Movies like Dr. Caligari (1989)
The best movies like Dr. Caligari (1989) are Psycho Goreman (2020), Asylum: Twisted Horror and Fantasy Tales (2020) and Buddy (2026). If Dr. Caligari hooked you with its fantasy and horror, these 30 similar films are what to watch next, and every pick says why it matches.
Quick picks
- Highest ratedNight of the Living Dead (1968)7.6/10 from 2,890 votes
- NewestBuddy (2026)Released 2026
Psycho Goreman (2020)
Siblings Mimi and Luke unwittingly resurrect an ancient alien overlord. Using a magical amulet, they force the monster to obey their childish whims, and accidentally attract a rogues’ gallery of intergalactic assassins to small-town suburbia.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction & comedy
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisAsylum: Twisted Horror and Fantasy Tales (2020)
Brandon prepares to give his last stand-up comedy show. As his stories and jokes pass, the public begins to cheer up. But at that precise moment Brandon will realize that these stories have a strong relationship with his past. More than he imagines.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both comedy & horror
SnoozefestMovies like thisBuddy (2026)
Inside the colorful world of "It's Buddy!", a group of children spend their days singing, dancing, and helping Buddy - bright orange unicorn - spread happiness. But when one child refuses to play along, Buddy is not pleased and cracks begin to appear in this seemingly perfect world.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both horror & comedy
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisIck (2025)
Science teacher Hank’s life changes when he reconnects with his first love and suspects that a new student may be his daughter—all while facing an alien threat in their town.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both horror & science fiction
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisInfestation (2009)
After being stung by a giant insect, Cooper learns that these bugs are attacking the whole city. He joins forces with the survivors, in order to find a way to counter-attack.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both comedy & horror
SnoozefestMovies like thisSouthbound (2015)
On a desolate stretch of desert highway, weary travelers — two men on the run from their past, a band on their way to the next gig, a man struggling to get home, a brother in search of his long-lost sister and a family on vacation — are forced to confront their worst fears and darkest secrets in these interwoven tales of terror and remorse on the open road.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both fantasy & horror
SnoozefestMovies like thisSociety (1990)
Bill Whitney is worried that he is different to his sister and parents. They mix with other upper-class people while Bill is more down to earth. Even his girlfriend seems a bit odd. All is revealed when Bill returns home to find a party in full swing.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both comedy & horror
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisAmazon Women on the Moon (1987)
Centered on a television station which features a 1950s-style sci-fi movie interspersed with a series of wild commercials, wacky shorts and weird specials, this lampoon of contemporary life and pop culture skewers some of the silliest spectacles ever created in the name of entertainment.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both comedy & science fiction
SnoozefestMovies like thisYear 10 (2024)
After the fall of civilization, the few survivors have been driven to cannibalism. A young man must confront a violent tribe that has murdered his father and stolen the medicine that keeps his girlfriend alive.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both horror & science fiction
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisEraserhead (1977)
First-time father Henry Spencer tries to survive his industrial environment, his angry girlfriend, and the unbearable screams of his newly born mutant child.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both horror & science fiction
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe Hidden (1987)
When average, law-abiding citizens suddenly turn to a life of hedonistic behavior and violent crime, Detective Tom Beck is tasked with helping young FBI agent Lloyd Gallagher determine the cause.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction & horror
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisBeau Is Afraid (2023)
Following the sudden death of his mother, a mild-mannered but anxiety-ridden man confronts his darkest fears as he embarks on an epic odyssey back home.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both comedy & fantasy
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisMargaux (2022)
As a group of seniors celebrate their final college days at a smart house, the house's highly advanced AI system, Margaux, begins to take on a deadly presence of her own. A carefree weekend of partying turns into a dystopian nightmare as they realize Margaux's plans to eliminate her tenants one way or another. Time begins to run out as the group desperately tries to survive and outsmart the smart home.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both horror & science fiction
SnoozefestMovies like thisAfterburn (2025)
Set against the backdrop of a postapocalyptic Earth whose Eastern Hemisphere was destroyed by a massive solar flare, leaving what life remains mutated from radiation and fallout. The story revolves around a group of treasure hunters who extract such objects as the Mona Lisa, the Rosetta Stone and the Crown Jewels while facing rival hunters, mutants and pirates.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction & comedy
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Unhealer (2021)
A botched faith healing bestows supernatural Shaman powers on a bullied teenager. When his lifelong tormentors pull a prank that kills someone he loves, he uses his powers for revenge and goes on a bloody rampage to settle the score.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both fantasy & horror
SnoozefestMovies like thisThe Caller (1987)
One night, an unusual stranger in need asks a woman living alone in a house in the woods if he can use her phone. It soon becomes clear that they're playing a strange mind game and that there's something very wrong about the woods.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction & horror
SnoozefestMovies like thisDon't Worry Darling (2022)
