Movies like Twentieth Century
The best movies like Twentieth Century are Edge of the City (1957), Firebird (2021) and Sunshine (1999). If Twentieth Century hooked you with its history and drama, these 30 similar films are what to watch next, and every pick says why it matches.
Twentieth Century
Quick picks
- Highest ratedThe Godfather (1972)8.7/10 from 23,969 votes
- NewestWilliam Tell (2025)Released 2025
Edge of the City (1957)
A male army deserter and a black male dock worker join forces against a corrupt manager, in a corrupt environment, and as their connection blossoms they must face the oppressive and morally decaying city they live in.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & crime
Worth the HypeMovies like thisFirebird (2021)
At the height of the Cold War, a troubled soldier forms a forbidden love triangle with a daring fighter pilot and his female comrade amid the dangerous surroundings of a Soviet Air Force Base.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & romance
Worth the HypeMovies like thisSunshine (1999)
The fate of a Hungarian Jewish family throughout the 20th century.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & history
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisQuerelle (1982)
French sailor Querelle arrives in Brest and starts frequenting a strange whorehouse. He discovers that his brother Robert is the lover of the lady owner, Lysiane. Here, you can play dice with Nono, Lysiane's husband: if you win, you are allowed to make love with Lysiane; if you lose, you have to make love with Nono... Querelle loses on purpose.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both romance & crime
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Godfather (1972)
Spanning the years 1945 to 1955, a chronicle of the fictional Italian-American Corleone crime family. When organized crime family patriarch, Vito Corleone barely survives an attempt on his life, his youngest son, Michael steps in to take care of the would-be killers, launching a campaign of bloody revenge.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & crime
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisWilliam Tell (2025)
The narrative unfolds in the 14th Century, when the European nations vie for supremacy within the Holy Roman Empire. The ambitious Austrian Empire, desiring more land, invades neighbouring Switzerland, a serene and pastoral nation. Protagonist William Tell, a formerly peaceful hunter, finds himself forced to take action as his family and homeland come under threat from the oppressive Austrian King and his ruthless warlords.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & history
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisWhere Hands Touch (2018)
Germany, 1944. Leyna, the fifteen-year-old daughter of a white German mother and a black African father, meets Lutz, a compassionate member of the Hitler Youth whose father is a prominent Nazi soldier, and they form an unlikely connection in this quickly changing world.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & romance
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisTess (1979)
A strong-willed peasant girl is sent by her father to the estate of some local aristocrats to capitalize on a rumour that their families are from the same line. This fateful visit commences an epic narrative of sex, class, betrayal, and revenge.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & romance
Worth the HypeMovies like thisA Bronx Tale (1993)
Set in the Bronx during the tumultuous 1960s, an adolescent boy is torn between his honest, working-class father and a violent yet charismatic crime boss. Complicating matters is the youngster's growing attraction - forbidden in his neighborhood - for a beautiful black girl.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & crime
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisThe Secrets We Keep (2020)
In post-World War II America, a woman, rebuilding her life in the suburbs with her husband, kidnaps her neighbor and seeks vengeance for the heinous war crimes she believes he committed against her.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both history & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisOnce Upon a Time in America (1984)
A former Prohibition-era Jewish gangster returns to the Lower East Side of Manhattan over thirty years later, where he once again must confront the ghosts and regrets of his old life.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & crime
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisBonhoeffer: Pastor. Spy. Assassin (2024)
As the world teeters on the brink of annihilation, Dietrich Bonhoeffer joins a deadly plot to assassinate Hitler, risking his faith and fate to save millions of Jews from genocide.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both history & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisShining Through (1992)
Spirited New Yorker Linda Voss goes to work for international lawyer and secret Office of Strategic Services operative Ed Leland just before World War II. As they fall in love, the United States enters the fight against Hitler, and Linda volunteers to work for Ed spying undercover behind Nazi lines. Assigned to uncover information about a German bomb, Linda also has personal motives to fulfill: discovering the fate of her Jewish family members in Berlin.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & romance
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisWalking with the Enemy (2014)
Regent Horthy is the leader of Hungary and a German ally, but his favorable standing with Hitler changes as the war comes to an end. Forced to cede Hungary’s power or else witness the execution of his son, Regent Horthy gives up control of his country to the Nazis, who quickly move Hungarians to ghettos and death camps, with no hope in sight. But the despair changes when a young man named Elek emerges. Separated from his family during the relocations and aided by the woman he loves , Elek defies the enemy by becoming one of them. In a race against time, disguised as a Nazi Officer he embarks on a mission to save his family and thousands of his countrymen.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & history
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisPrivate Peaceful (2012)
