Film

Wonder

Name: Wonder
Genre: Family, Drama
Released: 2017
Cast: Jacob Tremblay, Julia Roberts, Owen Wilson, Izabela Vidovic, Noah Jupe

Drama

Wonder follows ten-year-old Auggie Pullman's first year of school outside the safety of home, tracking how classmates, siblings and parents adjust his story around him from every direction. Adapted from R.J. Palacio's novel, it's a tearjerker built for family viewing — earnest, hopeful, occasionally corny, and unafraid to hand its camera to supporting characters. Best watched with tissues and, ideally, a kid old enough to sit still.

TMDb rating

4.0

Should you watch it?

Watch it if you like warm school-corridor stories where the emotional payoff comes from small kindnesses between children, and you don't mind a film that leans openly on sentiment to get there.

Skip it if you find gentle, uplifting family dramas cloying, since it pushes its message hard and rarely lets an awkward moment stay awkward for long.

What it asks of you: Settle in for just under two hours of unhurried, mostly light-footed storytelling, shifting between several characters' viewpoints rather than following one thread at full speed.

Not sure? Find tonight's pick in a minute.

If you liked this

The Peanut Butter Falcon2019

Zack Gottsagen, who has Down syndrome, anchors this Huck Finn riff with warmth that never tips into pity; it's the rare disability story that lets its hero be reckless, funny and free.

But The plot is loose and meandering — more mood than momentum, so it can feel slight if you want a tighter story.

Room2015

Jacob Tremblay again proves he can carry a film's emotional weight, this time as a boy discovering the world is bigger and scarier than the one room he's always known.

But The setup is genuinely distressing before it turns hopeful — not a film to put on for younger kids expecting Wonder's gentleness.

Mask1985

Cher and Eric Stoltz turn a true story of facial disfigurement into something fierce and unsentimental, more about a mother's ferocity than pity for her son.

But Its 1980s frankness about sex, drugs and mortality means it sits older and rougher than Wonder's PG world.

Not sure tonight? Get a pick in a minute, starting from Wonder

The wildcard

Something you would not have found on your own.

The Elephant Man1980

Same core question — humanity beneath a face people can't look past — stripped of Wonder's warmth and aimed at adults instead of children.

David Lynch's black-and-white telling of Joseph Merrick's life asks the exact question Wonder asks a child audience — what do we owe a face the world flinches from — but for grown-ups, without a safety net.

But It's bleak, based on real cruelty, and offers none of Wonder's reassurance that things will work out.

Simon Birch1998

A small boy convinced he's destined for greatness despite a body that keeps letting him down — funnier and stranger than Wonder, with real heart underneath the whimsy.

But The tone swings between comedy and tragedy in ways that can feel manipulative rather than earned.

The Fault in Our Stars2014

Trades physical difference for terminal illness but asks the same question Wonder does — how do you let people see you fully when your body marks you as an exception?

But It's unapologetically a tearjerker aimed at teens; if you found Wonder's sentimentality a lot, this turns the dial higher.

A Monster Calls2016

A boy being bullied at school copes with a looming grief through a monster who tells him brutal stories — darker and stranger than Wonder, with real bite to its fantasy.

But It earns its sadness rather than softening it, so it's a heavier, less comforting watch than Wonder.

Radio2003

A true story of a small town's football coach befriending a boy with an intellectual disability — old-fashioned, sincere, built on the same belief that community can widen to include anyone.

But It leans hard into inspirational-sports-movie conventions and doesn't complicate its kindness much.

The Fundamentals of Caring2016

A road-trip comedy pairing a grieving caregiver with a teenager who has muscular dystrophy — funnier and looser than Wonder, but sharing its refusal to let disability be the whole story.

But The humor is drier and more adult-aimed, so it won't land the same way with younger viewers.

Patch Adams1998

Robin Williams as a doctor who treats suffering with laughter — an older, broader film about the same idea Wonder has: that how you're seen changes how you heal.

But It's mawkish in a very 90s way, and Williams' manic clowning may feel dated or too much.

Dumbo1941

The same story — a child mocked for a physical difference who finds unlikely allies — retold as a musical cartoon a lifetime before Wonder existed.

Before Auggie, there was a baby elephant mocked for his ears — Disney's animated classic about ridicule, separation and finding your own kind of flight is Wonder's plot in miniature, decades earlier.

But It's a 64-minute cartoon with 1941 sensibilities and one genuinely traumatic sequence that still upsets kids.

Bully2011

Wonder fictionalizes school bullying and gives it a happy ending; this documentary shows the same problem in real classrooms, unresolved and unscripted.

This documentary follows real kids enduring the kind of school cruelty Wonder dramatizes, with none of the narrative safety of a script — it's the version without the hopeful music cues.

But There's no tidy resolution here, and some of the footage is hard to watch precisely because nobody's protecting these kids from the camera.