Movies like The Escapist (2008)
The best movies like The Escapist (2008) are Escape Plan (2013), Nowhere to Run (1993) and Figures in a Landscape (1970). If The Escapist hooked you with its action and thriller, these 30 similar films are what to watch next, and every pick says why it matches.
Quick picks
- Highest ratedBad Boys (1983)7.0/10 from 325 votes
- NewestIn Cold Light (2026)Released 2026
Escape Plan (2013)
Ray Breslin is the world's foremost authority on structural security. After analyzing every high security prison and learning a vast array of survival skills so he can design escape-proof prisons, his skills are put to the test. He's framed and incarcerated in a master prison he designed himself. He needs to escape and find the person who put him behind bars.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both action & thriller
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisNowhere to Run (1993)
Escaped convict Sam Gillen single-handedly takes on ruthless developers who are determined to evict a widow with two young children.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both action & thriller
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisFigures in a Landscape (1970)
Two escaped convicts are on the run in an unnamed Latin American country. But everywhere they go, they are followed and hounded by a menacing black helicopter.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both thriller & action
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisLights Out (2024)
A drifting ex-soldier turns underground fighter with the help of a just-released ex-con, pitting him against corrupt cops and hired killers now gunning for him and all those he cares about.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both action & thriller
Worth the HypeMovies like thisSection 8 (2022)
After avenging the murder of his family, a former soldier is sprung from prison and recruited by a shadowy government agency.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both action & thriller
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisOff the Grid (2025)
After a morally-bankrupt company tries to weaponize a brilliant scientist's revolutionary technology, he goes off the grid to safeguard humanity. When the company sends a strike force to find him, they make their biggest mistake of all – they weaponize the man they are trying to catch.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both action & thriller
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisMurphy's Law (1986)
A tough police detective escapes from custody after being framed and arrested for the murder of his ex-wife, and must now find the real killer and prove his innocence.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both action & thriller
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisDamage (2009)
An ex-con battles it out in the cage to pay for the operation that would save the daughter of his victim. Along the way he finds fatherly love, and friendship, in the most unlikely of places.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both action & thriller
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisExit Protocol (2025)
An assassin whose specialty is killing other assassins trying to get out of the business decides to try to get out himself and must then team up with his former mark to escape the hired killers now gunning for them both.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both action & thriller
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisPoint Blank (2019)
A nurse is forced to spring a wounded murder suspect from the hospital when the man’s brother kidnaps his pregnant wife and wants to make a trade.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both action & thriller
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisBorder Hunters (2025)
After his police officer brother is killed by a drug dealer who flees to the protection of his cartel-connected uncle in Mexico, an American man with a diverse law enforcement/military background goes south of the border to get revenge
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both action & thriller
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Package (1989)
Experienced Green Beret sergeant Johnny Gallagher is escorting a prisoner, Airborne Ranger Thomas Boyette, back to the US, but Boyette escapes and Gallagher must risk life and limb to catch him.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both thriller & action
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisHunting Grounds (2025)
Desperate to find refuge for her children, Chloe Marvino runs away from her Mafia tied husband, and finds shelter in a cabin with a recluse drifter named Jake. But as her husband's henchmen draw closer to her, it turns out that Jake is the biggest enemy of them all.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both action & thriller
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisMaze (2017)
Inspired by the true events of the infamous 1983 prison breakout of 38 IRA prisoners from HMP Maze, which was to become the biggest prison escape in Europe since World War II.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both thriller
SnoozefestMovies like thisMona Lisa and the Blood Moon (2022)
A young woman with psychokinetic powers breaks out of a Louisiana asylum and makes her way to New Orleans, where she falls into the city’s netherworld of misfits and miscreants.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both thriller
Popcorn FlickMovies like this5lbs of Pressure (2024)
Fresh out of prison after serving time for murder, Adam returns to his old stomping grounds to seek out a son who doesn't know him. Eli, the brother of the man he killed is looking for revenge. Mike, is trying to escape a life of crime living under the thumb of his gangster Uncle.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both thriller
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisBad Boys (1983)
