A deadpan young man numb with grief finds his way back to feeling through a strange, tender romance — the same hushed, melancholic-funny register as Beginners, made a decade earlier.

But The soundtrack-forward mood-piece style has become a genre unto itself, and can feel dated or mannered now.

The Descendants2011

Same year, same wry ache — a man reckons with a marriage and a father he didn't fully know while everyone around him keeps living. Clooney does the quiet devastation Plummer does here.

But It's a more conventional studio dramedy, tidier in its arc than Beginners' loose, fragmented structure.

Away We Go2009no page yet

A couple wandering between friends and family in search of what a life together should look like — funny, sad, and full of the same generous curiosity about other people's messes.

But Its earnestness is thicker and less ironic; some may find the whimsy sentimental rather than sharp.

Lars and the Real Girl2007

A whole town treats one man's strange, tender delusion with total sincerity — the same deadpan gentleness Beginners brings to grief and love that doesn't look like anyone else's.

But The premise is odder on paper than in execution, but it may still be too whimsical for viewers wanting realism.

Silver Linings Playbook2012

Two damaged people circling each other while their families implode around them, handled with a lightness that never denies how much is actually wrong. A similar mix of romance and real dysfunction.

But It's brasher and more plot-driven, with a rom-com engine Beginners deliberately avoids.

The Skeleton Twins2014no page yet

Two siblings, one absent father, grief handled through dark jokes and old habits — a smaller, sadder cousin to Beginners' way of finding comedy inside loss.

But It leans further into bleakness than romance, tipping more toward drama than the funnier moments here.

Chris & Don: A Love Story2008no page yet

The real-life story of writer Christopher Isherwood and much-younger Don Bachardy is the true version of Hal and Andy — an age-gap gay relationship the world doubted, told by the people who actually lived it.

Old home movies, candid interviews, and decades of devotion make this documentary a quietly moving rebuttal to anyone who assumed their love was a phase or a joke.

But It's a talking-heads documentary with none of Beginners' visual playfulness — a plainer, slower delivery of a similar tenderness.

Weekend2011

Released the same year as Beginners, it's the stripped-down version of the same subject: a gay relationship arriving briefly and upending everything, with no quirk or safety net to soften it.

An intense, unguarded weekend between two near-strangers becomes a study of how much intimacy can happen in almost no time — raw where Beginners is wistful, but asking the same question about love worth the risk.

But It's far more explicit and emotionally unshielded, without any of the humor or visual whimsy that softens Beginners' sadder moments.