Movies like Frankie and Johnnie (1936)
The best movies like Frankie and Johnnie (1936) are Fast Girls (2012), Beyond the Sea (2004) and Shadows (1960). If Frankie and Johnnie hooked you with its drama, these 30 similar films are what to watch next, and every pick says why it matches.
Quick picks
- Highest ratedApocalypse Now (1979)8.3/10 from 9,555 votes
- NewestOmaha (2025)Released 2025
Fast Girls (2012)
A street smart runner develops an intense rivalry with an equally ambitious wealthy young athlete.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisBeyond the Sea (2004)
Based on the life and career of legendary entertainer, Bobby Darin, the biopic moves back and forth between his childhood and adulthood, to tell the tale of his life.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisShadows (1960)
The relationship between Lelia, a light-skinned black woman, and Tony, a white man is put in jeopardy when Tony meets Lelia’s darker-skinned jazz singer brother, Hugh, and discovers that her racial heritage is not what he thought it was.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisToo Late Blues (1961)
Ghost is an ideological musician and leader of a jazz band who would rather play his blues in the park to the birds than compromise himself. His peripatetic performances lead him to cross paths with a singer, while his masculinity is thrown into question following a violent brawl.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisAdopt a Highway (2019)
Russ Millings has just been released from prison after serving 21 years for a 3rd strike conviction for possessing an ounce of marijuana. As he tries to adapt to a world he doesn’t recognize – including trying to learn how to use the internet – he finds an abandoned baby in a dumpster behind the fast food restaurant where he works as a dishwasher. Unsure of what to do, and caught between impulses of kindness and panic, Russ soon realizes this could be his chance at redemption.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisOmaha (2025)
A young girl and her brother are awoken by their father and loaded into the car on an early morning in 2008. As they road trip across the American West, she discovers the truth about their seemingly spontaneous journey.
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 thisSound of Christmas (2016)
Lizzie is a young piano teacher working at a music school while trying to save enough money for a Steinway piano. The school is gearing up for their major Christmas fundraiser and she has committed much of her time to plan the event. One afternoon, she meets Brad who takes an interest in her playing and asks if she will teach his uninterested teenage daughter. She begins to break through to the young girl, and sparks begin to fly with Brad, but she is shocked to find out that his interest is not solely in her playing, but in the property that houses the music school. She sets out to save the school and the event, but can she work things out with Brad?
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisWon't Back Down (2012)
Jamie Fitzpatrick and Nona Alberts are two women from opposites sides of the social and economic track, but they have one thing in common: a mission to fix their community's broken school and ensure a bright future for their children. The two women refuse to let any obstacles stand in their way as they battle a bureaucracy that's hopelessly mired in traditional thinking, and they seek to re-energize a faculty that has lost its passion for teaching.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisDoctor Who: A Christmas Carol (2010)
Amy Pond and Rory Williams are trapped on a crashing space liner, and the only way the Eleventh Doctor can rescue them is to save the soul of a lonely old miser. But is Kazran Sardick, the richest man in Sardicktown, beyond redemption? And what is lurking in the fogs of Christmas Eve?
