Movies like La Sombra Del Sahuaro (2005)
The best movies like La Sombra Del Sahuaro (2005) are El padrino: The Latin Godfather (2004), Straight from the Barrio (2008) and Training Day (2001). If La Sombra Del Sahuaro hooked you with its action and drama, these 30 similar films are what to watch next, and every pick says why it matches.
Quick picks
- Highest ratedFacing El Chapo (2026)8.7/10 from 991 votes
- NewestFacing El Chapo (2026)Released 2026
- In SpanishStraight from the Barrio (2008)Also in Spanish
El padrino: The Latin Godfather (2004)
In the streets of East Los Angeles, Manny is a formidable drug dealer. Impressed by his extravagant lifestyle and prowess, his young son, Kilo, yearns to follow in his footsteps. Kilo resolves to learn how to prosper in the drug world, and his new life as a dealer begins. In a world where a man wants everything, he may end up with nothing.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both action & crime
Worth the HypeMovies like thisStraight from the Barrio (2008)
A young drug dealer falls in love while facing disruption among the men in his gang, and being offered a career as a Reggaetón singer.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & action
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisTraining Day (2001)
On his first day on the job as a narcotics officer, a rookie cop works with a rogue detective who isn't what he appears.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both action & crime
Worth the HypeMovies like thisTruth or Consequences, N.M. (1997)
Raymond Lembecke is a con just out of prison after serving time for selling drugs for his mob boss Tony Vago. (Lembecke was innocent and took the rap for Vago.) Lembecke thinks Vago owes him big time so, when his former boss gets him a measly job in a warehouse, he decides on revenge and plans to steal a million dollars worth of drugs from him.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both action & crime
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisGet the Gringo (2012)
A career criminal nabbed by Mexican authorities is placed in a tough prison where he learns to survive with the help of a 9-year-old boy.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both action & crime
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Marksman (2021)
Jim Hanson’s quiet life is suddenly disturbed by two people crossing the US/Mexico border – a woman and her young son – desperate to flee a Mexican cartel. After a shootout leaves the mother dead, Jim becomes the boy’s reluctant defender. He embraces his role as Miguel’s protector and will stop at nothing to get him to safety, as they go on the run from the relentless assassins.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both action & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Snitch Cartel (2011)
The real life story of Andres Lopez Lopez aka "Frecita" during his years involved with the Colombian Cartel aka "Cartel Norte del Valle"
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & crime
Worth the HypeMovies like thisFoxy Brown (1974)
A voluptuous black woman takes a job as a high-class prostitute in order to get revenge on the mobsters who murdered her boyfriend.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both action & crime
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisLoving Pablo (2017)
The film chronicles the rise and fall of the world's most feared drug lord Pablo Escobar and his volatile love affair with Colombia's most famous journalist Virginia Vallejo throughout a reign of terror that tore a country apart.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both crime & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisCoffy (1973)
After her younger sister gets involved in drugs and is severely injured by contaminated heroin, a nurse sets out on a mission of vengeance and vigilante justice, killing drug dealers, pimps, and mobsters who cross her path.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both crime & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisSicario: Day of the Soldado (2018)
Agent Matt Graver teams up with operative Alejandro Gillick to prevent Mexican drug cartels from smuggling terrorists across the United States border.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both action & crime
Worth the HypeMovies like thisMexicali (2026)
A former special forces contractor is forced out of retirement as an avocado farmer in Mexico when local gangsters try to force him and his family off their farm.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both action & drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe Infiltrator (2016)
A U.S Customs official uncovers a massive money laundering scheme involving Pablo Escobar.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both crime & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Mule (2018)
Earl Stone, a man in his eighties, is broke, alone, and facing foreclosure of his business when he is offered a job that simply requires him to drive. Easy enough, but, unbeknownst to Earl, he's just signed on as a drug courier for a Mexican cartel. He does so well that his cargo increases exponentially, and Earl hit the radar of hard-charging DEA agent Colin Bates.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both crime & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisFacing El Chapo (2026)
Two Mexican officers must survive the final hours of their shift after crossing a ruthless cartel boss.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both crime & action
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisBrothers Under Fire (2026)
Captain Jordan Wright's squadron on leave for a wedding in Mexico encounters a murderous cartel. As Jordan tries to lead survivors to safety, war erupts between his squad and the cartel, forcing him into a battle to save his men.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both action & drama
SnoozefestMovies like thisDesperado (1995)
El Mariachi plunges headfirst into the dark border underworld when he follows a trail of blood to the last of the infamous Mexican drug lords, Bucho, for an action-packed, bullet-riddled showdown. With the help of his friend and a beautiful bookstore owner, El Mariachi tracks Bucho, takes on his army of desperados, and leaves his own trail of blood.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both action & crime
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisGotti (1996)
