Film

The Souvenir

Joanna Hogg's semi-autobiographical drama follows a hesitant film student whose life is slowly reshaped by a magnetic, evasive older lover. Told in elliptical scenes and hushed rooms, it's less about plot than atmosphere — memory rendered as texture, feeling withheld until it isn't. Patient, painterly, quietly devastating; for anyone who likes their heartbreak understated and their filmmaking about filmmaking.

TMDb rating6.0

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Phantom Thread2017

An artist obsessively drawn to a controlling, difficult love, shot with exquisite formal control — it mirrors the push-pull between devotion and craft that runs through Julie's story.

But Glacial pacing and a chilly emotional register that some viewers find distancing rather than intoxicating.

Phantom Thread poster

An Education2009no page yet

A shy schoolgirl is seduced by a sophisticated, dishonest older man, told with wit and heartbreak in equal measure — practically Julie's story in a different key.

But Tidier and more conventionally structured, lacking the fractured, dreamlike ambiguity Hogg trades in.

Call Me by Your Name2017

Captures the disorienting rush of a first serious love with lush, sensory filmmaking that lingers on small gestures rather than plot.

But Warmer and more idyllic in tone, missing the corrosive doubt that runs underneath Julie's romance.

Call Me by Your Name poster

The wildcard

Something you would not have found on your own.

Persona1966

Like The Souvenir, it's about a woman losing her outline to someone else's presence, and about the impossibility of separating a life from its representation on screen.

Two women's identities dissolve into one another in Bergman's hypnotic, formally daring study of self and performance — cinema interrogating itself decades before Hogg tried the same trick.

But Austere, elliptical, and largely uninterested in conventional narrative; a real commitment for casual viewers.

Persona poster
More like this (8)

Fish Tank2009

A rougher, more visceral British take on a young woman drawn toward an older man who offers danger and escape in the same breath.

But Much starker and angrier in tone, with none of the hushed, upper-middle-class reticence of Hogg's world.

Fish Tank poster

Frances Ha2013

A scrappier, funnier portrait of a young woman fumbling toward artistic identity and adulthood, shot in gorgeous black and white.

But Lighter and more comic throughout, so it won't satisfy anyone wanting the ache of Julie's story.

Frances Ha poster

Lady Bird2017

Another coming-of-age study built on a mother-daughter push-pull as pointed as Julie and Rosalind's, though warmer where Hogg stays guarded.

But Much brighter and more forgiving, without the numbness and self-erasure that define Julie's arc.

Lady Bird poster

Portrait of a Lady on Fire2019

An artist's gaze becomes the story itself — love rendered through looking and painting rather than declaration, exquisitely controlled.

But Its period setting and formal restraint may feel even more remote than Hogg's already reticent style.

Portrait of a Lady on Fire poster

The Piano1993

A muted heroine finds expression only through her art while entangled with two very different men — all lush repression and withheld feeling.

But More melodramatic and symbol-heavy than Hogg's spare naturalism, with a wilder emotional register.

The Piano poster

45 Years2015

A quietly devastating British drama about how little we truly know the people we love, told with the same unhurried, watchful patience.

But Concerns a much older couple and a long marriage rather than youth and first love — a different kind of ache.

45 Years poster

Stories We Tell2012

Both filmmakers mine their own past for material and openly stage-manage memory to reach emotional truth rather than fact — Polley just tells you she's doing it, out loud.

Sarah Polley turns detective on her own family's secrets, blending home movies, reenactment and interview into a documentary that questions memory itself.

But It's nonfiction about someone else's real family, a cooler, more investigative register than Hogg's aching drama.

Stories We Tell poster

Perfect Blue1998

Same skeleton as The Souvenir — a young woman absorbing someone else's story until she can't tell where she ends and the influence begins — just recast as nightmare instead of memory.

A young performer's identity fractures under ambition and a manipulative figure she can't quite trust, told as feverish psychological horror.

But An animated Japanese thriller with violence and paranoia far removed from Hogg's hushed realism — a real tonal jolt.

Perfect Blue poster

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