Movies like The Lonely Shepherd (2019)
The best movies like The Lonely Shepherd (2019) are Rebound: The Legend of Earl 'The Goat' Manigault (1996), Bastard Out of Carolina (1996) and Xiu Xiu: The Sent-Down Girl (1998). If The Lonely Shepherd hooked you with its drama, these 30 similar films are what to watch next, and every pick says why it matches.
Quick picks
- Highest ratedWhat Maisie Knew (2013)7.1/10 from 466 votes
- NewestAnimal Farm (2026)Released 2026
Rebound: The Legend of Earl 'The Goat' Manigault (1996)
A dramatization of the life of Earl 'The Goat' Manigault (Don Cheadle), with a lot of factual based occurrences. A reformed junkie returns from prison to clean up his act and devote the rest of his life to the young kids of Harlem. 1996 was the 25th anniversary of the first tournament named after him.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisBastard Out of Carolina (1996)
A poor, struggling South Carolinian mother and daughter face painful choices with their resolve and pride. Bone, the eldest daughter, and Anney her tired mother, grow both closer and farther apart: Anney sees Glen as her last chance.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisXiu Xiu: The Sent-Down Girl (1998)
Young teen girl Xiu Xiu is sent away to a remote corner of the Sichuan steppes for manual labor in 1975 (sending young people to there was a part of Cultural Revolution in China). A year later, she agrees to go to even more remote spot with a Tibetan saddle tramp Lao Jin to learn horse herding.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisHurry Sundown (1967)
A ruthless Southern opportunist tries to buy his cousin's land, and when thwarted, brings several tragedies to the lives of his loved ones.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisGirl in the Box (2016)
The true story of 20-year-old Colleen Stan, a hitchhiking woman abducted by a young couple and held captive for seven years, during which time she's tortured and forced to live as a slave to her captors.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Sound of Silence (2019)
A successful "house tuner" in New York City, who calibrates the sound in people's homes in order to adjust their moods, meets a client with a problem he can't solve.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
SnoozefestMovies like thisFaith Like Potatoes (2006)
Frank Rautenbach leads a strong cast as Angus Buchan, a Zambian farmer of Scottish heritage, who leaves his farm in the midst of political unrest and racially charged land reclaims and travels south with his family to start a better life in KwaZulu Natal,South Africa.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisSkin (2009)
Based on the true story of a black girl who was born to two white Afrikaner parents in South Africa during the apartheid era.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisWhat Maisie Knew (2013)
In New York City, six-year-old Maisie is caught in the middle of a bitter custody battle between her self-absorbed parents—an aging rock singer mother and a distracted art dealer father. As both quickly marry new partners to strengthen their legal standing, Maisie is shuttled back and forth in an endless game of emotional point-scoring. Yet amid the chaos and upheaval, Maisie begins to find true comfort and affection in her new step-parents.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisOut Stealing Horses (2019)
November 1999. 67-year-old Trond lives in new-found solitude and looks forward to spending New Year's Eve 2000 alone. As winter arrives he discovers he has a neighbor, a man Trond knew back in 1948, the summer he turned 15 and the summer Trond's father prepared him to carry the burden of his forthcoming betrayal and disappearance.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Congress (2013)
An aging, out-of-work actress accepts one last job, though the consequences of her decision affect her in ways she didn't consider.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisEl Chicano (2019)
A pair of twin brothers from East L.A. choose to live their lives differently and end up on opposite sides of the law.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisAnne of Green Gables (2016)
Anne Shirley, an orphan, is fostered by farmer Matthew Cuthbert and his sister Marilla, who were expecting a boy to be sent them to help with their farm work. They accept Anne, who quickly endears herself to them and to the local villagers.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisHardball (2001)
An aimless young man who is scalping tickets, gambling and drinking, agrees to coach a Little League team from the Cabrini Green housing project in Chicago as a condition of getting a loan from a friend.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisJohnny Belinda (1948)
A small-town doctor helps a deaf-mute farm girl learn to communicate.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisAll Day and a Night (2020)
While serving life in prison, a young man looks back at the people, the circumstances and the system that set him on the path toward his crime.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisZero Kelvin (1995)
