Movies like Makala (2017)
The best movies like Makala (2017) are The Gleaners and I (2000), The Salt of the Earth (2014) and Faces Places (2017). If Makala hooked you with its documentary, these 30 similar films are what to watch next, and every pick says why it matches.
Quick picks
- Highest ratedThe Salt of the Earth (2014)8.1/10 from 700 votes
- NewestGhost Elephants (2026)Released 2026
- In FrenchThe Gleaners and I (2000)Also in French
The Gleaners and I (2000)
Varda focuses her eye on gleaners: those who scour already-reaped fields for the odd potato or turnip. Her investigation leads from forgotten corners of the French countryside to off-hours at the green markets of Paris, following those who insist on finding a use for that which society has cast off, whether out of necessity or activism.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe Salt of the Earth (2014)
During the last forty years, the photographer Sebastião Salgado has been travelling through the continents, in the footsteps of an ever-changing humanity. He has witnessed the major events of our recent history: international conflicts, starvations and exodus… He is now embarking on the discovery of pristine territories, of the wild fauna and flora, of grandiose landscapes: a huge photographic project which is a tribute to the planet's beauty. Salgado's life and work are revealed to us by his son, Juliano, who went with him during his last journeys, and by Wim Wenders, a photographer himself.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisFaces Places (2017)
Director Agnès Varda and photographer/muralist JR journey through rural France and form an unlikely friendship.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Worth the HypeMovies like thisLove Means Zero (2017)
An in-depth look at famed tennis coach Nick Bollettieri. No other coach has matched his success, his dominance or his fame. His greatness, though, came at a terrible price.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Modern Life (2008)
For ten years, Raymond Depardon has followed the lives of farmer living in the mountain ranges. He allows us to enter their farms with astounding naturalness. This moving film speaks, with great serenity, of our roots and of the future of the people who work on the land. This the last part of Depardon's triptych "Profils paysans" about what it is like to be a farmer today in an isolated highland area in France. "La vie moderne" examines what has become of the persons he has followed for ten years, while featuring younger people who try to farm or raise cattle or poultry, come hell or high water.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Waste Land (2010)
An uplifting feature documentary highlighting the transformative power of art and the beauty of the human spirit. Top-selling contemporary artist Vik Muniz takes us on an emotional journey from Jardim Gramacho, the world's largest landfill on the outskirts of Rio de Janeiro, to the heights of international art stardom. Vik collaborates with the brilliant catadores, pickers of recyclable materials, true Shakespearean characters who live and work in the garbage quoting Machiavelli and showing us how to recycle ourselves.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Worth the HypeMovies like thisEmpire of Dust (2011)
Lao Yang is head of logistics of the group. He is responsible for the equipment, building materials and food (mainly chickens) to arrive in the isolated Chinese prefab camp. The Congolese government was supposed to deliver these things but so far the team hasn't received anything. With Eddy (a Congolese man who speaks Mandarin fluently) as an intermediate, Lao Yang is forced to leave the camp and deal with local Congolese entrepreneurs, because without the construction materials the road works will cease. What follows is an endless, harsh, but absurdly funny roller coaster of negotiations and misunderstandings, as Lao Yang learns about the Congolese way of making deals.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Daguerréotypes (1978)
An intimate portrait of the small shops and shopkeepers of the Rue Daguerre in Paris, a picturesque street that has been the filmmaker’s home for more than 50 years.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Worth the HypeMovies like thisBallad of the Little Soldier (1984)
A group of Miskito Indians use Nicaraguan child soldiers in their resistance against the Sandinistas.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Babies (2010)
A non-narrated documentary following the lovesome lives of four infants from birth to their first birthday. The babies featured are two from rural areas: Ponijao from Opuwo, Namibia, and Bayar from Bayanchandmani, Mongolia, as well as two from urban areas: Mari from Tokyo, Japan, and Hattie from San Francisco, USA.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Worth the HypeMovies like thisMugabe and the White African (2009)
Short-listed as one of the 15 best documentaries of the year, Mugabe And The White African is the story of one family's astonishing bravery as they fight to protect their property, their livelihood and their country. Mike Campbell is one of the few white farmers left in Zimbabwe since its leader, Robert Mugabe, enacted his disastrous land redistribution program. Once the breadbasket of Africa, Zimbabwe has since spiraled into chaos, the economy decimated as farms given to Mugabe cronies are run into ruin. After enduring years of intimidation and threats, Campbell decides to take action. Unable to call upon help from his country's authorities, he challenges Mugabe before an international court.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Machines (2017)
This portrayal of the rhythm of life and work in a gigantic textile factory in Gujarat, India, moves through the corridors and bowels of the enormously disorienting structure—taking the viewer on a journey of dehumanizing physical labor and intense hardship.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Minding the Gap (2018)
Three young men bond together to escape volatile families in their Rust Belt hometown. As they face adult responsibilities, unexpected revelations threaten their decade-long friendship.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe Boys of Baraka (2005)
Four 12-year-old black boys from one of the most violent ghettos in Baltimore, Maryland, are taken 10,000 miles away to an experimental boarding school in rural Kenya, to try to take advantage of the educational opportunities they can't get in their own country.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Exit Through the Gift Shop (2010)
Banksy is a graffiti artist with a global reputation whose work can be seen on walls from post-hurricane New Orleans to the separation barrier on the Palestinian West Bank. Fiercely guarding his anonymity to avoid prosecution, Banksy has so far resisted all attempts to be captured on film. Exit Through the Gift Shop tells the incredible true story of how an eccentric French shop keeper turned documentary maker attempted to locate and befriend Banksy, only to have the artist turn the camera back on its owner.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Worth the HypeMovies like thisFinding Vivian Maier (2014)
