Movies like The Boy and the Ball and the Hole in the Wall (1965)
The best movies like The Boy and the Ball and the Hole in the Wall (1965) are Alone in Berlin (2016), Pink Floyd: The Wall (1982) and The Good German (2006). If The Boy and the Ball and the Hole in the Wall hooked you with its drama, these 30 similar films are what to watch next, and every pick says why it matches.
Quick picks
- Highest ratedPink Floyd: The Wall (1982)8.0/10 from 1,735 votes
- NewestEleanor the Great (2025)Released 2025
- In SpanishDancing on Glass (2022)Also in Spanish
Alone in Berlin (2016)
Berlin in June of 1940. While Nazi propaganda celebrates the regime’s victory over France, a kitchen-cum-living room in Prenzlauer Berg is filled with grief. Anna and Otto Quangel’s son has been killed at the front. This working class couple had long believed in the ‘Führer’ and followed him willingly, but now they realise that his promises are nothing but lies and deceit. They begin writing postcards as a form of resistance and in a bid to raise awareness: Stop the war machine! Kill Hitler! Putting their lives at risk, they distribute these cards in the entrances of tenement buildings and in stairwells. But the SS and the Gestapo are soon onto them, and even their neighbours pose a threat.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisPink Floyd: The Wall (1982)
A troubled rock star descends into madness in the midst of his physical and social isolation from everyone.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisThe Good German (2006)
An American journalist arrives in Berlin just after the end of World War Two. He becomes involved in a murder mystery surrounding a dead GI who washes up at a lakeside mansion during the Potsdam negotiations between the Allied powers. Soon his investigation connects with his search for his married pre-war German lover.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
SnoozefestMovies like thisValkyrie (2008)
Wounded in Africa during World War II, Nazi Col. Claus von Stauffenberg returns to his native Germany and joins the Resistance in a daring plan to create a shadow government and assassinate Adolf Hitler. When events unfold so that he becomes a central player, he finds himself tasked with both leading the coup and personally killing the Führer.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisDancing on Glass (2022)
When immense pressure threatens a ballerina in a new lead role, she and another dancer escape into a friendship that isolates them from the real world.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisEleanor the Great (2025)
94-year-old Eleanor Morgenstein tries to rebuild her life after the death of her best friend. As a result, she moves back to New York City after living in Florida for decades.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisGeorgetown (2019)
Ulrich Mott is an eccentric and versatile social climber with grandiose plans to affect United States foreign policy. Encouraged in his attempts by his strategically chosen (and much older) wife, the well-connected journalist Elsa Brecht, Mott has a knack for making himself indispensable and impossible to ignore. The only one seemingly immune to his charms is Elsa's daughter Amanda, who might simply disapprove of her mother marrying a much younger man - or perhaps she senses something more sinister beneath the smooth-talking surface?
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
SnoozefestMovies like thisDespair (1978)
Berlin, 1930, during the rise of Nazism. Hermann Hermann, a Russian emigrant and chocolate manufacturer, married to the capricious Lydia, loses his temper more and more every day when dealing with his workers and other businessmen; until he meets Felix, a vagrant, who seems to be physically identical to him; a disconcerting fact that leads Hermann Hermann to plot a particular way out of a fake world he actually hates.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Book Thief (2013)
While subjected to the horrors of WWII Germany, young Liesel finds solace by stealing books and sharing them with others. Under the stairs in her home, a Jewish refugee is being sheltered by her adoptive parents.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe Kings of the World (2022)
Rá, Culebro, Sere, Winny and Nano. Five boys who live on the streets of Medellín. Five kings with no kingdom, no law, no family, set out on a journey in search of the promised land. A subversive tale told through a wild and endearing clan, somewhere between reality and delirium. A journey to nowhere, where everything happens.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisConspiracy (2001)
At the Wannsee Conference on January 20, 1942, senior Nazi officials meet to determine the manner in which the so-called "Final Solution to the Jewish Question" can be best implemented.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisMy Neighbor Adolf (2022)
South America, 1960. A lonely and grumpy Holocaust survivor convinces himself that his new neighbor is none other than Adolf Hitler. Not being taken seriously, he starts an independent investigation to prove his claim, but when the evidence still appears to be inconclusive, Polsky is forced to engage in a relationship with the enemy in order to obtain irrefutable proof.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisTÁR (2022)
As celebrated conductor Lydia Tár starts rehearsals for a career-defining symphony, the consequences of her past choices begin to echo in the present.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisGood Day, Ramon (2013)
After five failed attempts to go to the United States, 18-year-old Ramón decides to look for a friend’s aunt in Germany, but never finds her. With no papers or money, and without knowing the language, he barely survives living on the street until he meets Ruth, an old retired nurse who doesn’t speak Spanish. Beyond language barriers and prejudices, they discover that solidarity and humanity make life bearable.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisScarecrow (1973)
Two drifters bum around, visit earthy women and discuss opening a car wash in Pittsburgh.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisInside I'm Dancing (2004)
Michael is a 24-year-old who has cerebral palsy and long-term resident of the Carrigmore Residential Home for the Disabled, run by the formidable Eileen. His life is transformed when the maverick Rory O'Shea moves in.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like this20th Century Women (2016)