Larsen, an aspiring poet in '20s Oslo, leaves his girlfriend to spend a year as a trapper in East Greenland. There he is teamed with a seemingly rough old sailor/trapper, Randbæk, and a scientist, Holm. Trapped in a tiny hut together as the Arctic winter sets in, a complex and intense love/hate relationship develops between Randbæk and Larsen, who are more similar than either would like to admit. A powerful psychological and physical drama set against stunningly bleak Arctic scenery.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Christmas Shoes (2002)
Two separate stories mesh - in the first, a young music teacher, Maggie Andrews, begins dying of a heart condition and her son Nathan tries to get a pair of Christmas shoes for her before she dies. In the second, lawyer Robert Layton and his wife Kate are slowly drifting apart and the matter comes to a head during Christmas when Kate takes over for Maggie for the school choir.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisCome Sunday (2018)
Evangelist Carlton Pearson is ostracized by his church for preaching that there is no Hell.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
SnoozefestMovies like thisGoodbye June (2025)
Four siblings' lives change drastically when their ailing mother takes a turn for the worse over the holiday season.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisParched (2015)
In the arid landscape of Rajasthan, four women navigate their way through personal and cultural difficulties.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisAnimal Farm (2026)
A group of farm animals rise up against their neglectful owner, dreaming of equality and freedom. But as the pigs take control, the revolution turns into tyranny, with truth rewritten and dissent crushed.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisJinpa (2019)
Stoic truck driver Jinpa picks up a silver dagger wearing hitchhiker in the desolate Kekexili plateau. The stranger suddenly reveals he’s going to kill the man who murdered his father.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Rosamunde Pilcher: Zeit der Erkenntnis (2000)
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Mektoub, My Love: Canto Uno (2018)
Amin, an aspiring screenwriter living in Paris, returns home for the summer, in Sète, South of France. It is a time of reconnecting with his family and his childhood friends. Together with his cousin Tony and his best friend Ophélie, he spends his time between the Tunisian restaurant run by his parents, the local bars and the beaches frequented by girls on holiday.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisAnimal (2005)
A farmer finds out that a wolf's bite has turned him into a voracious beast. Worse still, his only son seems to have swapped brains with one of his sheep.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
The Sundowners (1960)
In the Australian Outback, the Carmody family--Paddy, Ida, and their teenage son Sean--are sheep drovers, always on the move. Ida and Sean want to settle down and buy a farm. Paddy wants to keep moving. A sheep-shearing contest, the birth of a child, drinking, gambling, and a racehorse will all have a part in the final decision.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Thistle in the Kiss (2025)
Declan has had no luck with the holidays: his girlfriend Stephanie broke up with him on the way to Christmas dinner. He's managed to keep it secret until New Year's Day, when his car breaks down and his sister Rachel shows up to help him fix it. Crumbling under her relentless curiosity, Declan is now on a crash course to confront the poor decisions of his life.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Padre Padrone (1977)
The true story of the life of Gavino Ledda, the son of a Sardinian shepherd, and how he managed to escape his harsh, almost barbaric existence by slowly educating himself, despite violent opposition from his brutal father.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThanos and Despina (1967)
Katina, an impoverished Greek woman, tries to arrange the marriage of her shepherd son, Thanos, to Despina, the daughter of a wealthy landowner. But Despina’s father, Vlahopoulos refuses to give his blessings.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
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Frequently asked questions
What are the best movies like The Lonely Shepherd?
The closest matches to The Lonely Shepherd are Rebound: The Legend of Earl 'The Goat' Manigault (1996), Bastard Out of Carolina (1996) and Xiu Xiu: The Sent-Down Girl (1998). Below are 27 more, each with the reason it matches.
What should I watch after The Lonely Shepherd?
Start with Rebound: The Legend of Earl 'The Goat' Manigault (1996), the closest match to The Lonely Shepherd.
What is the highest-rated movie like The Lonely Shepherd?
What Maisie Knew (2013), rated 7.1/10 by 466 TMDB users.
What is the newest movie like The Lonely Shepherd?
Animal Farm (2026) is the most recent release on this list.
How are movies similar to The Lonely Shepherd chosen?
First come films that Trakt’s viewers watch alongside The Lonely Shepherd, then TMDB’s recommendations and films it rates as similar in story and genre. Each pick says which signal put it there.