John Gotti, the head of a small New York mafia crew breaks a few of the old family rules. He rises to become the head of the Gambino family and the most well-known mafia boss in America. Life is good, but suspicion creeps in, and greed, rule-breaking and his high public profile all threaten to topple him.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both crime & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisClose Range (2015)
A rogue soldier turned outlaw is thrust into a relentless fight with a corrupt sheriff, his obedient deputies, and a dangerous drug cartel in order to protect his sister and her young daughter.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both action & crime
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisMan on Fire (2004)
Jaded ex-CIA operative John Creasy reluctantly accepts a job as the bodyguard for a 10-year-old girl in Mexico City. They clash at first, but eventually bond, and when she's kidnapped he's consumed by fury and will stop at nothing to save her life.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both action & drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisBatman Begins (2005)
Driven by tragedy, billionaire Bruce Wayne dedicates his life to uncovering and defeating the corruption that plagues his home, Gotham City. Unable to work within the system, he instead creates a new identity, a symbol of fear for the criminal underworld - The Batman.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama & crime
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe Exorcism of God (2022)
An American priest working in Mexico is considered a saint by many local parishioners. However, due to a botched exorcism, he carries a secret that’s eating him alive until he gets an opportunity to face his demon one final time.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both crime & drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe Godfather (1972)
Spanning the years 1945 to 1955, a chronicle of the fictional Italian-American Corleone crime family. When organized crime family patriarch, Vito Corleone barely survives an attempt on his life, his youngest son, Michael steps in to take care of the would-be killers, launching a campaign of bloody revenge.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama & crime
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisThe Godfather Part II (1974)
In the continuing saga of the Corleone crime family, a young Vito Corleone grows up in Sicily and in 1910s New York. In the 1950s, Michael Corleone attempts to expand the family business into Las Vegas, Hollywood and Cuba.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama & crime
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisThe Life of Rayful Edmond (2005)
The true king of cocaine. At his peak he sold 2,000 kilos a week, reaped gross profits of $70 million a month, and ran an operation with over 150 soldiers to support him. In his life champagne flowed like water, trips to Vegas, New York, and Los Angeles were the norm, and $150,000 shopping sprees were nothing. At the height of Washington, D.C.'s brutal crack epidemic in 1987, there was a 22 year old man responsible for distributing 90% of Columbian Cocaine onto the city's streets. This man is Rayful Edmond III. In the media's eyes he was guilty until proven innocent, but in the streets eyes he was a hero who made it to the top. This is his story-a story of; Power, Money, Murder, Betrayal and the rise and fall of the Edmond's Empire.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both crime & drama
Walk the Line (2005)
A chronicle of country music legend Johnny Cash's life, from his early days on an Arkansas cotton farm to his rise to fame with Sun Records in Memphis, where he recorded alongside Elvis Presley, Jerry Lee Lewis and Carl Perkins.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisVolver (2006)
Three generations of women deal with family secrets while surviving the east wind, fire, insanity, superstition, lies and even death.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisI am Ichihashi: Journal of a Murderer (2013)
Tatsuya Ichihashi kills a British woman who taught English in Japan. Ichihashi escapes the police dragnet to Aomori, 550 kilometres away. Learning that he is wanted by the law, he cuts his own lips to change his features. Burdened by guilt, he continues to avoid the law enforcement. He travels 1000 kilometres to Shikoku to participate in a pilgrimage in hope of resurrecting his murder victim. Obviously it fails and he remains a fugitive. As if to escape his own guilt he changes his identity and has cosmetic surgery to further alter his features. He works at construction sites and when people get suspicious of him he flees to a far-off island in Okinawa where he relies on survival skills.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Desert Dancer (2014)
Inspirational true story of Iranian dancer Afshin Ghaffarian, who risked his life for his dream to become a dancer despite a nationwide dancing ban.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Theory of Everything (2014)
Once a healthy, active young man, Hawking received an earth-shattering diagnosis at 21 years of age. With Jane fighting tirelessly by his side, Stephen embarks on his most ambitious scientific work, studying the very thing he now has precious little of – time.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like this
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Frequently asked questions
What are the best movies like La Sombra Del Sahuaro?
The closest matches to La Sombra Del Sahuaro are El padrino: The Latin Godfather (2004), Straight from the Barrio (2008) and Training Day (2001). Below are 27 more, each with the reason it matches.
What should I watch after La Sombra Del Sahuaro?
Start with El padrino: The Latin Godfather (2004), the closest match to La Sombra Del Sahuaro.
What is the highest-rated movie like La Sombra Del Sahuaro?
Facing El Chapo (2026), rated 8.7/10 by 991 TMDB users.
What is the newest movie like La Sombra Del Sahuaro?
Facing El Chapo (2026) is the most recent release on this list.
Are there Spanish movies like La Sombra Del Sahuaro?
Yes: Straight from the Barrio (2008), The Snitch Cartel (2011) and Loving Pablo (2017).
How are movies similar to La Sombra Del Sahuaro chosen?
First come films that Trakt’s viewers watch alongside La Sombra Del Sahuaro, then TMDB’s recommendations and films it rates as similar in story and genre. Each pick says which signal put it there.