Movies like The Can (1994)
The best movies like The Can (1994) are Timescape (1992), The 27th Day (1957) and Chaos Walking (2021). If The Can hooked you with its science fiction, these 20 similar films are what to watch next, and every pick says why it matches.
Quick picks
- Highest ratedDoctor Who: The Runaway Bride (2006)7.8/10 from 255 votes
- NewestAfterburn (2025)Released 2025
Timescape (1992)
Before they can complete renovations on their new country inn, a widowed father and his young daughter are visited by a strange group of tourists. He soon makes a chilling discovery: they are disaster junkies from the future who visit the past to witness history's greatest catastrophes—and his small town is their next stop.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe 27th Day (1957)
Five individuals from five nations, including the USA, USSR, and China, suddenly find themselves on an alien saucer, where an alien gives each a container holding three capsules. The alien explains that no power on earth can open a given container except a mental command from the person to whom it is given, then anyone may take a capsule and, by speaking a latitude and longitude at it, cause instant death to all within a given radius: thus each of the five has been provided with the power of life and death. Then, they are given 27 days to decide whether to use the capsules, and returned to the places from which each one came...
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisChaos Walking (2021)
Two unlikely companions embark on a perilous adventure through the badlands of an unexplored planet as they try to escape a dangerous and disorienting reality, where all inner thoughts are seen and heard by everyone.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisInfinite (2021)
Evan McCauley has skills he never learned and memories of places he has never visited. Self-medicated and on the brink of a mental breakdown, a secret group that call themselves “Infinites” come to his rescue, revealing that his memories are real.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisMargaux (2022)
As a group of seniors celebrate their final college days at a smart house, the house's highly advanced AI system, Margaux, begins to take on a deadly presence of her own. A carefree weekend of partying turns into a dystopian nightmare as they realize Margaux's plans to eliminate her tenants one way or another. Time begins to run out as the group desperately tries to survive and outsmart the smart home.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction
SnoozefestMovies like thisThey Live (1988)
A lone drifter stumbles upon a unique pair of sunglasses that reveal aliens are systematically gaining control of the Earth by masquerading as humans and lulling the public into submission.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction
Worth the HypeMovies like thisSpace/Time (2025)
After a fatal test shuts down their project, a disgraced team of scientists enters the criminal underworld to rebuild a forbidden space-bending engine that could rescue humanity or annihilate it entirely.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction
SnoozefestMovies like thisThe 5th Wave (2016)
16-year-old Cassie Sullivan tries to survive in a world devastated by the waves of an alien invasion that has already decimated the population and knocked mankind back to the Stone Age.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction
SnoozefestMovies like thisDoctor Who: The Runaway Bride (2006)
A young bride in the midst of her wedding finds herself mysteriously transported to the TARDIS. The Doctor must discover what her connection is with the Empress of the Racnoss's plan to destroy the world.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction
Worth the HypeMovies like thisVoyagers (2021)
With the future of the human race at stake, a group of young men and women -- bred for intelligence and obedience -- embark on an expedition to colonize a distant planet. When they uncover disturbing secrets about the mission, they defy their training and begin to explore their most primitive natures. As life on the ship descends into chaos, they soon become consumed by fear, lust and an insatiable hunger for power.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisPaycheck (2003)
Michael Jennings is a genius who's hired – and paid handsomely – by high-tech firms to work on highly sensitive projects, after which his short-term memory is erased so he's incapable of breaching security. But at the end of a three-year job, he's told he isn't getting a paycheck and instead receives a mysterious envelope. In it are clues he must piece together to find out why he wasn't paid – and why he's now in hot water.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Wave (2019)
A man on the verge of a promotion takes a mysterious hallucinogenic drug that begins to tear down his reality and expose his life for what it really is.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisAfterburn (2025)
Set against the backdrop of a postapocalyptic Earth whose Eastern Hemisphere was destroyed by a massive solar flare, leaving what life remains mutated from radiation and fallout. The story revolves around a group of treasure hunters who extract such objects as the Mona Lisa, the Rosetta Stone and the Crown Jewels while facing rival hunters, mutants and pirates.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisAxcellerator (2019)
When a young car thief stumbles on the invention of the century (and the various government agencies that want to kill him), he and a sassy checkout clerk named Kate have the adventure of a lifetime.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisMonsters of Man (2020)
A robotics company vying to win a lucrative military contract team up with a corrupt CIA agent to conduct an illegal live field test. They deploy four weaponized prototype robots into a suspected drug manufacturing camp in the Golden Triangle, assuming they'd be killing drug runners that no one would miss. Six doctors on a humanitarian mission witness the brutal slaughter and become prime targets.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisNext (2007)
Las Vegas showroom magician Cris Johnson has a secret which torments him: he can see a few minutes into the future. Sick of the examinations he underwent as a child and the interest of the government and medical establishment in his power, he lies low under an assumed name in Vegas, performing cheap tricks and living off small-time gambling "winnings." But when a terrorist group threatens to detonate a nuclear device in Los Angeles, government agent Callie Ferris must use all her wiles to capture Cris and convince him to help her stop the cataclysm.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisDoctor Who: Dark Water / Death in Heaven (2014)
In this epic two-part finale, the Doctor comes face to face with the mysterious Missy, and an impossible choice is looming. With Cybermen on the streets of London, old friends unite against old enemies, and the Doctor takes to the air in a startling new role.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction
Absolute CinemaMovies like this2149: The Aftermath (2016)
In an oppressive future, where everyone's only contact is their computer, one lonely young man is forced to venture forth in search of human contact.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisSuperintelligence (2020)
When an all-powerful Superintelligence chooses to study the most average person on Earth, Carol Peters, the fate of the world hangs in the balance. As the A.I. decides to enslave, save or destroy humanity, it’s up to Carol to prove that people are worth saving.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction
SnoozefestMovies like thisSolo: A Star Wars Story (2018)
Through a series of daring escapades deep within a dark and dangerous criminal underworld, Han Solo meets his mighty future copilot Chewbacca and encounters the notorious gambler Lando Calrissian.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction
Popcorn FlickMovies like this
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Frequently asked questions
What are the best movies like The Can?
The closest matches to The Can are Timescape (1992), The 27th Day (1957) and Chaos Walking (2021). Below are 17 more, each with the reason it matches.
What should I watch after The Can?
Start with Timescape (1992), the closest match to The Can.
What is the highest-rated movie like The Can?
Doctor Who: The Runaway Bride (2006), rated 7.8/10 by 255 TMDB users.
What is the newest movie like The Can?
Afterburn (2025) is the most recent release on this list.
Are there English movies like The Can?
Yes: Timescape (1992), The 27th Day (1957) and Chaos Walking (2021).
How are movies similar to The Can chosen?
First come films that Trakt’s viewers watch alongside The Can, then TMDB’s recommendations and films it rates as similar in story and genre. Each pick says which signal put it there.