Alice and Jack are lucky to be living in the idealized community of Victory, the experimental company town housing the men who work for the top-secret Victory Project and their families. But when cracks in their idyllic life begin to appear, exposing flashes of something much more sinister lurking beneath the attractive façade, Alice can’t help questioning exactly what they’re doing in Victory, and why.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction & horror
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisHold the Fort (2025)
A HOA turns out to be more troublesome than usual in this wildly amusing, FX-heavy freak-out about newly minted suburbanites unexpectedly forced to take part in a struggle against monstrous forces.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both horror & comedy
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisAltered States (1980)
A research scientist explores the boundaries and frontiers of human consciousness. Using sensory deprivation and hallucinogenic mixtures from Native American shamans, he explores these altered states of cognizance and finds that memory, time, and reality itself are states of mind.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both horror & science fiction
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisGatlopp: Hell of a Game (2022)
Four friends get together for a nostalgic evening of fun and games after a decade of absence, which takes a dark turn.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both comedy & horror
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisBad Taste (1987)
A team from the intergalactic fast food chain Crumb's Crunchy Delights descends on Earth, planning to make human flesh the newest taste sensation. After they wipe out the New Zealand town Kaihoro, the country’s Astro-Investigation and Defense Service (AIaDS) is called in to deal with the problem. Things are complicated due to Giles, an aid worker who comes to Kaihoro the same day to collect change from the residents. He is captured by the aliens, and AIaDS stages a rescue mission that quickly becomes an all-out assault on the aliens’ headquarters.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both comedy & horror
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisRing 2 (1999)
While investigating the horrifying death of her boyfriend, Mai Takano learns about a videotape haunted by the spirit of a disturbing girl named Sadako, which kills anyone who watches it exactly one week later. When her boyfriend’s son, Yoichi, starts to develop the same psychic abilities as Sadako, Takano must find a way to keep the boy and herself from becoming the next victims.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both horror & science fiction
SnoozefestMovies like thisSon of the Mask (2005)
Tim Avery, an aspiring cartoonist, finds himself in a predicament when his dog stumbles upon the mask of Loki. Then after conceiving an infant son "born of the mask", he discovers just how looney child raising can be.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both fantasy & comedy
SnoozefestMovies like thisNight of the Living Dead (1968)
A ragtag group barricade themselves in an old Pennsylvania farmhouse to remain safe from a horde of flesh-eating ghouls ravaging the Northeast.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both horror & science fiction
Worth the HypeMovies like thisTakeshis' (2005)
Beat Takeshi lives the busy and sometimes surreal life of a showbiz celebrity. One day he meets his blond lookalike named Kitano, a shy convenience store cashier, who, still an unknown actor, is waiting for his big break. After their paths cross, Kitano seems to begin hallucinating about becoming Beat.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both comedy & fantasy
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisChildren Shouldn't Play with Dead Things (1972)
Six actors go to a graveyard on a remote island to act out a necromantic ritual. The ceremony works, and soon the dead are walking about and chowing down on human flesh.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both horror & comedy
SnoozefestMovies like thisVexanthrone (2024)
A loner artist, exiled from the art community for creating a sculpture deemed too offensive, embarks on a bizarre odyssey of art, flesh, decomposition, and spiritual ascension. Vexanthrone details the mental and physical difficulties of the creative process in an experimental and surreal fashion that mixes arthouse sensibilities with gross-out body horror.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both horror
Efreet (2022)
Sophia, who recently turned 10, is haunted by mysterious nightmares. In her nightmares, a girl named Selinka keeps appearing, showing her things about her mother Tina's past that she shouldn't know anything about. Tina thinks that her ex-husband Markus is secretly seeing Sophia, although he is not allowed to have any contact with her. But when one evening Sophia mentions the name "Efreet", Dana (a close friend of the little family) knows that they are dealing with evil forces.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both horror
Face Lift (2017)
Be better and more beautiful than you were before.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both comedy
He Was a Quiet Man (2007)
An unhinged office worker who planned to go on a shooting spree at his workplace struggles with his newfound status as a hero after he ends up stopping a shooting spree instead.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both comedy
Popcorn FlickMovies like this
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Frequently asked questions
What are the best movies like Dr. Caligari?
The closest matches to Dr. Caligari are Psycho Goreman (2020), Asylum: Twisted Horror and Fantasy Tales (2020) and Buddy (2026). Below are 27 more, each with the reason it matches.
What should I watch after Dr. Caligari?
Start with Psycho Goreman (2020), the closest match to Dr. Caligari.
What is the highest-rated movie like Dr. Caligari?
Night of the Living Dead (1968), rated 7.6/10 by 2,890 TMDB users.
What is the newest movie like Dr. Caligari?
Buddy (2026) is the most recent release on this list.
Are there English movies like Dr. Caligari?
Yes: Psycho Goreman (2020), Asylum: Twisted Horror and Fantasy Tales (2020) and Buddy (2026).
How are movies similar to Dr. Caligari chosen?
First come films that Trakt’s viewers watch alongside Dr. Caligari, then TMDB’s recommendations and films it rates as similar in story and genre. Each pick says which signal put it there.