If Disobedience left you breathless with its restrained intimacy, religious tension, and the emotional weight of forbidden love, you’re not alone. This 2017 drama isn’t just about a romance between two women — it’s about identity, guilt, and the cost of freedom.
In this list, we’ve curated lesbian movies that echo the core emotional themes of Disobedience. What do they all share?
🚫 Forbidden love under social or religious pressure
🔥 Slow-burn chemistry that simmers with every glance
🧠 Emotionally complex characters facing internal or external conflict
🎭 Understated performances and beautiful direction
Whether it’s set in the past or present, these lesbian dramas all carry the same quiet ache — a longing for love in a world that won’t make space for it.
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Movies Like Disobedience List
🎬 Director: Céline Sciamma
🎭 Main Cast: Noémie Merlant, Adèle Haenel
🌍 Country: France
🎞️ Genre: Historical Drama, Romance
🔑 Keywords: forbidden love, female gaze, sapphic longing
📖 Plot Summary
In 18th century France, a painter is hired to secretly paint a noblewoman’s wedding portrait. As the two women spend time together in isolation, a forbidden romance begins to blossom.
❤️ Why it’s like Disobedience:
Both films explore repressed passion within rigid social structures. Through long gazes and quiet moments, they show how love can ignite where it’s least allowed.
💬 A masterpiece of silence and staring — you’ll feel every breath.
🎬 Director: Mona Fastvold
🎭 Main Cast: Katherine Waterston, Vanessa Kirby
🌍 Country: USA
🎞️ Genre: Period Drama, Romance
🔑 Keywords: emotional isolation, 19th-century love, frontier hardship
📖 Plot Summary
Two farmers’ wives in 1850s New York form a close friendship that evolves into love, offering warmth amid the emotional coldness of their repressive lives.
❤️ Why it’s like Disobedience:
Both stories are about women whose desires can’t exist in public, and whose love is built on stolen moments and inner yearning.
💬 A slow, melancholic burn that lingers like winter air.
🎬 Director: Annabel Jankel
🎭 Main Cast: Anna Paquin, Holliday Grainger
🌍 Country: UK
🎞️ Genre: Romantic Drama
🔑 Keywords: small-town, 1950s, motherhood, hidden love
📖 Plot Summary
In a conservative Scottish town, a doctor and a single mother bond over shared struggles, sparking a romance that draws the attention of a judgmental community.
❤️ Why it’s like Disobedience:
Both portray queer love under heavy societal scrutiny, showing how tenderness becomes an act of defiance.
💬 If you love tender moments and quiet rebellion, this one’s for you.
🎬 Director: Francis Lee
🎭 Main Cast: Kate Winslet, Saoirse Ronan
🌍 Country: UK
🎞️ Genre: Period Drama, Biopic
🔑 Keywords: Victorian era, fossil collector, silent passion
📖 Plot Summary
Mary Anning, a reclusive paleontologist, forms a surprising relationship with a fragile young woman sent to convalesce by the sea.
❤️ Why it’s like Disobedience:
It captures the ache of forbidden affection in a world where women must love discreetly, echoing Disobedience‘s emotional restraint.
💬 A cold seashore. A warm glance. A love that never says its name.
🎬 Director: Dee Rees
🎭 Main Cast: Adepero Oduye
🌍 Country: USA
🎞️ Genre: Coming-of-Age, Queer Identity
🔑 Keywords: Black lesbian identity, family pressure, urban life
📖 Plot Summary
Alike, a 17-year-old Black teenager in Brooklyn, navigates her sexual identity while hiding her true self from her conservative family.
❤️ Why it’s like Disobedience:
Both films show the painful divide between who we are and what our communities allow us to be — and the courage it takes to live authentically.
💬 A raw and poetic portrait of queer self-discovery.
🎬 Director: Tali Shalom-Ezer
🎭 Main Cast: Elliot Page, Kate Mara
🌍 Country: USA
🎞️ Genre: Political Romance
🔑 Keywords: death penalty, family trauma, opposites attract
📖 Plot Summary
Two women from opposing sides of a death penalty protest fall in love, despite deeply personal and political divides between them.
❤️ Why it’s like Disobedience:
It shares the same emotional stakes — choosing between love and loyalty, identity and expectation.
💬 Messy, human, and beautifully sincere.
🎬 Director: Catherine Corsini
🎭 Main Cast: Izïa Higelin, Cécile de France
🌍 Country: France
🎞️ Genre: Political Romance, Period Drama
🔑 Keywords: rural vs city, feminism, lesbian awakening
📖 Plot Summary
In 1970s France, Delphine leaves her rural family farm for Paris, where she meets Carole — a passionate feminist activist — and begins to question her place in the world.
❤️ Why it’s like Disobedience:
Like Ronit in Disobedience, Delphine must decide between her roots and her heart, her duty and her desire.
💬 Romantic and rebellious — love as a political act.
🎬 Director: Park Chan-wook
🎭 Main Cast: Kim Min-hee, Kim Tae-ri
🌍 Country: South Korea
🎞️ Genre: Erotic Thriller, Psychological Drama
🔑 Keywords: deception, female agency, twisted love
📖 Plot Summary
In Japanese-occupied Korea, a conwoman posing as a maid finds herself falling for the heiress she’s supposed to deceive — but nothing is what it seems.
❤️ Why it’s like Disobedience:
While more erotic and suspenseful, both films are about women reclaiming agency in spaces that want to control them.
💬 Clever, bold, and deliciously defiant.
🎬 Director: Abdellatif Kechiche
🎭 Main Cast: Adèle Exarchopoulos, Léa Seydoux
🌍 Country: France
🎞️ Genre: Coming-of-Age, Erotic Drama
🔑 Keywords: first love, heartbreak, queer adolescence
📖 Plot Summary
A teenage girl falls in love with an older art student, navigating the ecstasy and devastation of first queer love.
❤️ Why it’s like Disobedience:
It captures the intensity of desire that cannot be tamed, and the fallout when love meets the real world.
💬 Raw, passionate, and painfully real.
🎬 Director: Bruno Barreto
🎭 Main Cast: Miranda Otto, Glória Pires
🌍 Country: Brazil
🎞️ Genre: Biopic, Historical Romance
🔑 Keywords: poet, cultural clash, long-distance love
📖 Plot Summary
Based on the true story of poet Elizabeth Bishop, this film chronicles her tempestuous relationship with Brazilian architect Lota de Macedo Soares.
❤️ Why it’s like Disobedience:
It deals with longing, distance, and the tension between love and self-sufficiency — themes deeply present in Disobedience.
💬 For those who love their romance poetic and imperfect.
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