Movies like A Night in September (1939)
The best movies like A Night in September (1939) are Matewan (1987), Bastard Out of Carolina (1996) and Pale Rider (1985). If A Night in September hooked you with its drama, these 30 similar films are what to watch next, and every pick says why it matches.
Quick picks
- Highest ratedDogville (2003)7.7/10 from 2,827 votes
- NewestThe Cut (2025)Released 2025
Matewan (1987)
Filmed in the coal country of West Virginia, "Matewan" celebrates labor organizing in the context of a 1920s work stoppage. Union organizer, Joe Kenehan, a scab named "Few Clothes" Johnson and a sympathetic mayor and police chief heroically fight the power represented by a coal company and Matewan's vested interests so that justice and workers' rights need not take a back seat to squalid working conditions, exploitation and the bottom line.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisBastard Out of Carolina (1996)
A poor, struggling South Carolinian mother and daughter face painful choices with their resolve and pride. Bone, the eldest daughter, and Anney her tired mother, grow both closer and farther apart: Anney sees Glen as her last chance.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisPale Rider (1985)
A mysterious preacher protects a humble prospector village from a greedy mining company trying to encroach on their land.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe End of St. Petersburg (1927)
Arriving in St. Petersburg in search of work, a peasant unwittingly aids in the arrest of an old friend who is now a labour leader. The unemployed man is arrested and sent to fight in the Great War. After three years, he returns to rebel.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisXiu Xiu: The Sent-Down Girl (1998)
Young teen girl Xiu Xiu is sent away to a remote corner of the Sichuan steppes for manual labor in 1975 (sending young people to there was a part of Cultural Revolution in China). A year later, she agrees to go to even more remote spot with a Tibetan saddle tramp Lao Jin to learn horse herding.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe Safety of Objects (2002)
In a suburban landscape, the lives of several families interlace with loss, despair and personal crisis. Esther Gold has lost focus on all but caring for her comatose son, Paul, and neglects her daughter and husband. Lawyer Jim Train is devoted to his career, not his family. Helen Christianson wants to find a new spark in life, while Annette Jennings tries to rebuild hers.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisSons and Lovers (1960)
The son of a working-class British mining family has dreams of pursuing an art career, but when he strikes up an affair with an older, married woman from the town it enrages his kind but possessive mother.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies 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 thisF.I.S.T. (1978)
Johnny Kovak joins the Teamsters trade-union in a local chapter in the 1930s and works his way up in the organization. As he climbs higher and higher his methods become more ruthless and finally senator Madison starts a campaign to find the truth about the alleged connections with the Mob.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisDear Comrades! (2020)
When the communist government raises food prices in 1962, rebellious workers from the small industrial town of Novocherkassk go on strike. The massacre that ensues is seen through the eyes of a devout party activist.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe Cut (2025)
A retired boxer intends to return to the ring for one last shot at the title, but first he must make the weight. Holed up in a room in Las Vegas with an unscrupulous trainer, he embarks on an intensive and illegal weight-cutting program.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
SnoozefestMovies like thisStrike (1925)
Just before the 1905 Bolshevik Revolution, factory workers strike against their oppressive factory bosses. When a worker is accused of stealing a piece of machinery, he commits suicide, and his colleagues revolt against the overarching Czarist regime. As the strike drags on and government officials grow increasingly desperate to end it, their methods of dealing with the rebellious workers become more and more aggressive.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisDogville (2003)
A woman on the run from the mob is reluctantly accepted in a small Colorado community in exchange for labor, but when a search visits the town, she learns that their support has a price.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThat Evening Sun (2009)
An aging Tennessee farmer returns to his homestead and must confront a family betrayal, the reappearance of an old enemy, and the loss of his farm.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe 33 (2015)
Based on the true story of the collapse of a mine in San Jose, Chile—that left 33 miners isolated underground for 69 days.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisHounddog (2008)
A drama set in the American South, where a precocious, troubled girl finds a safe haven in the music and movement of Elvis Presley.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisHoller (2021)
In a forgotten pocket of Southern Ohio where American manufacturing and opportunity are drying up, a determined young woman finds a ticket out when she is accepted to college. Alongside her older brother, Ruth Avery joins a dangerous scrap metal crew in order to pay her way. Together, they spend one brutal winter working the scrap yards during the day and stealing valuable metal from the once thriving factories by night. With her goal in sight, Ruth finds that the ultimate cost of an education for a girl like her may be more than she bargained for, and she soon finds herself torn between a promising future and the family she would leave behind.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe River (1984)
