What to Watch After The Devil Wears Prada

Films about ambition and self-definition existed long before Meryl Streep in a white bob — but The Devil Wears Prada set the benchmark: sharp dialogue, a protagonist with real stakes, and a villain too intelligent to reduce to a caricature. What follows are the films where that same engine runs. Each differently.

What ties this collection together

Not "women's films" in the lazy sense. A specific formula: a protagonist enters a world with ruthless unwritten rules — fashion, media, advertising, law — and has to decide who she's going to be inside it. Comply, subvert, or walk away. That decision is what makes The Devil Wears Prada more than a comedy, and it's exactly what makes each film here worth watching.

Where to start

The Intern (2015) is the natural first pick. Same star, same fashion company, opposite chair — Anne Hathaway is the CEO now, not the assistant. Different power dynamic, same emotional honesty underneath the polish.

Mean Girls (2004) is the most structurally precise parallel: Regina George and Miranda Priestly are the same archetype at different scales. One of the sharper analyses of how hierarchy actually works — underneath the pink.

Legally Blonde (2001) looks like a light comedy and functions as a manifesto. Elle Woods refuses to become someone else to earn the room's respect, and the film is better for it.

The Proposal (2009) reverses the formula entirely: the terrifying boss is the one forced to become human. Sandra Bullock plays it exactly right.

How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days (2003) puts its heroine inside a New York magazine — the same professional environment, different kind of absurd premise on top of it.

Who it's for

This collection works best the same way the original does: on a weekday evening when you want wit over spectacle. No setup required — every film earns its first fifteen minutes.

Revisit them at thirty and they read differently. Legally Blonde is sharper politically than it looked at twenty. Pretty Woman is more complicated than a fairy tale. 13 Going on 30 — about a girl who trades her real life for a glamour fantasy — plays almost like a cautionary tale once you've actually been inside a workplace that runs on appearances. That's a good property for a good film to have.