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisPoor Cow (1967)
Joy lives a life filled with bad choices. At a young age, she marries and has a child–with an abusive thief who quickly ends up incarcerated. Left alone, she takes up with the guy's mate, another thief, who seems to give her some happiness but who also ends up locked up. She then takes up with a series of seedy types who offer nothing but momentary pleasure–if that.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Christmas Shoes (2002)
Two separate stories mesh - in the first, a young music teacher, Maggie Andrews, begins dying of a heart condition and her son Nathan tries to get a pair of Christmas shoes for her before she dies. In the second, lawyer Robert Layton and his wife Kate are slowly drifting apart and the matter comes to a head during Christmas when Kate takes over for Maggie for the school choir.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisReturn (2011)
Back from a tour of duty, Kelli struggles to find her place in her family and the rust-belt town she no longer recognizes.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisGood Vibrations (2012)
The story of music legend Terri Hooley, a key figure in Belfast's punk rock scene. Hooley founded the Good Vibrations store from which a record label sprung, representing bands such as The Undertones, Rudi and The Outcasts.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisDetour (1945)
The life of Al Roberts, a pianist in a New York nightclub, turns into a nightmare when he decides to hitchhike to Los Angeles to visit his girlfriend.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisHurry Sundown (1967)
A ruthless Southern opportunist tries to buy his cousin's land, and when thwarted, brings several tragedies to the lives of his loved ones.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisHoneydripper (2007)
In 1950s Alabama, the owner of the Honeydripper juke joint finds his business dropping off and against his better judgment, hires a young electric guitarist in a last ditch effort to draw crowds during harvest time.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
SnoozefestMovies like thisMansfield Park (2007)
Fanny Price is sent to live with her wealthy relatives, the Bertrams, where she is treated poorly by most except her cousin Edmund. Her life is complicated by the arrival of the worldly Mary and Henry Crawford
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisWhere the Red Fern Grows (1974)
Billy Coleman works hard and saves his earnings for two years to achieve his dream of buying two red-bone coonhound pups. He develops a new trust in life as he faces overwhelming challenges in adventure and tragedy roaming the river bottoms of Cherokee country with his dogs, Old Dan and Little Ann.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisVanya on 42nd Street (1994)
An uninterrupted rehearsal of Chekhov's 'Uncle Vanya' plays out by a company of actors. The setting: their run-down theater with an unusable stage and crumbling ceiling. The play is shown act by act with the briefest of breaks to move props or for refreshments. The lack of costumes, real props and scenery is soon forgotten.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisApocalypse Now (1979)
At the height of the Vietnam war, Captain Benjamin Willard is sent on a dangerous mission that, officially, "does not exist, nor will it ever exist." His goal is to locate - and eliminate - a mysterious Green Beret Colonel named Walter Kurtz, who has been leading his personal army on illegal guerrilla missions into enemy territory.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisDancer in the Dark (2000)
Selma, a Czech immigrant on the verge of blindness, struggles to make ends meet for herself and her young son, who has inherited the same genetic disorder and will suffer the same fate without an expensive operation. When life becomes increasingly difficult, Selma learns to cope through her love of musicals, dreaming up little numbers to the rhythmic beats of her surroundings.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisTu Meri Zindagi Hai (2027)
A self-destructive, tormented rockstar finds his life and love transformed through an intense romantic journey shaped by music and emotion.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Coming SoonMovies like thisPalm Springs (1936)
A gambler in need of cash plots a romance between his daughter and a wealthy Englishman. The daughter, however, has plans of her own.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Lili Marleen (1981)
The story of a German singer named Willie, who while working in Switzerland, falls in love with a Jewish composer named Robert, whose family is helping people to flee from the Nazis. Robert’s family is skeptical of Willie, thinking she could be a Nazi as she becomes famous for singing the song “Lili Marleen”.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisPaganini (1973)
Operetta concerning the love affair of Niccolò Paganini, the violinist, and Élisa Bonaparte, the younger sister of Napoleon.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
The Wave (2025)
A music student’s testimony ignites a feminist uprising on her campus, where protest becomes performance and collective voice becomes an act of resistance.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Hawaii Calls (1938)
After being nabbed while trying to stow away on board an ocean liner en route to Hawaii, young Bobby Breen sings for his travel fare and, along with sidekick Pua, turns detective to recover stolen naval documents from crooks
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Swing! (1938)
Ted Gregory is trying to be the first black producer to mount a show on Broadway, but he has trouble with his star singer.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Gucha! (2006)
Juliet, a white girl, falls in love with a dark-skinned romeo, a divine trumpet player from the Roma orchestra. But her father Satchmo doesn't accept Romeo. Romeo needs to fight for Juliet at the legendary Festival of the trumpeters in Gucha.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
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Frequently asked questions
What are the best movies like Frankie and Johnnie?
The closest matches to Frankie and Johnnie are Fast Girls (2012), Beyond the Sea (2004) and Shadows (1960). Below are 27 more, each with the reason it matches.
What should I watch after Frankie and Johnnie?
Start with Fast Girls (2012), the closest match to Frankie and Johnnie.
What is the highest-rated movie like Frankie and Johnnie?
Apocalypse Now (1979), rated 8.3/10 by 9,555 TMDB users.
What is the newest movie like Frankie and Johnnie?
Omaha (2025) is the most recent release on this list.
Are there English movies like Frankie and Johnnie?
Yes: Fast Girls (2012), Beyond the Sea (2004) and Shadows (1960).
How are movies similar to Frankie and Johnnie chosen?
First come films that Trakt’s viewers watch alongside Frankie and Johnnie, then TMDB’s recommendations and films it rates as similar in story and genre. Each pick says which signal put it there.