Movies like Tarik Shah: Don't Play Like Them (2025)

Mr. Dynamite: The Rise of James Brown (2014)

James Brown changed the face of American music forever. Abandoned by his parents at an early age, James Brown was a self-made man who became one of the most influential artists of the 20th century, not just through his music, but also as a social activist. Charting his journey from rhythm and blues to funk, MR. DYNAMITE: THE RISE OF JAMES BROWN features rare and previously unseen footage, photographs and interviews, chronicling the musical ascension of “the hardest working man in show business,” from his first hit, “Please, Please, Please,” in 1956, to his iconic performances at the Apollo Theater, the T.A.M.I. Show, the Paris Olympia and more.

Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both documentary

Miles Davis: Birth of the Cool (2019)

An immersive look at the eventful life and brilliant artistic career of visionary American jazz trumpeter Miles Davis (1926-1991).

Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both documentary

Looking for Richard (1996)

Al Pacino's deeply-felt rumination on Shakespeare's significance and relevance to the modern world through interviews and an in-depth analysis of "Richard III."

Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both documentary

Tupac: Resurrection (2003)

Home movies, photographs, and recited poetry illustrate the life of Tupac Shakur, one of the most beloved, revolutionary, and volatile hip-hop MCs of all time.

Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both documentary

I Am Not Your Negro (2017)

Working from the text of James Baldwin’s unfinished final novel, director Raoul Peck creates a meditation on what it means to be Black in the United States.

Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both documentary

Bright Lights: Starring Carrie Fisher and Debbie Reynolds (2016)

An intimate portrait of Hollywood royalty featuring Debbie Reynolds, Todd Fisher, and Carrie Fisher.

Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both documentary

Summer of Soul (...Or, When the Revolution Could Not Be Televised) (2021)

During the same summer as Woodstock, over 300,000 people attended the Harlem Cultural Festival, celebrating African American music and culture, and promoting Black pride and unity. The footage from the festival sat in a basement, unseen for over 50 years, keeping this incredible event in America's history lost — until now.

Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both documentary

ReMastered: The Two Killings of Sam Cooke (2019)

This investigation examines the mysterious shooting of soul icon Sam Cooke, whose death silenced one of the most vital voices in the civil rights movement.

Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both documentary

ReMastered: Who Shot the Sheriff (2018)

In 1976, reggae icon Bob Marley survived an assassination attempt as rival political groups battled in Jamaica. But who exactly was responsible?

Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both documentary

When We Were Kings (1996)

It's 1974. Muhammad Ali is 32 and thought by many to be past his prime. George Foreman is ten years younger and the heavyweight champion of the world. Promoter Don King wants to make a name for himself and offers both fighters five million dollars apiece to fight one another, and when they accept, King has only to come up with the money. He finds a willing backer in Mobutu Sese Suko, the dictator of Zaire, and the "Rumble in the Jungle" is set, including a musical festival featuring some of America's top black performers, like James Brown and B.B. King.

Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both documentary

13th (2016)

An in-depth look at the prison system in the United States and how it reveals the nation's history of racial inequality.

Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both documentary

Biggie & Tupac (2002)

In 1997, rap superstars Tupac Shakur and Christopher Wallace (aka Biggie Smalls, The Notorious B.I.G.) were gunned down in separate incidents, the apparent victims of hip hop's infamous east-west rivalry. Nick Broomfield's film introduces Russell Poole, an ex-cop with damning evidence that suggests the LAPD deliberately fumbled the case to conceal connections between the police, LA gangs and Death Row Records, the label run by feared rap mogul Marion "Suge" Knight.

Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both documentary

God Grew Tired of Us (2006)

Filmmaker Christopher Quinn observes the ordeal of three Sudanese refugees -- Jon Bul Dau, Daniel Abul Pach and Panther Bior -- as they try to come to terms with the horrors they experienced in their homeland, while adjusting to their new lives in the United States.

Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both documentary

Tongues Untied (1990)

Marlon Riggs, with assistance from other gay Black men, especially poet Essex Hemphill, celebrates Black men loving Black men as a revolutionary act. The film intercuts footage of Hemphill reciting his poetry, Riggs telling the story of his growing up, scenes of men in social intercourse and dance, and various comic riffs, including a visit to the "Institute of Snap!thology," where men take lessons in how to snap their fingers: the sling snap, the point snap, the diva snap.

Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both documentary

My Mom Jayne (2025)

Through deeply personal interviews with her siblings and an examination of the photographs, letters, and belongings left behind, Mariska assembles a new portrait of her mother Jayne Mansfield, an extraordinary and complex woman.

Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both documentary

I Called Him Morgan (2016)

Part jazz history, part true-crime tale, Kasper Collin’s new documentary employs extensive archival footage and new interviews to tell the tragic story of the magnificently talented trumpeter Lee Morgan and his common-law wife Helen, who murdered him in a New York bar in 1972.

Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both documentary

A Toxic Love Story (2026)

A string of threatening emails escalates into a revenge plot involving a newly married US marshal and his ex-girlfriend.

Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both documentary

David Byrne's American Utopia (2020)

A filmed version of David Byrne's Broadway show, a unifying musical celebration that inspires audiences to connect to each other and to the global community.

Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both documentary

Murder to Mercy: The Cyntoia Brown Story (2020)

After 16-year-old Cyntoia Brown is sentenced to life in prison, questions about her past, physiology and the law itself call her guilt into question.

Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both documentary

S4: The Bob Lazar Story (2026)

Over 35 years after Bob Lazar's revelations, this documentary exposes secrets of a facility the government still denies. Featuring Lazar's testimony, recreations, and new evidence, it reopens a case that continues to spark global curiosity

Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both documentary

A Son of Africa: The Autobiography of a Slave (1996)

A documentary following the life of Olaudah Equiano, based on his autobiography "The Interesting Narration of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, or Gustavus Vassa the African".

Why it matches: Similar story and style · both documentary

Dear Director (2015)

During the summer of 1980, the American jazz concert pianist Kazzrie Jaxen writes a 16 pages long letter to director Ingmar Bergman. His film 'From the Life of the Marionettes' have sent her on a dramatic inner journey, making her realize that she is not alone in her own body.

Why it matches: Similar story and style · both documentary

The Secret of Selling the Negro (1954)

Film commissioned by the Chicago-based publisher of Negro Digest, Ebony, Tan, and Jet to encourage advertisers to reach out to African American consumers. The Secret of Selling the Negro depicts the lives, activities, and consumer behavior of African American professionals, students, and housewives. A Business Screen reviewer noted that the film focused on the “bright positive” aspects of the “new Negro family.” The sponsor issued a companion booklet offering the “do’s and don’ts of selling to the Negro.”

Why it matches: Similar story and style · both documentary

Black February: Music Is an Open Door (TBA)

Vipal Monga's first feature-length documentary chronicles an unprecedented series of concerts performed in February 2005 by the legendary jazz composer Lawrence D. Butch Morris. The concerts were in celebration of the 20th anniversary of Conduction, Butch's revolutionary technique for live music-making. Butch put on 44 performances in 28 days with 85 musicians pulled from all across New York's musical community. Along with footage from these remarkable concerts that span a full range of musical styles from big band jazz to funk to electronic and symphonic works. The documentary features some of the leading lights of the New York creative-music community, including Henry Threadgill, JD Allen, Brandon Ross, Graham Haynes, Howard Mandel, and Greg Tate. Although the film provides unique insight into New York's vibrant avant-garde music scene,

Why it matches: Similar story and style · both documentary

Oscar Peterson & André Previn (1974)

Oscar Peterson and Andre Previn look at some of the styles and personalities involved in the development of piano jazz.

Why it matches: Similar story and style · both documentary

Les doléances (2024)

Why it matches: Similar story and style · both documentary

A Film About Kids and Music. Sant Andreu Jazz Band (2013)

A Film About Kids and Music is a project arising from a music class. Conducted by Joan Chamorro, the big band brings together children between 6 and 18 years old, around a classic jazz repertoire with lots of swing, which gained the public’s attention and sold-out some of the most important music auditoriums in Spain.

Why it matches: Similar story and style · both documentary

Sing! Fight! Sing! Fight! From LeRoi to Amiri (2024)

The story of how Everett Leroy Jones became Amiri Baraka, from his childhood to the mid '60s, is told through interviews recorded in the late '90s.

Why it matches: Similar story and style · both documentary

A Song For My Father (TBA)

A Song For My Father is a six-minute poetic documentary that examines grief and the complicated relationship we develop with the things that once connected us to the people we’ve lost. After the sudden death of their musician father, filmmaker Shona Buschlen and her younger brother Eddie, a jazz trumpet player, return to a performance space where their father once played. In the early stages of grief, music becomes difficult to hear, no longer comforting but a reminder of absence. Over time, these feelings begin to shift. Through archival recordings of their father’s bass and live trumpet improvisations by Eddie, the film creates a call and answer across time, tracing how sound becomes a way to sit with grief rather than escape it. Blending voiceover, childhood footage, and sound-driven editing, A Song For My Father explores grief not as something to be resolved, but as something lived with, where healing comes from allowing yourself to feel.

Why it matches: Similar story and style · both documentary

Cecil Taylor: All The Notes (2005)

Cecil Taylor was the grand master of free jazz piano. "All the Notes" captures in breezy fashion the unconventional stance of this media-shy modern musical genius, regarded as one of the true giants of post-war music. Seated at his beloved and battered piano in his Brooklyn brownstone the maestro holds court with frequent stentorian pronouncements on life, art and music.

Why it matches: Similar story and style · both documentary