Set in the fields of Devon and the WW1 battlefields of Flanders, two brothers fall for the same girl while contending with the pressures of their feudal family life, the war, and the price of courage and cowardice.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & romance
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisJoe (1970)
After murdering his daughter's drug-dealing boyfriend, a wealthy ad executive stumbles into a bar and strikes up an uneasy alliance with Joe Curran, a drunken bigot with a bloodlust who works at a local factory.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & crime
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisChristopher and His Kind (2011)
In 1931, budding author Christopher Isherwood goes to Berlin at the invitation of his friend W. H. Auden for the gay sex that abounds in the city. He falls for street sweeper Heinz, paying medical bills for the boy's sickly mother, to the disapproval of her other son, Nazi Gerhardt.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & romance
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Most Hated Woman in America (2017)
The true story of Madalyn Murray O'Hair -- iconoclast, opportunist, and outspoken atheist -- from her controversial rise to her untimely demise.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both crime & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisSavior (1998)
A hardened mercenary in the Foreign Legion begins to find his own humanity when confronted with atrocities during the fighting in Bosnia.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both history & drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisTitus (1999)
Titus Andronicus returns from the wars and sees his sons and daughters taken from him, one by one. Shakespeare's goriest and earliest tragedy.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & history
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisA Very Long Engagement (2004)
Young Frenchwoman Mathilde searches for the truth about her missing fiancé, lost during World War I, and learns many unexpected things along the way. The love of her life is gone. But she refuses to believe he's gone forever — and she needs to know for sure.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama & romance
Worth the HypeMovies like thisAmerican Gigolo (1980)
Julian makes a lucrative living as an escort to older women in the Los Angeles area. He begins a relationship with Michelle, a local politician's wife, without expecting any pay. One of his clients is murdered and Detective Sunday begins pumping him for details on his different clients, something he is reluctant to do considering the nature of his work. Julian begins to suspect he's being framed. Meanwhile Michelle begins to fall in love with him.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both crime & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisBeauty Betrayed (2002)
A gun fires and supermodel Lily Sampson is dead. Two cops, Clark and his new partner Allie, are on the case. Their only clues are a revealing videotape of the victim in a searing game of bondage with a famous fashion photographer, and Lily's high school yearbook which reveals a mysterious twin sister and clues to a lifelong rivalry with another model.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama & crime
Kirepapa. (2008)
Chisato is a beautiful 35-year-old writer, who looks like 18, and the father of Riju, a cute 15-year-old boy. Chisato's hobby is to drive away all of Riju's friends because he thinks they want to corrupt his precious child, so he shows his good side to these boys while he poisons the cake he brings them with a smile; however, there is one guy, Shunsuke, who doesn't fall for the tricks. But is Shunsuke really aiming for Riju? Who is that mysterious writer Chisato loves so much? And why is Chisato convinced that Riju's friends want to take advantage of him?
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both romance & drama
The Match (2021)
Inspired by true events from the spring of 1944 when the Nazis organized a football match between a team of camp inmates and an elite Nazi team on Adolf Hitler's birthday. A match the prisoners are determined to win, no matter what happens.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama & history
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisWhat Christmas Left Behind (2024)
A war. Two friends. Chaos will reign.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama & history
Un crime de guerre (1994)
A film that relates the trial in Bordeaux in January 1953 of some of the participants in the Oradour-sur-Glane massacre of June 10, 1944.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama & history
Children of War (2014)
Children of War is a movie based on the true events of the 1971 Genocide. Can we, in search of power, become animals? A genocide; neglected! The first use of rape as a weapon of war; undocumented! The lives of millions; unaccounted! The culprits; unpunished!
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama & history
The Assault (1986)
At the end of WWII the Dutch resistance kills a German officer in front of the house of a Dutch family. Years after the war the young boy who witnessed the killing runs into the members of the resistance who committed the killing.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like this
Like Twentieth Century and something else?
Blend two favourites and we’ll find the films in between.
Frequently asked questions
What are the best movies like Twentieth Century?
The closest matches to Twentieth Century are Edge of the City (1957), Firebird (2021) and Sunshine (1999). Below are 27 more, each with the reason it matches.
What should I watch after Twentieth Century?
Start with Edge of the City (1957), the closest match to Twentieth Century.
What is the highest-rated movie like Twentieth Century?
The Godfather (1972), rated 8.7/10 by 23,969 TMDB users.
What is the newest movie like Twentieth Century?
William Tell (2025) is the most recent release on this list.
Are there English movies like Twentieth Century?
Yes: Edge of the City (1957), Firebird (2021) and Sunshine (1999).
How are movies similar to Twentieth Century chosen?
First come films that Trakt’s viewers watch alongside Twentieth Century, then TMDB’s recommendations and films it rates as similar in story and genre. Each pick says which signal put it there.