Movies like Joséphine Baker
The best movies like Joséphine Baker are Maria (2024), Bolero (2024) and All Eyez on Me (2017). If Joséphine Baker hooked you with its history and music, these 30 similar films are what to watch next, and every pick says why it matches.
Quick picks
- Highest ratedLe Cercle Rouge (1970)7.6/10 from 773 votes
- NewestThe Rays and Shadows (2026)Released 2026
- In FrenchBolero (2024)Also in French
Maria (2024)
Maria Callas, the world's greatest opera singer, lives the last days of her life in 1970s Paris, as she confronts her identity and life.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both history & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisBolero (2024)
Boundary-pushing Russian dancer and actress Ida Rubinstein selects renowned French composer Maurice Ravel to compose the music for her next ballet. Ravel ends up creating his greatest success ever: Boléro.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both music & history
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisAll Eyez on Me (2017)
All Eyez on Me chronicles the life and legacy of Tupac Shakur, including his rise to superstardom as a hip-hop artist, actor, poet and activist, as well as his imprisonment and prolific, controversial time at Death Row Records. Against insurmountable odds, Tupac rose to become a cultural icon whose career and persona both continue to grow long after his passing.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both history & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisDjango (2017)
The story of Django Reinhardt, famous guitarist and composer, and his flight from German-occupied Paris in 1943.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & history
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Colors of Fire (2022)
February 1927. The funeral of Marcel Péricourt, the most powerful banker in Paris. His daughter Madeleine must take the helm of the financial empire of which she is the heiress. But she has a son, Paul, who with an unexpected and tragic gesture will place her on the path to ruin.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both history & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisDalida (2017)
Based on the true story of acclaimed music icon "Dalida" born in Cairo, who gained celebrity in the 50s, singing in French, Spanish, Arabic, Hebrew, German, Italian, playing in awarded Youssef Chahine's picture "Le Sixième Jour", and who later committed suicide in 1987 in Paris, after selling more than 130 million records worldwide.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both music & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisDe Gaulle (2020)
Paris, June 1940. The de Gaulle couple is confronted with the military and political collapse of France. Charles de Gaulle joins London while Yvonne, his wife, finds herself with her three children on the road of the exodus.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both history & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisBlame It on Fidel! (2006)
A 9-year-old girl weathers big changes in her household as her parents become radical political activists in 1970-71 Paris.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both history & drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe Round Up (2010)
A faithful retelling of the 1942 "Vel' d'Hiv Roundup" and the events surrounding it.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & history
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe Flood (2024)
1792. Louis XVI, his wife Marie Antoinette, and their children have been arrested and imprisoned in the Tour du Temple, a sinister chateau in Paris, awaiting their trial. Far from the splendour of Versailles, they are isolated and vulnerable for the first time in their lives.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & history
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisValentino (1977)
The untimely death of silent screen star Rudolph Valentino prompts the many women in his past to reminisce about his troubled rise to superstardom.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & history
SnoozefestMovies like thisStavisky... (1974)
Biarritz, 1933. Charm and talent assist small-time swindler Serge Alexandre, alias Stavisky, to bribe his way into the centre of French politics. But when his great scam involving millions is exposed, he brings the government to the verge of collapse and the country to the brink of civil war.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & history
SnoozefestMovies like thisAaliyah: The Princess of R&B (2014)
The story of R&B singer and actress Aaliyah; namely, the highs and lows of her career, her romantic pursuits, and the events leading up to her death in 2001 at the age of 22.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & music
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisNouvelle Vague (2025)
After writing for Cahiers du cinéma, young Godard decides making films is the best film criticism. He gets Beauregard to fund a low-budget feature, creating a treatment with Truffaut about a gangster couple.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & history
Worth the HypeMovies like thisFarewell, Mr. Haffmann (2022)
Paris 1942. François Mercier is an ordinary man who only aspires to start a family with the woman he loves, Blanche. He is also the employee of a talented jeweler, Mr. Haffmann. But faced with the German occupation, the two men will have no other choice but to conclude an agreement whose consequences, over the months, will upset the fate of our three characters.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both history & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisNiki (2024)
French-American artist Niki de Saint-Phalle, from the age of 23, is a model and an aspiring actor who is married and has a two year old daughter. Together, they flee the U.S. during the oppressive McCarthy era and come to France, where they experience a short-lived euphoria. Soon, distant and frightening memories begin to emerge in Niki’s mind. Her vocation as an artist will be her salvation.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & history
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Rays and Shadows (2026)
Jean and Otto, a French newspaperman and a young German Francophile, are fighting for peace in Europe. Jean’s daughter, Corinne, is launching a brilliant acting career in the film world, but war breaks out and France is occupied. The two friends have a major role to play in this new France. Jean becomes a big press baron and an ardent advocate of collaboration with the occupying forces, while Otto becomes the Reich’s ambassador in Paris. Corinne, meanwhile, finds herself thrown into the lion’s pit.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & history
Worth the HypeMovies like thisYankee Doodle Dandy (1942)
