What's a comforting movie about loneliness?

Lost in Translation or Her. Both are about lonely people making unexpected connections, and both end with more hope than sadness.

Best Movies About Loneliness and Isolation

In short: For lonely people finding each other, watch Lost in Translation or Her. For literal isolation, Cast Away, All Is Lost or Moon. For the darker side of alienation, Taxi Driver. For teenage loneliness, Eighth Grade. For love and memory, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.

A single wooden chair standing alone on a cracked, empty salt flat beside a bare tree. — Real, complicated solitude, not a tidy resolution.

Get movie picks based on this article

Want a film that understands how you feel? Get picks matched to your mood.

Get movie picksPrefer to answer a few questions? Take the 8-question movie quiz →

Lonely people finding each other

Lost in Translation (2003, dir. Sofia Coppola, 102 minutes). A faded movie star (Bill Murray) and a young newlywed (Scarlett Johansson), both sleepless in Tokyo, form a brief, tender friendship. Coppola won the Oscar for Best Original Screenplay.

Her (2013, dir. Spike Jonze, 126 minutes). Joaquin Phoenix, recently divorced, falls in love with an AI voiced by Scarlett Johansson. Gentle, strange and more relevant every year. Another Original Screenplay Oscar winner.

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004, dir. Michel Gondry, 108 minutes). Jim Carrey and Kate Winslet erase their relationship from memory, and discover what loneliness feels like without it.

Growing up

Eighth Grade (2018, dir. Bo Burnham, 93 minutes). Kayla (Elsie Fisher) makes YouTube advice videos nobody watches while struggling to talk to anyone in person. Cringe-funny and deeply kind.

Alone, literally

Cast Away (2000, dir. Robert Zemeckis, 143 minutes). A FedEx executive (Tom Hanks) survives four years on an island, talking to a volleyball named Wilson.

All Is Lost (2013, dir. J.C. Chandor, 106 minutes). Robert Redford, the only actor on screen, tries to survive alone in the Indian Ocean. Almost wordless.

Moon (2009, dir. Duncan Jones, 97 minutes). Sam Rockwell nears the end of three years alone on a lunar mining base, with only a computer for company, when something changes.

Alienation

Taxi Driver (1976, dir. Martin Scorsese, 114 minutes). Robert De Niro's Travis Bickle drives nights through New York, growing more isolated and dangerous. A disturbing classic.

Our verdict

If you want company, Lost in Translation. If you want to feel understood, Eighth Grade. If you want to be unsettled, Taxi Driver.

Frequently asked questions

What's a good movie about being stranded alone? Cast Away, with Tom Hanks on a deserted island, or All Is Lost, with Robert Redford alone at sea and almost no dialogue.

Is Eighth Grade a comedy? Partly. Bo Burnham's film is funny and painfully awkward, and also an honest portrait of anxiety and loneliness online.

Want a movie for tonight?

Our movie quiz can match one to your mood, with runtimes for each pick.