Tom and Mae Garvey are a Tennessee farming couple battling violent floods to save their land. In addition to natural disasters, the Garveys fight to stop a selfish land developer and a local corporation from foreclosing on their farm. While Mae stays at home to care for their children and tend to the crops, Tom finds work as a scab at a steel mill to preserve his family's property.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisGuilty by Suspicion (1991)
Owing to his alleged involvement with communist parties, film director David Merrill is forbidden from working in Hollywood. He decides to fight for his rights and faces numerous challenges.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisMy Friend Ivan Lapshin (1985)
Russian provincial town in the middle of the 1930s Stalin's Great Purge. Ivan Lapshin, the head of the local police, does what he has to do. And he does it well.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisHitman (2007)
A genetically engineered assassin with deadly aim, known only as "Agent 47" eliminates strategic targets for a top-secret organization. But when he's double-crossed, the hunter becomes the prey as 47 finds himself in a life-or-death game of international intrigue.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisAnother Life (1987)
Psychological drama about a university dean who leads a double life.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Rocky IV (1985)
Rocky Balboa holds the world heavyweight championship, but a new challenger has stepped forward: Drago, a six-foot-four, 261-pound fighter who has the backing of the Soviet Union. This time, Rocky's training regimen takes him to Siberia, where he prepares for a globally televised match in the heart of Moscow. But nothing can truly prepare him for what he's about to face – a fight to the finish, in which he must defend not only himself, but also the honor of his country!
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisHostile Waters (1997)
Based on true events, an American submarine collides into a Soviet sub of the coast of America and an ensuing standoff occurs that could lead to total annihilation.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisHasan Arbakesh (1966)
A story about the clash of two cultures, two worlds - traditional Tajik culture and the new, invading and imperialist in its nature, Soviet culture, about the formation of self-awareness of the Tajik dekhkanin in the 1920s-1930s.... Poor Hasan thinks and experiences a lot before he is able to comprehend the changes in his life, to realize that old traditions and customs are no longer valued. Bent by need and disenfranchisement, he finds the strength to stand up against the Basmachi.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
October Days (1958)
Historical drama depicting the events leading up to the 1917 October Revolution produced to celebrate the 40th anniversary.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Three Days of Viktor Chernyshyov (1968)
Mid 20th century. Industry is developing rapidly and the need for workers in factories is growing. After graduating from the tenth year, Viktor Chernyshyov, now a city dweller, did not bother to continue his education and went to the plant as a turner. He considered it quite normal that the guys enthusiastically listened to the stories of his peer Kolya, a lounger who boasted of victories over women, and participated in his dubious amusements. Only one of them, Pyotr — a real worker, a doctor, tried to reason with Kolya and the others.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
The Man Without a World (1991)
The Man Without a World is credited to the legendary (and imaginary) 1920s Soviet director, Yevgeny Antinov. But the film is anything but old. In fact, Antinov himself is the creation of contemporary filmmaker Eleanor Antin. Her film is a moving, comic melodrama set in a typical shtetl (village) in Poland. The Jews’ struggle against poverty and racial hatred is complicated by their own division into hostile political factions of the religious orthodoxy, assimilationists, socialists, Zionists, anarchists and survivors. While the Jews of the shtetl pursue their loves, politics, religion, business and dreams for the future, the Angel of Death is ever near...
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Mən qayıdacağam (2020)
The film is about the military figure, General Jamshid Nakhchivanski, commander of the first national rifle division of Azerbaijan. Although his physical life ended in 1938 with a shooting as a result of repression, as he himself told his family, "he returned."
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
K-19: The Widowmaker (2002)
When Russia's first nuclear submarine malfunctions on its maiden voyage, the crew must race to save the ship and prevent a nuclear disaster.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
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Frequently asked questions
What are the best movies like A Night in September?
The closest matches to A Night in September are Matewan (1987), Bastard Out of Carolina (1996) and Pale Rider (1985). Below are 27 more, each with the reason it matches.
What should I watch after A Night in September?
Start with Matewan (1987), the closest match to A Night in September.
What is the highest-rated movie like A Night in September?
Dogville (2003), rated 7.7/10 by 2,827 TMDB users.
What is the newest movie like A Night in September?
The Cut (2025) is the most recent release on this list.
How are movies similar to A Night in September chosen?
First come films that Trakt’s viewers watch alongside A Night in September, then TMDB’s recommendations and films it rates as similar in story and genre. Each pick says which signal put it there.