In 1979 Santa Barbara, California, Dorothea Fields is a determined single mother in her mid-50s who is raising her adolescent son, Jamie, at a moment brimming with cultural change and rebellion. Dorothea enlists the help of two younger women – Abbie, a free-spirited punk artist living as a boarder in the Fields' home and Julie, a savvy and provocative teenage neighbour – to help with Jamie's upbringing.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisBerlin Express (1948)
In post-war Europe, a diverse group of passengers aboard a U.S. Army train to bombed-out Frankfurt becomes involved in a Nazi assassination plot.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe King of Havana (2015)
Recently escaped from reformatory, Reinaldo struggles to get by in the streets of Havana in the late 90s, one of the worst decades for Cuban society. Hopes, disillusionment, rum, good humor and above all hunger, accompany him in his wanderings, until he meets Magda and Yunisleidy, survivors like himself. In one or the other's arms, he will try to escape the material and moral misery surrounding him, living love, passion, tenderness and uninhibited sex to the limit.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisGoal II: Living the Dream (2007)
Tempted away from Newcastle United to join Real Madrid, rising star Santiago Munez finds this latest change of fortune the greatest challenge yet - personally as well as professionally. He is reunited with Gavin Harris, though they must compete to be on the team, and estranged from fiancee Roz, whose nursing career keeps her back home.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisNight Shapes (1999)
The Pope is in town and the night of his stay is anything but heavenly for some of Berlin′s inhabitants. Rich and poor, down-and-outs and policemen, street kids and taxi drivers - in their search for a little bit of happiness, they all end up on an amusing and at times harrowing odyssey through the labyrinth of the big city.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
A Walk to Remember (2002)
When the popular, restless Landon Carter is forced to participate in the school drama production, he falls in love with Jamie Sullivan, the daughter of the town's minister. Jamie has a "to-do" list for her life, as well as a very big secret she must keep from Landon.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisGrow Up (TBA)
Sophie is a small-town teenager taking an art scholarship program at Wyatt University in the summer. This summer will change Sophie's life forever.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Never Mind the Wall (2001)
Germany 1982: The country is divided into two parts. Nele, coming from West-Germany, travels to East-Germany where she meets Captain, singer of a band. They fall in love with each other, but the regime "takes care" of their relationship, meaning: They can not see each other again. Germany 1990: The country is reunited. Nele starts searching their lost love...
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Raspberry Magic (2010)
An eleven-year-old science enthusiast turns her raspberry-growing project into an emotional mission to reunite her family after her father leaves and her mother falls into depression.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Fairyocious (2019)
Alma, petrified, does not know how to react when her son, age 8, wants to dress as a fairy and go to school. She asks advice from her neighbor, and eventually the entire building debates his right to behave cross-gender.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
The Harmonists (1997)
Comedian Harmonists tells the story of a famous, German male sextet, five vocals and piano, the "Comedian Harmonists", from the day they meet first in 1927 to the day in 1934, when they become banned by the upcoming Nazis, because three of them are Jewish.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisCamellia (2023)
The Vietnamese German Huong, equipped with her small video camera, documents her life before moving out, exploring her relationships with friends, family, places and objects that she leaves behind. A poetic snapshot of her person, addressed to her father.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Kehraus (1983)
Ferdinand Weitel, a forklift driver, is desperate: Insurance agent Arno von Mehling, a true sales talent, has had contracts signed in record amounts. Now Weitel is wandering through the corridors of the insurance company trying to save what can still be saved - on Shrove Tuesday of all days. The department for customer service and complaints is in a colorful mood and has no ear for Weitel's worries. Finally, secretary Annerose Waguscheit takes heart and tells him about the evening carnival ball "Traum-Police", where he can safely find Mr. Mehling.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Empire Waist (2024)
Lenore Miller’s size has always earned her teases and jeers in her school’s hallways, but this clothes-loving teenager is about to set the world on fire with her own line of inclusive fashion designs.
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 The Boy and the Ball and the Hole in the Wall?
The closest matches to The Boy and the Ball and the Hole in the Wall are Alone in Berlin (2016), Pink Floyd: The Wall (1982) and The Good German (2006). Below are 27 more, each with the reason it matches.
What should I watch after The Boy and the Ball and the Hole in the Wall?
Start with Alone in Berlin (2016), the closest match to The Boy and the Ball and the Hole in the Wall.
What is the highest-rated movie like The Boy and the Ball and the Hole in the Wall?
Pink Floyd: The Wall (1982), rated 8.0/10 by 1,735 TMDB users.
What is the newest movie like The Boy and the Ball and the Hole in the Wall?
Eleanor the Great (2025) is the most recent release on this list.
Are there Spanish movies like The Boy and the Ball and the Hole in the Wall?
Yes: Dancing on Glass (2022), The Kings of the World (2022) and The King of Havana (2015).
How are movies similar to The Boy and the Ball and the Hole in the Wall chosen?
First come films that Trakt’s viewers watch alongside The Boy and the Ball and the Hole in the Wall, then TMDB’s recommendations and films it rates as similar in story and genre. Each pick says which signal put it there.