Movies like The Specialist (1980)
The best movies like The Specialist (1980) are The Hours (2002), On Her Majesty's Secret Service (1969) and Rocks (2020). If The Specialist hooked you, these 20 similar films are what to watch next, and every pick says why it matches.
The Specialist
Quick picks
- Highest ratedEastern Promises (2007)7.3/10 from 3,915 votes
- NewestThe Runner (2026)Released 2026
The Hours (2002)
The story of three women searching for more potent, meaningful lives. Each is alive at a different time and place, all are linked by their yearnings and their fears. Their stories intertwine, and finally come together in a surprising, transcendent moment of shared recognition.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Worth the HypeMovies like thisOn Her Majesty's Secret Service (1969)
With the help of Marc-Ange Draco, head of the Unione Corse crime syndicate, and Draco's troubled daughter Tracy, James Bond tracks his archnemesis, Ernst Stravro Blofeld, to a mountaintop retreat in the Swiss Alps, where he is training an army of beautiful, lethal women.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisRocks (2020)
15-year-old Rocks fears that she and her little brother Emmanuel will be taken into care and forced apart if anyone finds out that their mother has left them. Against all odds, and with the help of her loyal friends, she evades the authorities and navigates the most defining days of her young life.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisIn Darkness (2018)
A blind musician hears a murder committed in the apartment upstairs from hers that sends her down a dark path into London's gritty criminal underworld.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisFuze (2025)
An unexploded WWII bomb is discovered on a busy construction site in the centre of London. Chaos ensues as the military and police begin a mass evacuation against a ticking clock.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Worth the HypeMovies like thisBlitz (2011)
A tough cop is dispatched to take down a serial killer who has been targeting police officers.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisVillage of the Damned (1960)
In a small English village everyone suddenly falls unconscious. When they awake every woman of child bearing age is pregnant. The resulting children have the same strange blond hair, eyes and a strong connection to each other.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Worth the HypeMovies like thisMidnight Lace (1960)
Kit Preston begins to unravel when she receives threatening telephone calls informing her she's soon to be murdered.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisEastern Promises (2007)
A Russian teenager living in London dies during childbirth but leaves clues in her diary that could tie her child to a rape involving a violent Russian mob family.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Worth the HypeMovies like thisA Long Way Down (2014)
Four lost souls—a disgraced TV presenter, a foul-mouthed teen, an isolated single mother, and a failed musician—decide to end their lives on the same night, New Year's Eve. When this disillusioned quartet of strangers meet unintentionally at the same suicide hotspot, a London high-rise with the well-earned nickname Topper's Tower, they mutually agree to call off their plans for six weeks, forming an unconventional, dysfunctional family. They become media sensations as the Topper House Four and search together for reasons to keep on living.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisOur Mother's House (1967)
Seven children bury their mother and hide her death - until their long-lost father returns.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe End We Start From (2023)
As London is submerged below floodwaters, a woman gives birth to her first child. Days later, she and her baby are forced to leave their home in search of safety. They head north through a newly dangerous country seeking refuge from place to place.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
SnoozefestMovies like thisLabor Day (2013)
Two strangers are drawn together under incredible circumstances. What starts as an unforeseen encounter over a long holiday weekend soon becomes a second chance love story.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Worth the HypeMovies like thisVelvet Goldmine (1998)
Almost a decade since larger-than-life glam-rock enigma Brian Slade disappeared from public eye, an investigative journalist is on assignment to uncover the truth behind his former idol.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisSpider (2002)
A mentally disturbed man takes residence in a halfway house. His mind gradually slips back into the realm created by his illness, where he replays a key part of his childhood.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisProfessor Marston and the Wonder Women (2017)
The unconventional life of Dr. William Marston, the Harvard psychologist and inventor who helped invent the modern lie detector test and co-created Wonder Woman in 1941.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Worth the HypeMovies like thisSomers Town (2008)
Two teenagers, both newcomers to London, forge an unlikely friendship over the course of a hot summer. Tomo is a runaway from Nottingham; Marek lives in the district of Somers Town, between King's Cross and Euston stations, where his dad is working on a new rail link.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisI Am David (2003)
A 12-year-old boy manages to flee a Communist concentration camp on his own, through sheer will and determination. All he has in his possession is a loaf of bread, a letter to deliver to someone in Denmark, and a compass to help get him there.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Runner (2026)
Maia Marten, a brilliant London lawyer, has her life shattered by a single call on her morning run: her son has been taken. To get him back, she must keep running, obey every ruthless command, and trust no one-each second a test of how far a mother will go to save her child.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Window (1949)
An imaginative boy who frequently makes things up witnesses a murder, but can't get his parents or the police to believe him. The only people taking him seriously are the killers - who live upstairs, know that he saw what they did, and are out to permanently silence him.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Worth the HypeMovies like this
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Frequently asked questions
What are the best movies like The Specialist?
The closest matches to The Specialist are The Hours (2002), On Her Majesty's Secret Service (1969) and Rocks (2020). Below are 17 more, each with the reason it matches.
What should I watch after The Specialist?
Start with The Hours (2002), the closest match to The Specialist.
What is the highest-rated movie like The Specialist?
Eastern Promises (2007), rated 7.3/10 by 3,915 TMDB users.
What is the newest movie like The Specialist?
The Runner (2026) is the most recent release on this list.
Are there English movies like The Specialist?
Yes: The Hours (2002), On Her Majesty's Secret Service (1969) and Rocks (2020).
How are movies similar to The Specialist chosen?
First come films that Trakt’s viewers watch alongside The Specialist, then TMDB’s recommendations and films it rates as similar in story and genre. Each pick says which signal put it there.