Movies like Kids for Cash (2014)
The best movies like Kids for Cash (2014) are American Animals (2018), Capturing the Friedmans (2003) and The Jewel Thief (2023). If Kids for Cash hooked you with its crime and documentary, these 30 similar films are what to watch next, and every pick says why it matches.
Quick picks
- Highest ratedDear Zachary: A Letter to a Son About His Father (2008)8.1/10 from 621 votes
- NewestTurn of the Tide: The Surreal Story of Rabo de Peixe (2025)Released 2025
American Animals (2018)
Lexington, Kentucky, 2004. Four young men attempt to execute one of the most audacious art heists in the history of the United States.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama & crime
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisCapturing the Friedmans (2003)
An Oscar nominated documentary about a middle-class American family who is torn apart when the father Arnold and son Jesse are accused of sexually abusing numerous children. Director Jarecki interviews people from different sides of this tragic story and raises the question of whether they were rightfully tried when they claim they were innocent and there was never any evidence against them.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary & crime
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe Jewel Thief (2023)
Gerald Blanchard's surprising, first-hand account as a calculating and accomplished criminal mastermind. Two unlikely detectives track him worldwide as he commits increasingly elaborate heists in a quest for fame.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary & crime
The Imposter (2012)
In 1994, a 13-year-old boy disappeared without a trace from his home in San Antonio, Texas. Three-and-a-half years later, he is found alive in a village in southern Spain with a horrifying story of kidnap and torture. His family is overjoyed to bring him home. But all is not quite as it seems.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary & crime
Worth the HypeMovies like thisDirty Wars (2013)
Investigative journalist, Jeremy Scahill is pulled into an unexpected journey as he chases down the hidden truth behind America's expanding covert wars, and examines how the US government has responded to international terrorist threats in ways that seem to go against the established laws of the land.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary & drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe Housewife and the Hustler (2021)
Go inside the real-life legal drama facing the husband of "The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills" cast member Erika Jayne, legal titan Tom Girardi. Once considered a crusader of justice, Girardi now stands accused of embezzling from the victims he swore to protect.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary & crime
Operation Varsity Blues: The College Admissions Scandal (2021)
An examination that goes beyond the celebrity-driven headlines and dives into the methods used by Rick Singer, the man at the center of the shocking 2019 college admissions scandal, to persuade his wealthy clients to cheat an educational system already designed to benefit the privileged.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary & crime
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisJuvenile Court (1973)
Before the Memphis Juvenile Court are a complex variety of cases: foster home placement, drug abuse, armed robbery, child abuse, and sexual offenses. Sequences illustrate such issues as community protection versus the desire for rehabilitation, the range and the limits of the choices available to the court, the psychology of the offender, and the constitutional and procedural questions involved in administering a juvenile court.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
The Tinder Swindler (2022)
Posing as a wealthy, jet-setting diamond mogul, an Israeli conman wooed women online then conned them out of millions of dollars. Now, some victims plan for payback.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary & crime
Worth the HypeMovies like thisLife of Crime: 1984-2020 (2021)
An intimate documentary that looks at the vicious cycles of drug addiction and street crime in one of the roughest parts of New Jersey.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary & drama
Girl in the Picture (2022)
A young mother’s mysterious death and her son’s subsequent kidnapping blow open a decades-long mystery about the woman’s true identity, and the murderous federal fugitive at the center of it all.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both crime & documentary
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe Witness (2015)
A brother's journey to unravel the truth about the mythic death and little known life of Kitty Genovese, who was reportedly murdered in front of 38 witnesses and has become the face of urban apathy.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisDear Zachary: A Letter to a Son About His Father (2008)
In 2001, Andrew Bagby, a medical resident, is murdered not long after breaking up with his girlfriend. Soon after, when she announces she's pregnant, one of Andrew's many close friends, Kurt Kuenne, begins this film, a gift to the child.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary & crime
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisBig Mäck: Gangsters and Gold (2023)
A man is convicted of a robbery he didn't commit and spends six years in jail. Decades later, he becomes a suspect again — but is he still innocent?
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Bully (2011)
This year, over 5 million American kids will be bullied at school, online, on the bus, at home, through their cell phones and on the streets of their towns, making it the most common form of violence young people in this country experience. The Bully Project is the first feature documentary film to show how we've all been affected by bullying, whether we've been victims, perpetrators or stood silent witness. The world we inhabit as adults begins on the playground. The Bully Project opens on the first day of school. For the more than 5 million kids who'll be bullied this year in the United States, it's a day filled with more anxiety and foreboding than excitement. As the sun rises and school busses across the country overflow with backpacks, brass instruments and the rambunctious sounds of raging hormones, this is a ride into the unknown.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary & drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisWhitey: United States of America v. James J. Bulger (2014)
A documentary that captures the sensational trial of infamous gangster James 'Whitey' Bulger, using the legal proceedings as a springboard to explore allegations of corruption within the highest levels of law enforcement. Academy Award-nominated filmmaker Joe Berlinger examines Bulger's relationship with the FBI and Department of Justice that allowed him to reign over a criminal empire in Boston for decades.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both crime & documentary
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Central Park Five (2012)
In 1989, five black and Latino teenagers from Harlem were arrested and later convicted of raping a white woman in New York City's Central Park. They spent between 6 and 13 years in prison before a serial rapist confessed that he alone had committed the crime, leading to their convictions being overturned. Set against a backdrop of a decaying city beset by violence and racial tension, this is the story of that horrific crime, the rush to judgment by the police, a media clamoring for sensational stories and an outraged public, and the five lives upended by this miscarriage of justice.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Worth the HypeMovies like thisHow to Make Money Selling Drugs (2012)
Ten easy steps show you how to make money from drugs, featuring a series of interviews with drug dealers, prison employees, and lobbyists arguing for tougher drug laws.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Worth the HypeMovies like thisTake Care of Maya (2023)
When Jack and Beata Kowalski are wrongfully accused of child abuse after their 10-year-old daughter Maya visits the ER, a nightmare unfolds.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Worth the HypeMovies like thisTales of the Grim Sleeper (2014)
When Lonnie Franklin Jr. was arrested in South Central Los Angeles in 2010 as the suspected murderer of a string of young black women, police hailed it as the culmination of 20 years of investigations. Four years later documentary filmmaker Nick Broomfield took his camera to the alleged killer’s neighborhood for another view.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both crime & documentary
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisStolen: Heist of the Century (2025)
Antwerp, 2003. A gang of thieves rob the impenetrable Diamond Center. Who was behind one of the world's biggest heists - and how did they pull it off?