Vivian Maier's photos were seemingly destined for obscurity, lost among the clutter of the countless objects she'd collected throughout her life. Instead these images have shaken the world of street photography and irrevocably changed the life of the man who brought them to the public eye. This film brings to life the interesting turns and travails of the improbable saga of John Maloof's discovery of Vivian Maier, unravelling this mysterious tale through her documentary films, photographs, odd collections and personal accounts from the people that knew her. What started as a blog to show her work quickly became a viral sensation in the photography world. Photos destined for the trash heap now line gallery exhibitions, a forthcoming book and this documentary film.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Worth the HypeMovies like thisSchool Life (2017)
John and Amanda teach Latin, English and guitar at a fantastical stately home-turned-school. Nearly 50-year careers are drawing to a close for the pair who have become legends with the mantra: “Reading! ’Rithmetic! Rock ’n’ roll!” But for pupil and teacher alike, leaving is the hardest lesson.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Whores' Glory (2011)
In Bangkok, Thailand, women punch a clock and wait for clients in a brightly lit glass box; in the red-light district of Faridpur, Bangladesh, a madam haggles over the price of a teenage girl; and in the border town of Reynosa, Mexico, crack-addicted women pray to a deity named Lady Death.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisMur Murs (1982)
Venturing from Venice Beach to Watts, Varda looks at the murals of LA as backdrop to and mirror of the city’s many cultures. She casts a curious eye on graffiti and photorealism, roller disco & gang violence, evangelical Christians, Hare Krishnas, artists, angels and ordinary Angelenos.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Favela Rising (2005)
A man emerges from the slums of Rio to lead the nonviolent cultural movement known as Afro-reggae.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
The Beaches of Agnès (2008)
Filmmaking icon Agnès Varda, the award-winning director regarded by many as the grandmother of the French new wave, turns the camera on herself with this unique autobiographical documentary. Composed of film excerpts and elaborate dramatic re-creations, Varda's self-portrait recounts the highs and lows of her professional career, the many friendships that affected her life and her longtime marriage to cinematic giant Jacques Demy.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Worth the HypeMovies like thisI, a Negro (1959)
Winner of the prestigious Prix Louis Delluc in 1958, "Moi, un noir" marked Jean Rouch's break with traditional ethnography, and his embrace of the collaborative and improvisatory strategies he called "shared ethnography" and "ethnofiction". The film depicts an ordinary week in the lives of men and women from Niger who have migrated to Abidjan, Côte d'Ivoire for work.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Ghost Elephants (2026)
In Angola's mist-shrouded highlands, three KhoiSan master trackers embark on a spiritual quest to rediscover the legendary "ghost elephants" of Lisima, creatures presumed lost but remembered in ancestral trance, ritual, and memory.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Worth the HypeMovies like thisTo Be and to Have (2002)
The documentary's title translates as "to be and to have", the two auxiliary verbs in the French language. It is about a primary school in the commune of Saint-Étienne-sur-Usson, Puy-de-Dôme, France, the population of which is just over 200. The school has one small class of mixed ages (from four to twelve years), with a dedicated teacher, Georges Lopez, who shows patience and respect for the children as we follow their story through a single school year.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Worth the HypeMovies like thisWhat Would Sophia Loren Do? (2021)
Nancy Vincenza Kulik, an Italian-American grandmother from Fort Lee, New Jersey, has experienced many challenges and triumphs. But she always meets life's journey with love, resilience and joy, inspired in part by another Italian grandmother, movie star Sophia Loren.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Dahomey (2024)
Thousands of royal artifacts of Dahomey, a West African kingdom, were taken by French colonists in the 19th century for collection and display in Paris. Centuries later, a fraction returned to their home in modern-day Benin. This dramatized documentary follows the journey of 26 of the treasures as told by cultural art historians, embattled university students, and one of the repatriated statues himself.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisBambi: A Tale of Life in the Woods (2024)
The life of Bambi, a male roe deer, from his birth through childhood, the loss of his mother, the finding of a mate, the lessons he learns from his father, and the experience he gains about the dangers posed by human hunters in the forest.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both documentary
Popcorn FlickMovies like this180° South (2010)
The film follows adventurer Jeff Johnson as he retraces the epic 1968 journey of his heroes Yvon Chouinard and Doug Tompkins to Patagonia.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both documentary
Worth the HypeMovies like thisMy Mom Jayne (2025)
Through deeply personal interviews with her siblings and an examination of the photographs, letters, and belongings left behind, Mariska assembles a new portrait of her mother Jayne Mansfield, an extraordinary and complex woman.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both documentary
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisThe Crystal Calls - Making The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance (2019)
Go behind the scenes with stars, puppeteers and creators as they bring Jim Henson's magical world of Thra back to life in a sweeping fantasy series.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both documentary
Worth the HypeMovies like this
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Frequently asked questions
What are the best movies like Makala?
The closest matches to Makala are The Gleaners and I (2000), The Salt of the Earth (2014) and Faces Places (2017). Below are 27 more, each with the reason it matches.
What should I watch after Makala?
People who watched Makala most often go on to The Gleaners and I (2000), The Salt of the Earth (2014) and Faces Places (2017).
What is the highest-rated movie like Makala?
The Salt of the Earth (2014), rated 8.1/10 by 700 TMDB users.
What is the newest movie like Makala?
Ghost Elephants (2026) is the most recent release on this list.
Are there French movies like Makala?
Yes: The Gleaners and I (2000), The Salt of the Earth (2014) and Faces Places (2017).
How are movies similar to Makala chosen?
First come films that Trakt’s viewers watch alongside Makala, then TMDB’s recommendations and films it rates as similar in story and genre. Each pick says which signal put it there.