Mick O'Brien is a young Chicago street thug torn between a life of petty crime and the love of his girlfriend. But when the heist of a local drug dealer goes tragically wrong Mick is sentenced to a brutal juvenile prison where violence is a rite of passage and respect is measured in vengeance.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both thriller
Worth the HypeMovies like thisIn Cold Light (2026)
Fresh out of prison, Ava's attempt to reclaim her drug operation collapses when she witnesses a brutal crime, forcing her to flee into a nightmarish underworld where allies are scarce and enemies multiply by the minute.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both thriller
SnoozefestMovies like thisSouth of Heaven (2021)
Convicted felon Jimmy gets early parole after serving twelve years for armed robbery. Upon his release, he vows to give Annie, his childhood love, now dying from cancer, the best last year of her life – unfortunately it’s not that simple.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both thriller
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisConvict (2014)
Set in the dark and old Parramatta prison built by the original convicts our lead character Ray a war veteran finds himself serving 18 months for manslaughter after defending his fiance. He soon realizes that the prison boss has it in for him and does everything possible to break Ray even going after his fiance.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both action
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisSurviving Evil (2009)
A TV documentary crew arrive on a remote island in the Philippines to film a survival special. Their back-to-the-wild adventure proves to be more terrifying than they ever could have imagined
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both action & thriller
Secret of the Andes (1999)
Cusi is a 20th century Incan boy who lives in a high mountain valley with an old llama herder named Chuto. Chuto raised Cusi in a traditional Incan fashion, although the Spanish culture was prevalent in Peru since the conquest of the Incan Empire. Although eager for adventure, Cusi is still drawn to the home he has known all his life. Cusi sets out from his home to try to find a family, but discovers that Chuto is all the family he needs.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both action & thriller
Lulu on the Bridge (1998)
A famous jazz saxophonist's life is forever changed after he is accidentally shot. After discovering a mysterious package, he meets and falls in love with a beautiful aspiring actress, but their happiness is cut short by a series of strange, dreamlike events.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both thriller
SnoozefestMovies like thisGirls Gone Psycho (2006)
Life's always been easy for trust-fund baby Sasha Childers (Kinsey Packard), who spends her nights with her glitterati friends at the hottest clubs in town. When a sex tape surfaces that puts Sasha in the tabloids, she takes revenge on the club owner who leaked it. But her crime puts her on someone else's hit list, sending Sasha and her friends someplace they've never been: on the run. Deanna Dozier, Monterey Salka and Robert Berson co-star.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both thriller
Macon County Line (1974)
A vengeful Southern sheriff is out for blood after his wife is brutally killed by a pair of drifters. Low-budget film set in Georgia in 1953 and at the time of release, purported to be based on a true story.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both action
Ben (1972)
A lonely boy becomes good friends with Ben, a rat. This rat is also the leader of a pack of vicious killer rats, killing lots of people.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both thriller
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisRace You to the Bottom (2005)
Nathan and Maggie are in the throes of a passionate affair. They're young, good-looking, and both have boyfriends. When Nathan is assigned to write a travel article on romantic hot-spots in Napa Valley, these unconventional lovers test the limits of the sensuality and fantasy that bond them.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both thriller
The Flying Saucer (1950)
The CIA sends playboy Mike Trent to Alaska with agent Vee Langley, posing as his "nurse," to investigate flying saucer sightings. At first, installed in a hunting lodge, the two play in the wilderness. But then they sight a saucer. Investigating, our heroes clash with an inept gang of Soviet spies, also after the saucer secret.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both thriller
Caracas Vice Vol. 2 (2017)
Ryan of the DEA will face again the most dangerous drug lord of Venezuela, this time with new friends, in 1983.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both action
The Age of Blood (2017)
Ancient Korea, 1728. Swordsman Kim Ho, guard of King Yeong-jo of Joseon, is demoted and sent to work in Uigeumbu prison. When night falls, the prison is assaulted by the master warrior Do Man-cheol and his powerful henchmen for the purpose of freeing Lee In-jwa, who has been condemned to death for rising up in revolt against the king.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both action
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Frequently asked questions
What are the best movies like The Escapist?
The closest matches to The Escapist are Escape Plan (2013), Nowhere to Run (1993) and Figures in a Landscape (1970). Below are 27 more, each with the reason it matches.
What should I watch after The Escapist?
Start with Escape Plan (2013), the closest match to The Escapist.
What is the highest-rated movie like The Escapist?
Bad Boys (1983), rated 7.0/10 by 325 TMDB users.
What is the newest movie like The Escapist?
In Cold Light (2026) is the most recent release on this list.
Are there English movies like The Escapist?
Yes: Escape Plan (2013), Nowhere to Run (1993) and Figures in a Landscape (1970).
How are movies similar to The Escapist chosen?
First come films that Trakt’s viewers watch alongside The Escapist, then TMDB’s recommendations and films it rates as similar in story and genre. Each pick says which signal put it there.