Movies like Sonatas (1959)
The best movies like Sonatas (1959) are Sahara (1983), The Gambler (1979) and Supercross (2005). If Sonatas hooked you with its adventure and drama, these 30 similar films are what to watch next, and every pick says why it matches.
Quick picks
- Highest ratedGabriel's Inferno (2020)8.4/10 from 2,485 votes
- NewestDreams (2025)Released 2025
- In SpanishThe Gambler (1979)Also in Spanish
Sahara (1983)
Intent on winning a competition in place of her distinguished late father, beautiful young heiress Dale takes on the guise of a man and competes in his spot, embarking on a car race that crosses the unforgiving Sahara desert.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both adventure & drama
SnoozefestMovies like thisThe Gambler (1979)
Three childhood friends; when they grow up, the poor boy is shut out from the possibility of romancing the girl because of class issues. He leaves town, learns to play pro-level poker, wins a fortune, then goes home to ruin his rival's life.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both adventure & drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisSupercross (2005)
Faced with the suspicious death of their father, two brothers must motivate one another to get back on their bikes and take the Las Vegas Motocross Championships by storm.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both adventure & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Sheik (1921)
Sheik Ahmed desperately desires feisty British socialite Diana, so he abducts her and carries her off to his luxurious tent-palace in the desert. The free-spirited Diana recoils from his passionate embraces and yearns to be released. Later, allowed to go into the desert, she escapes and makes her way across the sands...
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both adventure & drama
SnoozefestMovies like thisStrange Cargo (1940)
Convicts escaping from Devil's Island come under the influence of a strange Christ-like figure.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & romance
Worth the HypeMovies like thisAmor Bandido (2021)
Joan is a naïve, 16-year-old who falls in love easily. One day he decides to escape to the provinces with Luciana, a beautiful 35-year-old woman and a teacher at his school, in order to give free rein to his love. Soon, Joan discovers with horror that he has fallen into a trap that is a mix between sex, money, politics and violence.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both romance & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisWicked (2021)
Ivy Morgan, a college student in New Orleans, falls for Ren Owens, the last person she expected to enter her rigidly controlled life.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both romance & drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisWinter's Tale (2014)
A burglar falls for an heiress as she dies in his arms. When he learns that he has the gift of reincarnation, he sets out to save her.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & romance
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisPeter Ibbetson (1935)
When his mother dies, young Peter Ibbetson leaves Paris and his best friend, Mary, behind to live with a severe uncle in England. Years later, Peter is an architect with little time for women, until he begins a project with the Duke and Duchess of Towers. When Peter and the duchess become great friends, she reveals that she is Mary — but the duke soon suspects his wife of infidelity and challenges Peter to a duel, threatening the pair's second chance.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & romance
Worth the HypeMovies like thisDreams (2025)
A powerful socialite and a promising ballet dancer begin a dangerous affair. When he secretly crosses the US-Mexico border, she takes desperate measures to protect their future together.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both romance & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisBlack Gold (2011)
On the Arabian Peninsula in the 1930s, two warring leaders come face to face. The victorious Nesib, Emir of Hobeika, lays down his peace terms to rival Amar, Sultan of Salmaah. The two men agree that neither can lay claim to the area of no man’s land between them called The Yellow Belt. In return, Nesib adopts Amar’s two boys Saleeh and Auda as a guarantee against invasion. Twelve years later, Saleeh and Auda have grown into young men. Saleeh, the warrior, itches to escape his gilded cage and return to his father’s land. Auda cares only for books and the pursuit of knowledge. One day, their adopted father Nesib is visited by an American from Texas. He tells the Emir that his land is blessed with oil and promises him riches beyond his wildest imagination. Nesib imagines a realm of infinite possibility, a kingdom with roads, schools and hospitals all paid for by the black gold beneath the barren sand. There is only one problem. The precious oil is located in the Yellow Belt.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both adventure & drama
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 · both drama & adventure
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisPinocchio (2009)
The enchanted story of Pinocchio.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both adventure & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisEnd of Sentence (2019)
Newly widowed Frank Fogle embarks on a journey to Ireland to scatter his late wife’s ashes. His estranged son, Sean, recently released from prison, agrees to join only when his father promises that they’ll never see each other again following the trip. After revelations surface about an old flame of Frank’s wife and a charming hitchhiker with plans of her own intervenes, father and son find themselves drawn together in unexpected ways.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & adventure
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisBlind (2017)
A novelist is blinded in a car crash that killed his wife and several years later rediscovers his passion for life and writing when he embarks on an affair with the neglected wife of an indicted businessman.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & romance
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisDesire (2017)
Lucía and Ofelia, two sisters, finally meet after 7 years of cold relationships upon Lucia 's wedding. But when Juan, Lucia's husband, and Ofelia meet, they feel like a disruptive fantasy have enchanted their minds and bodies...