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary & crime
Worth the HypeMovies like thisTurn of the Tide: The Surreal Story of Rabo de Peixe (2025)
In June 2001, hundreds of kilos of cocaine washed up in a Portuguese village. This gripping documentary reveals the long-lasting impact on the community.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary & crime
West of Memphis (2012)
The documentary tells the hitherto unknown story behind an extraordinary and desperate fight to bring the truth to light. Told and made by those who lived it, the filmmakers' unprecedented access to the inner workings of the defense allows the film to show the investigation, research, and appeals process in a way that has never been seen before; revealing shocking and disturbing new information about a case that still haunts the American South.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Worth the HypeMovies like thisHappy Valley (2014)
The children of "Happy Valley" were victimized for years, by a key member of the legendary Penn State college football program. But were Jerry Sandusky’s crimes an open secret? With rare access, director Amir Bar-Lev delves beneath the headlines to tell a modern American parable of guilt, redemption, and identity.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary & crime
The Family I Had (2017)
In The Family I Had, a mother recalls how her brilliant teenage son came to shatter their idyllic family through one horribly violent and shocking act. Now, left to pick up the pieces, the survivors test the boundaries of their newly defined reality in this moving true crime exploration of the nature and limits of familial love.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both crime & documentary
The Sentence (2018)
Cindy Shank, mother of three, is serving a 15-year sentence in federal prison for her tangential involvement with a Michigan drug ring years earlier. This intimate portrait of mandatory minimum drug sentencing's devastating consequences, captured by Cindy's brother, follows her and her family over the course of ten years.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary & crime
Catfish (2010)
Nev, a 24-year-old New York-based photographer, has no idea what he's in for when Abby, an eight-year-old girl from rural Michigan, contacts him on Facebook, seeking permission to paint one of his photographs. When he receives her remarkable painting, Nev begins a friendship and correspondence with Abby's family. But things really get interesting when he develops a cyber-romance with Abby's attractive older sister, Megan, a musician and model. Prompted by some startling revelations about Megan, Nev and his buddies embark on a road trip in search of the truth.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisKidnapped for Christ (2014)
Kidnapped For Christ tells the shocking stories of American teenagers who were taken from their homes and shipped to Escuela Caribe, an American-run Christian behavior modification program in the Dominican Republic. The film centers on David, a straight-A student who was sent to Escuela Caribe because he is gay and his parents can't deal with the situation. When a young evangelical filmmaker is granted unprecedented access to film behind the gates of this controversial school, she discovers shocking secrets and young students that change her life.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary & drama
The Iceman Confesses: Secrets of a Mafia Hitman (2001)
Richard Kuklinski was a devoted husband, a loving father...and a ruthless killer. A decade after HBO last visited him in prison, the convicted murderer, who freely admits having whacked more than 100 people in cold blood, takes viewers back inside his cold, calculating mind. In this follow-up to America Undercover's 1992 film The Iceman Tapes: Conversations with a Killer, Kuklinski provides all-new insights about his exploits as one of the Mafia's most notorious assassins...and reveals some shocking confessions for a number of previously unsolved murders.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary & crime
The Devil on Trial (2023)
Explore the first – and only – time “demonic possession” has officially been used as a defense in a U.S. murder trial. Including firsthand accounts of alleged devil possession and a shocking murder, this extraordinary story forces reflection on our fear of the unknown.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both documentary & drama
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Frequently asked questions
What are the best movies like Kids for Cash?
The closest matches to Kids for Cash are American Animals (2018), Capturing the Friedmans (2003) and The Jewel Thief (2023). Below are 27 more, each with the reason it matches.
What should I watch after Kids for Cash?
People who watched Kids for Cash most often go on to American Animals (2018), Capturing the Friedmans (2003) and The Jewel Thief (2023).
What is the highest-rated movie like Kids for Cash?
Dear Zachary: A Letter to a Son About His Father (2008), rated 8.1/10 by 621 TMDB users.
What is the newest movie like Kids for Cash?
Turn of the Tide: The Surreal Story of Rabo de Peixe (2025) is the most recent release on this list.
Are there English movies like Kids for Cash?
Yes: American Animals (2018), Capturing the Friedmans (2003) and The Jewel Thief (2023).
How are movies similar to Kids for Cash chosen?
First come films that Trakt’s viewers watch alongside Kids for Cash, then TMDB’s recommendations and films it rates as similar in story and genre. Each pick says which signal put it there.