Movies like The Contestant (2023)
The best movies like The Contestant (2023) are Three Identical Strangers (2018), Catfish (2010) and You Can See Everything (2026). If The Contestant hooked you with its documentary, these 30 similar films are what to watch next, and every pick says why it matches.
Quick picks
- Highest ratedCitizenfour (2014)7.7/10 from 1,472 votes
- NewestYou Can See Everything (2026)Released 2026
Three Identical Strangers (2018)
New York, 1980. Three complete strangers accidentally discover that they're identical triplets, separated at birth. The 19-year-olds' joyous reunion catapults them to international fame, but also unlocks an extraordinary and disturbing secret that goes beyond their own lives – and could transform our understanding of human nature forever.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Worth the HypeMovies like thisCatfish (2010)
Nev, a 24-year-old New York-based photographer, has no idea what he's in for when Abby, an eight-year-old girl from rural Michigan, contacts him on Facebook, seeking permission to paint one of his photographs. When he receives her remarkable painting, Nev begins a friendship and correspondence with Abby's family. But things really get interesting when he develops a cyber-romance with Abby's attractive older sister, Megan, a musician and model. Prompted by some startling revelations about Megan, Nev and his buddies embark on a road trip in search of the truth.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisYou Can See Everything (2026)
Thirty-four days before she's sent to prison, notorious Silicon Valley founder Elizabeth Holmes invites a skeptical film crew to document her every move. What begins as an intimate portrait of an enigmatic felon becomes a mind-bending three-year journey into the abyss.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisThe Source Family (2013)
A feature documentary film set in Hollywood, examining a radical experiment in '70s utopian living. The Source Family were the darlings of the Sunset Strip until their communal living, outsider ideals and spiritual leader Father Yod's 13 wives became an issue with local authorities. They fled to Hawaii, leading to their dramatic demise.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Untold: The Liver King (2025)
He built a supplement empire by devouring raw meat on social media. And he had the muscles to prove it. But, really, how did the Liver King get so huge?
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
SnoozefestMovies like thisWe Live in Public (2009)
In 1999, Internet entrepreneur Josh Harris recruits dozens of young men and women who agree to live in underground apartments for weeks at a time while their every movement is broadcast online. Soon, Harris and his girlfriend embark on their own subterranean adventure, with cameras streaming live footage of their meals, arguments, bedroom activities, and bathroom habits. This documentary explores the role of technology in our lives, as it charts the fragile nature of dot-com economy.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisSecret Mall Apartment (2025)
In 2003, eight Rhode Islanders created a secret apartment inside a busy mall and lived there for four years, filming everything along the way. Far more than a prank, the secret apartment became a deeply meaningful place for all involved.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisMan on Wire (2008)
On August 7th 1974, French tightrope walker Philippe Petit stepped out on a high wire, illegally rigged between New York's World Trade Center twin towers, then the world's tallest buildings. After nearly an hour of performing on the wire, 1,350 feet above the sidewalks of Manhattan, he was arrested. This fun and spellbinding documentary chronicles Philippe Petit's "highest" achievement.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Worth the HypeMovies like thisCitizenfour (2014)
In June 2013, Laura Poitras and reporter Glenn Greenwald flew to Hong Kong for the first of many meetings with Edward Snowden. She brought her camera with her.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Worth the HypeMovies like thisTrainwreck: The Real Project X (2025)
A night of drunken chaos rocks a quiet Dutch town in this shocking documentary about a teen's birthday invite that accidentally went viral on Facebook.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
SnoozefestMovies like thisEvil Influencer: The Jodi Hildebrandt Story (2025)
Unravel the case of Utah therapist Jodi Hildebrandt, whose child abuse arrest with parenting YouTuber Ruby Franke exposed a twisted tale of manipulation.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisGrenfell: Uncovered (2025)
Survivors, witnesses, and experts tell the story of the tragic fire that engulfed a residential tower block in London — and the investigation that ensued.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Worth the HypeMovies like thisRobin's Wish (2020)
The final word in the story of what really happened to Robin Williams at the end of his life, focusing on his fight against a deadly neurodegenerative disorder known as Lewy body dementia.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Worth the HypeMovies like thisNobody Speak: Trials of the Free Press (2017)
The courtroom and publicity battles between the superstar wrestler and the notorious website explode in a sensational trial all about the limits of the First Amendment and the new no holds barred nature of celebrity life in an internet dominated society.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisI Think We're Alone Now (2008)
Every celebrity deals with his or her share of obsessed fans. "I Think We're Alone Now" is a documentary that focuses on two individuals, Jeff and Kelly, who claim to be in love with the 80's pop singer Tiffany. Jeff Turner, a 50-year-old man from Santa Cruz, California has attended Tiffany concerts since 1988. Diagnosed with Asperger's syndrome, he never had a girlfriend. Jeff spends his days hanging out on the streets of Santa Cruz, striking up conversations with anyone who has a moment to spare. Kelly McCormick is a 38-year-old intersex woman from Denver, Colorado, who claims to have been friends with Tiffany as a teenager. She credits Tiffany as the shining star who has motivated her to do everything in her life. Both Jeff and Kelly have been labeled stalkers by the media and other Tiffany fans. This film takes you inside the lonely lives these two characters, revealing the source of their clinging obsessions...
