Movies like Exotic Malice (1980)
The best movies like Exotic Malice (1980) are The Surrender (2025), The Eyes of My Mother (2016) and The Last House on the Left (2009). If Exotic Malice hooked you with its drama and horror, these 30 similar films are what to watch next, and every pick says why it matches.
Quick picks
- Highest ratedStrange Darling (2024)6.9/10 from 1,100 votes
- NewestThe Surrender (2025)Released 2025
- In ItalianThe Strange Vice of Mrs. Wardh (1971)Also in Italian
The Surrender (2025)
A fraught mother-daughter relationship is put to a terrifying test when the family patriarch dies, and the grieving mother hires a mysterious stranger to bring her husband back from the dead.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & horror
SnoozefestMovies like thisThe Eyes of My Mother (2016)
A young, lonely woman is consumed by her deepest and darkest desires after tragedy strikes her quiet country life.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & horror
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Last House on the Left (2009)
When athletic teen Mari Collingwood opts to hang out with her friend Paige in town rather than spend an evening in with her parents vacationing at the family's remote lake house, it marks the beginning of a night no one is going to forget.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both horror & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Shuttered Room (1967)
In a small island off the American coast, the Whateleys live in an old mill where a mysterious bloody being creates an atmosphere of horror. After her parents get killed by lightning, young Susannah is sent to New York by her aunt Agatha, who wants her to avoid the family curse. Years later Susannah, now married, persuades her husband to spend a holiday in the abandoned mill. Once on the island, Susannah and Mike soon find themselves exposed to the hostility of a gang of thugs led by Ethan, Susannah's brutal cousin.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & horror
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisSavaged (2014)
After thugs brutalize a deaf-mute woman, the spirit of an Apache warrior takes over her lifeless body and sets out on a bloodthirsty quest for revenge.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & horror
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisFrank and Penelope (2022)
A tale of love and violence when a man on his emotional last legs finds a savior seductively dancing in a run-down strip club. And a life most certainly headed off a cliff suddenly becomes redirected - as everything is now worth dying for.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both horror
Worth the HypeMovies like thisFunny Games (2008)
When Ann, husband George, and son Georgie arrive at their holiday home they are visited by a pair of polite and seemingly pleasant young men. Armed with deceptively sweet smiles and some golf clubs, they proceed to terrorize and torture the tight-knit clan, giving them until the next day to survive.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both horror
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisNightmare Cinema (2018)
A series of down-on-their-luck individuals enter the decrepit and spine-chilling Rialto theater, only to have their deepest and darkest fears brought to life on the silver screen by The Projectionist – a mysterious, ghostly figure who holds the nightmarish futures of all who attend his screenings.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both horror
SnoozefestMovies like thisStrange Darling (2024)
Nothing is what it seems when a twisted one-night stand spirals into a serial killer’s vicious murder spree.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both horror
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Strange Vice of Mrs. Wardh (1971)
When socialite and heiress Julie Wardh begins receiving blackmail letters attributed to a mysterious serial killer, she suspects her cruel and sadistic former lover Jean is behind them. With her husband Neil frequently out of town, she falls into the arms of her friend's cousin George, and as the unknown assassin begins to make his move, she fears that one of the three men in her life may be the killer.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both horror
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisDaylight's End (2016)
Years after a mysterious plague has devastated the planet and turned most of humanity into blood-hungry creatures, a rogue drifter on a vengeful hunt stumbles across a band of survivors in an abandoned police station and reluctantly agrees to try to help them defend themselves and escape to the sanctuary they so desperately need.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both horror
SnoozefestMovies like thisInferno (1980)
A young man returns from Rome to his sister's satanic New York apartment house.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both horror
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Holy Boy (2025)
A PE teacher moves to a isolated mountain village where the people appear to live in unshakeable serenity, but soon stumbles across a disturbing ritual. Once a week, the locals are freed of their pain by a lonely boy born with the power to heal one's soul just by hugging them. Trying to rescue him from this madness, the man unleashes his dark side.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisConvict (2014)
Set in the dark and old Parramatta prison built by the original convicts our lead character Ray a war veteran finds himself serving 18 months for manslaughter after defending his fiance. He soon realizes that the prison boss has it in for him and does everything possible to break Ray even going after his fiance.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisLockdown (2000)
Avery (Jones) returns to college as a competitive swimmer after getting his life back on track. But his life takes another unexpected turn when he and his two friends (Bonds, Casseus) are wrongly accused of murder and end up in prison.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisBully (2001)