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both romance & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisGabriel's Inferno: Part III (2020)
The final part of the film adaption of the erotic romance novel Gabriel's Inferno written by an anonymous Canadian author under the pen name Sylvain Reynard.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both romance & drama
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisGabriel's Inferno (2020)
An intriguing and sinful exploration of seduction, forbidden love, and redemption, Gabriel's Inferno is a captivating and wildly passionate tale of one man's escape from his own personal hell as he tries to earn the impossible--forgiveness and love.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both romance & drama
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisLimbo (1999)
Traumatized by a fishing boat accident many years before, Joe Gastineau has given up his hopes for a life beyond the odd jobs he takes to support himself. That quickly changes when nomadic club singer Donna de Angelo and her troubled teen-age daughter enter Joe’s life. Both mother and daughter fall for Joe, increasing the friction between them. The tension continues to build when Joe invites them on a pleasure cruise up the Alaskan coast, discovering too late that the trip may cost them their lives.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both adventure & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisCave Rescue (2019)
When a youth football team of 12 boys, aged 11-16, and their 25-year-old coach is trapped deep inside a cave in Northern Thailand, thousands of volunteers and soldiers from around the world unite in a race against time to find them.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both adventure & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisEl recuerdo de aquella noche (1945)
Mexican movie
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama & romance
Amok (1944)
A doctor embezzles the proceeds of his Parisian clinic in order to better support the manipulative woman with whom he is having an affair. After losing all the money while gambling, he is forced to flee to an undeveloped region of India. There, he tries to mitigate the onslaught of a disease the natives term "Amok," while his past mistakes still plague him.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama & romance
Over the Waves (1950)
The life of the musician Juventino Rosas, who despite his talent lived an existence of misfortune and poverty.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama & romance
Let Me Be with You (2025)
Lucía lives with an incurable disease, and Bruno was deported to Mexico with no place to sleep. An unexpected phone call brings them together in an emotional story of overcoming, reconstruction and hope.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both romance & drama
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisMy Brother's Wife (2005)
After almost 10 years of marriage, attractive Zoe discovers that her marriage lacks passion and surprise, and is seduced by the possibility of finding those sensations already forgotten in her husband's brother. From this premise a series of events lead these three characters to a dangerous game of revenges, secrets and passions. Two brothers and one woman: the triangle is outlined in a disquieting way. It is a bomb that triggers family secrets, the contained rage of desire and the unmanageable power of love. An exciting story that subjugates the viewer from beginning to end. Even though Zoe/Sonia has been married to Ignacio/Ishan for about a decade, they are unable to have children. She wants to be intimate but he prefers to be ready for intimacy on Saturdays only, and she gets physically drawn to his artistic brother, Gonzalo/Rohan. Then things get complicated for her after she tests positive for motherhood and finds that her husband may be gay.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both romance & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisSanto vs. Black Magic Woman (1973)
Santo, the saint of the wrestling ring, faces off against an evil voodoo priestess intent on making a more powerful atomic bomb!
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both adventure
The Zone (2007)
Residents of an enclosed neighborhood in the middle of Mexico DF are shocked by a violent crime, and for one resident in particular, young Alejandro, the drama is ratcheted up when he encounters the lone kid who escaped the event and is hiding out within the neighborhood's borders.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisPerdiendo mi virginidad (2019)
Two stories are told of virgin girls who, while studying at university, fall in love with their teacher. But both stories will not have the same outcome.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Rudo & Cursi (2008)
Tato and Beto are poor stepbrothers living on a banana plantation in Mexico. Both are talented soccer players, but their dreams lay elsewhere: tone-deaf Tato wants to be a singer, while Beto is content to remain on the plantation. One day, a sports agent sees the two young men playing soccer and offers to take one of them to Mexico City for a chance at sports stardom.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisNo desearás la mujer de tu hijo (1950)
An elderly man falls in love with a beautiful young woman, without knowing that she is in love with his son.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Absolute CinemaMovies like this
Like Sonatas and something else?
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Frequently asked questions
What are the best movies like Sonatas?
The closest matches to Sonatas are Sahara (1983), The Gambler (1979) and Supercross (2005). Below are 27 more, each with the reason it matches.
What should I watch after Sonatas?
Start with Sahara (1983), the closest match to Sonatas.
What is the highest-rated movie like Sonatas?
Gabriel's Inferno (2020), rated 8.4/10 by 2,485 TMDB users.
What is the newest movie like Sonatas?
Dreams (2025) is the most recent release on this list.
Are there Spanish movies like Sonatas?
Yes: The Gambler (1979), Amor Bandido (2021) and Dreams (2025).
How are movies similar to Sonatas chosen?
First come films that Trakt’s viewers watch alongside Sonatas, then TMDB’s recommendations and films it rates as similar in story and genre. Each pick says which signal put it there.