A film of the life of the renowned musical composer, playwright, actor, dancer and singer George M. Cohan.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & music
Worth the HypeMovies like thisFinal Portrait (2017)
Paris, 1964. The Swiss sculptor and painter Alberto Giacometti, one of the most accomplished and respected artists of his generation, asks his friend, the American writer James Lord, to sit for a portrait, assuring him that it will take no longer than two or three hours, an afternoon at the most.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both history & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisMy Way (2012)
A biopic of French pop star Claude Francois, most famous for co-writing the song 'My Way'. Tracing his life from his childhood in Egypt through his success in France to his untimely death in Paris in 1978.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & music
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisA Season in Hell (1971)
The tumultuous life of Arthur Rimbaud, the cursed poet, who completed his masterwork at the age of twenty, became an arms dealer and died at thirty-seven; and his passionate relationship with Paul Verlaine, full of wanderings, storms and falling out.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama & history
The Glory of Life (2024)
Because of the power of love, the last year of Franz Kafka's life becomes his happiest. The well-known writer has never before been able to allow himself to experience intimacy, he suffers from tuberculosis and is dependent on his overbearing family. In the summer of 1923, he met Dora Diamant in the seaside resort Graal-Müritz on the Baltic Sea coast, where he is convalescing and she is working in a Jewish Volksheim. He is a man of world, the 14 years younger woman is from the deep East, he can write, she can dance. She has both feet firmly on the ground, he is always hovering a little above it. She embraces the indicative, he gets tangled up in the conjunctive. But the worldly wise Dora accepts him as he is. And he accepts her. Together they go to Berlin and when Franz's health deteriorates rapidly, to a sanatorium in Austria. They are granted a single year together until Franz Kafka's health deteriorates incurable. However their year together allows them to feel the glory of life.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama & history
A Magnificent Life (2025)
In 1955, 60-year-old Marcel Pagnol is a well-known and acclaimed playwright and filmmaker. When the editor-in-chief of ELLE magazine commissions a weekly column about Pagnol's childhood, he sees this as a great opportunity to go back to his artistic roots: writing. Realizing his memory is failing him and deeply affected by the disappointing results of his last two plays, Pagnol starts doubting his ability to pursue his work. That is until Little Marcel - the young boy he used to be - appears to him as if by magic. Together, they will explore Marcel Pagnol's incredible life and bring back to life his most cherished encounters and memories...
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both history & drama
The Life of Chikuzan (1977)
After over 50 years of wandering up and down Japan, finally in the 1970s, the rough-hewn blind shamisen player and folk-song collector named Takahashi Chikuzan became a musical sensation. This biographical drama chronicles his wanderings and his life, with a particular focus on his humble beginnings as a peasant on a remote and arid island.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama & history
True (2004)
While he's receiving an enigmatic phone call from his girlfriend Francine, Thomas remembers the milestones of their relationship, from the very moment they met in a really strange way. A segment of “Paris, je t'aime” (2006).
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisAngel-A (2005)
A beautiful and mysterious woman helps an inept scam artist get his game together... but is their meeting purely coincidence?
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisLe Cercle Rouge (1970)
When French criminal Corey gets released from prison, he resolves to never return. He is quickly pulled back into the underworld, however, after a chance encounter with escaped murderer Vogel. Along with former policeman and current alcoholic Jansen, they plot an intricate jewel heist. All the while, quirky Police Commissioner Mattei, who was the one to lose custody of Vogel, is determined to find him.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe Hunchback of Notre Dame (1956)
In 1482 Paris, Frollo, Chief Justice of benevolent King Louis XI, becomes infatuated by the beauty of Esmeralda, a young Romani girl. The hunchback Quasimodo, Frollo's protégé and bell-ringer of Notre Dame, lives in peace among the bells in the heights of the immense cathedral until he's involved by the twisted magistrate in his malicious plans to free himself from Esmeralda's alleged spell, which he believes to be the Devil's work.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisAnthony Zimmer (2005)
François, an ordinary Joe, falls hard for the sublimely beautiful woman who has just picked him up on the train and invited him to spend the weekend with her on the Riviera. But when the lady disappears the next morning and the police drag him in for questioning, François discovers he's been set up to pass for her notorious outlaw husband on the run, Anthony Zimmer. Even though he's been lied to and manipulated, François' life is changed forever and he's ready to give anything - maybe even his life - to hold this mysterious beauty in his arms again.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Apartment (1996)
Max is a former playboy who has decided to settle down by marrying his current love, Muriel. However, when Max catches a glimpse of the great lost love of his life, he becomes obsessed with rekindling their relationship.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like this
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Frequently asked questions
What are the best movies like Joséphine Baker?
The closest matches to Joséphine Baker are Maria (2024), Bolero (2024) and All Eyez on Me (2017). Below are 27 more, each with the reason it matches.
What should I watch after Joséphine Baker?
Start with Maria (2024), the closest match to Joséphine Baker.
What is the highest-rated movie like Joséphine Baker?
Le Cercle Rouge (1970), rated 7.6/10 by 773 TMDB users.
What is the newest movie like Joséphine Baker?
The Rays and Shadows (2026) is the most recent release on this list.
Are there French movies like Joséphine Baker?
Yes: Bolero (2024), Django (2017) and The Colors of Fire (2022).
How are movies similar to Joséphine Baker chosen?
First come films that Trakt’s viewers watch alongside Joséphine Baker, then TMDB’s recommendations and films it rates as similar in story and genre. Each pick says which signal put it there.