A group of teenagers in South Florida enact a murder plot against their mutual bully, Bobby, who has emotionally, physically, and sexually abused them for years.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisCheat (2023)
On the surface it's believed to be another urban legend - a supernatural being from the afterlife is violently killing anyone who cheats on their significant other in the small college town of Silvercreek, Pennsylvania. But the town's unusually high suicide rate is finally convincing both locals and college students that everything is not as it seems. When Maeve - a female college student - sleeps with Charlie, the married man of the host family she is staying with, both sense the deadly curse is closing in on them. Unable to get anyone to believe them, Maeve and Charlie seek out a local history student to help find answers and figure out a way to defend themselves. It all comes undone, however, as several people are horrifically killed by the savage being - one-by-one at a rapid pace. Eventually, Maeve, Charlie and the few survivors band together in an attempt to defeat the monster once and for all.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both horror
Worth the HypeMovies like thisGoodnight Mommy (2022)
When twin brothers arrive home to find their mother’s demeanor altered and face covered in surgical bandages, they begin to suspect the woman beneath the gauze might not be their mother.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both horror
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisSaw III (2006)
Jigsaw has disappeared. Along with his new apprentice Amanda, the puppet-master behind the cruel, intricate games that have terrified a community and baffled police has once again eluded capture and vanished. While city detectives scramble to locate him, Doctor Lynn Denlon and Jeff Reinhart are unaware that they are about to become the latest pawns on his vicious chessboard.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both horror
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Boss (1973)
A hitman finds himself embroiled in the middle of a Mafia war between the Sicilians and the Calabrians.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisProof (2005)
Catherine is a woman in her late twenties who is strongly devoted to her father, Robert, a brilliant and well-known mathematician whose grip on reality is beginning to slip away. As Robert descends into madness, Catherine begins to wonder if she may have inherited her father's mental illness along with his mathematical genius.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisSeduction of the White Angel (1972)
A young woman is troubled by vivid sexual dreams triggered by her experiences as a trainee nurse.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Maladonna (1984)
In late XIX century, rich and bored Maria (Paola Senatore) is after a more sexually interesting life and gets involved with Alessio who shows her other kinds of love. She soon becomes his sex slave but some unexpected consequences will arise from her desperate search for sexual fulfillment.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Just Once Before l Die (2025)
After giving up on her company, Min-jeong is living as a wreck in her house. After being given a terminal diagnosis, Min-jeong is told to break up with the man she loves without saying a word. With money running low and an unfulfilled hunger no matter how much she eats, Min-jeong calls her ex-boyfriend Yoon-jae. Min-jeong wants Yoon-jae to regret breaking up with her, but Yoon-jae fights with Min-jeong's stubbornness and leaves. After that, Min-jeong goes to find the men she loved...
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Amici per la pelle (2022)
During a vacation in the United States, the protagonist is seized by severe abdominal pain that forces him to return to Italy in a daring way and to be hospitalized urgently.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Man in Full Swing (1988)
The men in prison are frustrated and in agony. It's difficult because the desires of these men are concentrated on just one man. A man raped in the place of a woman. Although he is reluctant to do so, he gradually becomes fascinated by the variety of techniques possessed by the yakuza.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Heartbeat (1988)
Follows men who ride bicycles and a shopkeeper, known as the master, who lent small amounts of money to the young people who frequented his shop, and used their bodies in exchange for interest...
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Goodbye Anniversary (1988)
Sakairi Shozo, the owner of a gay bar called "Miyoshi", is dumped by handsome student Seijuro. This student also steals the title deed to the gay bar and the house of Sakairi Shozo. The regulars of the gay bar work together to get revenge on Seijuro.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Sweet Senior (2017)
A film about a step-mother and her new son who are both blinded by lust.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
An Exciting Afternoon (1989)
A young man navigates his want for a carefree sex life and his possessive partner...
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
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Frequently asked questions
What are the best movies like Exotic Malice?
The closest matches to Exotic Malice are The Surrender (2025), The Eyes of My Mother (2016) and The Last House on the Left (2009). Below are 27 more, each with the reason it matches.
What should I watch after Exotic Malice?
Start with The Surrender (2025), the closest match to Exotic Malice.
What is the highest-rated movie like Exotic Malice?
Strange Darling (2024), rated 6.9/10 by 1,100 TMDB users.
What is the newest movie like Exotic Malice?
The Surrender (2025) is the most recent release on this list.
Are there Italian movies like Exotic Malice?
Yes: The Strange Vice of Mrs. Wardh (1971), Inferno (1980) and The Holy Boy (2025).
How are movies similar to Exotic Malice chosen?
First come films that Trakt’s viewers watch alongside Exotic Malice, then TMDB’s recommendations and films it rates as similar in story and genre. Each pick says which signal put it there.