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Exit Through the Gift Shop (2010)
Banksy is a graffiti artist with a global reputation whose work can be seen on walls from post-hurricane New Orleans to the separation barrier on the Palestinian West Bank. Fiercely guarding his anonymity to avoid prosecution, Banksy has so far resisted all attempts to be captured on film. Exit Through the Gift Shop tells the incredible true story of how an eccentric French shop keeper turned documentary maker attempted to locate and befriend Banksy, only to have the artist turn the camera back on its owner.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Worth the HypeMovies like thisBad Axe (2022)
A real-time portrait of 2020 unfolds as an Asian-American family in Trump’s rural America fights to keep their restaurant and American dream alive in the face of a pandemic, Neo-Nazis, and generational scars from the Cambodian Killing Fields.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
The Wolfpack (2015)
Locked away from society in an apartment on the Lower East Side of Manhattan, the Angulo brothers learn about the outside world through the films that they watch. Nicknamed ‘The Wolfpack’, the brothers spend their childhood reenacting their favorite films using elaborate home-made props and costumes. Their world is shaken up when one of the brothers escapes and everything changes.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisIcarus (2017)
While investigating the furtive world of illegal doping in sports, director Bryan Fogel connects with renegade Russian scientist Dr. Grigory Rodchenkov—a pillar of his country's "anti-doping" program. Over dozens of Skype calls, urine samples, and badly administered hormone injections, Fogel and Rodchenkov grow closer despite shocking allegations that place Rodchenkov at the center of Russia's state-sponsored Olympic doping program.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Worth the HypeMovies like thisTickled (2016)
Journalist David Farrier stumbles upon a mysterious tickling competition online. As he delves deeper he comes up against fierce resistance, but that doesn’t stop him getting to the bottom of a story stranger than fiction.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Worth the HypeMovies like thisHoly Hell (2016)
An inside look at a West Hollywood cult formed by a charismatic teacher in the 1980s that eventually imploded.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Popcorn FlickMovies like this15 Minutes of Shame (2021)
Monica Lewinsky and filmmaker Max Joseph (Catfish) examine the human price of public shaming and cyber-harassment, profiling people who have experienced them first-hand – while investigating the bullies, bystanders, and experts in between.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Dear Mr. Brody (2022)
A documentary about Michael Brody Jr., a 21-year-old hippie millionaire who in 1970 promised to give away his $25M inheritance in an effort to usher in a new era of world peace.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Dynamo Is Dead (2023)
The world-renowned magician Dynamo is back as you've never seen him before - embarking on a transformative and soul-searching journey to explore the depths of mental health and well-being. As he grapples with his own struggles, Dynamo seeks answers from inspirational figures around the world so that he can bury his past and find a new beginning. Through candid conversations with iconic actors, musicians, sports stars, journalists, and activists, each with their own powerful stories to tell, Dynamo learns of the struggles behind their success as they open up about their own journeys and share the wisdom and tools to navigate the complexities of life.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Audrie & Daisy (2016)
A documentary film about three cases of rape, that includes the stories of two American high school students, Audrie Pott and Daisy Coleman. At the time of the sexual assaults, Pott was 15 and Coleman was 14 years old. After the assaults, the victims and their families were subjected to abuse and cyberbullying.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe Mother of All Lies (2024)
On a handmade set re-creating her Casablanca neighborhood, a young Moroccan filmmaker enlists family and friends to help unearth the troubling lies built into her childhood.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
The Inventor: Out for Blood in Silicon Valley (2019)
With a magical new invention that promised to revolutionize blood testing, Elizabeth Holmes became the world’s youngest self-made billionaire, heralded as the next Steve Jobs. Then, overnight, her 10-billion-dollar company dissolved. The rise and fall of Theranos is a window into the psychology of fraud.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Worth the HypeMovies like thisListen to Me Marlon (2015)
With exclusive access to his extraordinary unseen and unheard personal archive including hundreds of hours of audio recorded over the course of his life, this is the definitive Marlon Brando cinema documentary. Charting his exceptional career as an actor and his extraordinary life away from the stage and screen with Brando himself as your guide, the film will fully explore the complexities of the man by telling the story uniquely from Marlon's perspective, entirely in his own voice. No talking heads, no interviewees, just Brando on Brando and life.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Worth the HypeMovies like thisGoing Clear: Scientology and the Prison of Belief (2015)
The film profiles eight former members of the Church of Scientology, shining a light on how they attract true believers and the things they do in the name of religion.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThoughts & Prayers (2025)
In a dystopic America, children are taught how to prepare for school shootings through elaborate drills. Yet what are intended as self-defense mechanisms are themselves deeply traumatic for students, parents, educators, and entire communities.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Like The Contestant and something else?
Blend two favourites and we’ll find the films in between.
Frequently asked questions
What are the best movies like The Contestant?
The closest matches to The Contestant are Three Identical Strangers (2018), Catfish (2010) and You Can See Everything (2026). Below are 27 more, each with the reason it matches.
What should I watch after The Contestant?
People who watched The Contestant most often go on to Three Identical Strangers (2018), Catfish (2010) and You Can See Everything (2026).
What is the highest-rated movie like The Contestant?
Citizenfour (2014), rated 7.7/10 by 1,472 TMDB users.
What is the newest movie like The Contestant?
You Can See Everything (2026) is the most recent release on this list.
Are there English movies like The Contestant?
Yes: Three Identical Strangers (2018), Catfish (2010) and You Can See Everything (2026).
How are movies similar to The Contestant chosen?
First come films that Trakt’s viewers watch alongside The Contestant, then TMDB’s recommendations and films it rates as similar in story and genre. Each pick says which signal put it there.