15 Brilliant Nostalgia-Inducing Asian Movies

Cinema is the ideal medium for awakening nostalgia, a sentimental longing or wistful affection for the past, as it seamlessly combines evocative images, sounds, songs, styles, and places that transport viewers to another time. Through its powerful visual and auditory storytelling, films have a unique ability to rekindle memories of past eras, childhood, or simpler moments in life. Nostalgic movies often reflect cultural trends, iconic moments, and heart-warming themes, allowing audiences to emotionally reconnect with their own personal histories or with bygone periods.

This list highlights some nostalgia-inducing films that, through lush productions or skilful era recreation, evoke feelings and memories you might not realize you had. These films romanticize the passage of time and the loss of fleeting moments, using vivid imagery and sound to summon a deep connection to the past—even when this past is a turbulent one, or one you just want to lose yourself in.

1. Song Lang (2018) by Leon Le

“Song Lang” is a love story, gently told and slowly unravelling. The director’s devotion for stage performance and Cải Lương is what has influenced all his life choices as a performer and director, taking him to this point; his movie is a passionate love letter to his teenage time in Saigon in the 80’s, his tape cassettes and the way art influences life and vice versa. (Adriana Rosati)

2. Leonor Will Never Die (2022) by Martika Ramirez Escobar

With her fascinating feature debut, Escobar pays tribute to the Asian B action movies of the 1970s and 1980s, letting two stories run simultaneously. Fights in the “other reality” are meticulously choreographed, and there is a vintage cheesiness to them. The sound is crackling, the photography grainy, and dialogues so retro with their palette of clichés that you get flash-backed with countless stached men in tight shirts who reigned the screens back in time. (Marina D. Richter)

3. 1987: When The Day Comes (2017) by Jang Joon-hwan

The depiction of the era is one of the movie’s greatest assets, with Han Ah-reum’s production design, and Chae Kyung-hwa and Hwang Hyun-kyu’s costumes providing accuracy in detail. Just watch the people wearing short sleeve-shirts and ties over their long-sleeve sweatshirts and the joy a Walkman can bring, and you will know of what I mean. (Panos Kotzathanasis)

4. The Warden (2019) by Nima Javidi

Despite being set in the ’60, the film feels strangely far removed from present-day Iran, almost a parallel universe. Persian Shah Reza Pahlavi, whose picture adorn the walls of the prison offices, the unveiled and independent Miss Karimi, the gentle flirting with Major Jahed … all this create a pleasant sense of displacement making the rusty prison a cathedral of nostalgia in the middle of the barren Southern Iran desert. (Adriana Rosati)

5. Memory Box (2021) by Joana Hadjithomas and Khalil Joreige

On the other side though, there is the incredibly accurate reconstruction that the production design has done to reproduce all the details of 80’s Beirut life. The diaries, the photo paper (I could recognise some typical print formats in fashion at the time) the scratch-scented stickers, the Philips tape recorder, the wallpaper, newspaper cut-outs, cinema and concert tickets, Italy-Brazil World Cup 1982 celebrations, reels of pictures, super8 films and the hunting pictures and real footage of the devastation of the war and the ghostly, gutted buildings of Beirut. All these fragments plus the understated and never over-the-top accuracy of the costumes, hairstyles, and music selection concur to create an enveloping nostalgia trip. Cinematography joins the teamwork creating very different moods, from the cold and contemporary Canada setting to the grainy warm – claustrophobic at times – Beirut in the 80’s and finally the modern Lebanon with its clean bright and positive light. (Adriana Rosati)

6. Anita (2021) by Lok Man Leung

Taken all together though, “Anita” is certainly a nostalgic watch. For those familiar with Anita Mui, this film is sure to induce tears; for those more with the Hong Kong cinema, Mui’s celebrity connections are sure to please. In this way, “Anita” aptly captures Mui’s brilliant life of forty years: of excitement, loss, and change, but most importantly of hope as well. It is no wonder that this film premiered as the closing act of this year’s Busan Film Festival. It tearfully commemorates all that has happened… but it also encourages Hong Kongers to have faith in what is to come. (Grace Han)

7. Nezumikozo Jirokichi (2024) by Rintaro

83-year old director Rintaro returns after a decade with a short project but with a scope that is as great as the history of Japanese Cinema. He adapts “Nezumikozo Jirokichi,” a lost silent film by pioneering Japanese film director Sadao Yamanaka, from a script he left. With only three surviving works and volumes of screenplays, reimagining a lost silent movie like “Nezumikozo Jirokichi” is not an easy task to take on. This short project showcases the dedication of Yamanaka’s admirers to reintroduce the great director to a new audience, honouring his legacy and ensuring his influence endures. (Epoy Deyto)

8. A Light Never Goes Out (2022) by Anastasia Tsang

A great deal of nostalgia is invested in scenes showing how neon signs are being created: the painstaking attention to detail in sketching, forming and colour-testing. The ever present neon shine gives “A Light Never Goes Out” a dreamy touch, softening up the rough edges in the story when needed. Concretely, there is only one scene that could explain Heung’s feverish wish to revive the past, as in most of other flashbacks from their marital life one can not detect much of affection between the two. We see how they meet for the first time on a rooftop as youngsters, with Heung observing a big neon advertisement for an ointment, and Bill appearing to repair something on it. Shortly after, he will make her big dream of dancing on a lit podium come true. (Marina D. Richter)

9. Hi, Mom (2021) by Jia Ling

It is rather easy to understand the factors that made “Hi, Mom” such a big success and all of them are equally relevant. The nostalgia factor is surely one, aided by the competent work of Art director Zhou Hai and style designer Liu Xaoli. But the factory compound is not just a well-recreated memory-trigger, it’s a proper symbol of an idealistic place in time where human relations counted more than wealth, where competition was a benign driving force and where collaboration overshadowed individualism. This “It was better when it was worst” kind of setting is the ideal nest for sympathy, and not only for Chinese citizens. I wouldn’t be surprised if in the next years “Hi, Mom” turned into a franchising with multiple adaptations, on the line of the South Korean, also nostalgia-inspired, “Miss Granny”. (Adriana Rosati)

10. In The Mood For Love (2000) by Wong Kar-Wai

Silence has no place in “In The Mood For Love”. Even scenes mandating the essence of silence are accompanied by music or ambient sounds. The impossibility of quietness to exist is because of the movie’s root pointing towards nostalgia. Nostalgia never banks upon silence, instead relying upon a downpour of sensual components. The film is therefore restless. Nostalgic recollections always commence with joyful impressions over the reappearance of memories. Only later does the reminder of loss, the passage of time, and the impossibility of a return to the joyful times strikes the recollector. (…) It is no wonder that the story was first developed as “The Story Of Food”. Cuisine is one of the most valuable and durable characteristics of a past era and plays a vital role in nostalgic sentiments. It, unsurprisingly, acts as one of the most significant component of “In The Mood For Love”. Throughout the movie, characters are seen consuming, preparing or buying food. (Raktim Nandi)