Movies like King in the Wilderness (2018)
The best movies like King in the Wilderness (2018) are MLK/FBI (2020), Half the Picture (2018) and John Lewis: Good Trouble (2020). If King in the Wilderness hooked you with its documentary, these 30 similar films are what to watch next, and every pick says why it matches.
Quick picks
- Highest ratedRBG (2018)7.5/10 from 318 votes
- NewestSunday Best: The Untold Story of Ed Sullivan (2023)Released 2023
MLK/FBI (2020)
Based on newly declassified files, the film explores the US government’s surveillance and harassment of Martin Luther King, Jr.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Half the Picture (2018)
At a pivotal moment for gender equality in Hollywood, successful women directors talk about their art, lives and careers.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
John Lewis: Good Trouble (2020)
The timely biopic focuses on John Lewis’ longstanding prominence as a civil rights champion and his continuing crusade for racial and social equality. The documentary illuminates the 80-year-old Congressman’s life as it chronicles the moments on the extraordinary journey that have shaped his place in history and make him such a galvanizing figure today as protests circle the globe. Lewis’ schedule has increased ten-fold as he has become the go-to figure for TV news shows, podcasts and newspapers and magazines from the Washington Post to Vanity Fair, commenting on and leading the way forward through today’s worldwide protests and demonstrations.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Jane Fonda in Five Acts (2018)
Girl next door, activist, so-called traitor, fitness tycoon, Oscar winner: Jane Fonda has lived a life of controversy, tragedy and transformation – and she's done it all in the public eye. An intimate look at one woman's singular journey.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Worth the HypeMovies like thisRBG (2018)
Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg now 84, and still inspired by the lawyers who defended free speech during the Red Scare, Ginsburg refuses to relinquish her passionate duty, steadily fighting for equal rights for all citizens under the law. Through intimate interviews and unprecedented access to Ginsburg’s life outside the court, RBG tells the electric story of Ginsburg’s consuming love affairs with both the Constitution and her beloved husband Marty—and of a life’s work that led her to become an icon of justice in the highest court in the land.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe One and Only Dick Gregory (2021)
This revealing portrait of comedian, activist, pop-culture icon and thought leader Dick Gregory documents his many personal reinventions throughout the decades, from celebrity to civil rights hero and beyond, while hearing from the incredible entertainers who have been inspired by his blueprint.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Sunday Best: The Untold Story of Ed Sullivan (2023)
Ed Sullivan broke barriers by booking Black artists on his Sunday night variety show. This documentary spotlights the TV pioneer's legacy of equality.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Life Itself (2014)
The surprising and entertaining life of renowned film critic and social commentator Roger Ebert (1942-2013): his early days as a freewheeling bachelor and Pulitzer Prize winner, his famously contentious partnership with Gene Siskel, his life-altering marriage, and his brave and transcendent battle with cancer.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Worth the HypeMovies like thisSiempre, Luis (2020)
A story that embodies the tenacity and passion of the American Dream, this documentary is a portrait of the pioneering activist Luis A. Miranda Jr. Luis is a decades-long fighter for Latino communities, a key player in the New York and national political arena, and a loving father of three – including the award-winning composer, lyricist and actor, Lin-Manuel Miranda.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Bad Reputation (2018)
The life and career of rock n' roll icon Joan Jett from her early years ripping it up onstage as the founder and backbone of hard-rock legends The Runaways, to her long time collaboration with Kenny Laguna as Joan Jett & the Blackhearts, and her enduring presence in pop culture as a rock pioneer and mentor. With her inimitable singles "I Love Rock n Roll," and "Bad Reputation" Joan Jett inspired a generation of young women to rock.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisNorman Lear: Just Another Version of You (2016)
Arguably the most influential creator, writer, and producer in the history of television, Norman Lear brought primetime into step with the times. Using comedy and indelible characters, his legendary 1970s shows such as All In the Family, Maude, Good Times, and The Jeffersons, boldly cracked open dialogue and shifted the national consciousness, injecting enlightened humanism into sociopolitical debates on race, class, creed, and feminism.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
He Named Me Malala (2015)
A look at the events leading up to the Taliban's attack on the young Pakistani school girl, Malala Yousafzai, for speaking out on girls' education and the aftermath, including her speech to the United Nations.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisEvery Act of Life (2018)
The life of Tony-winning playwright Terrence McNally (Master Class, Ragtime): 60 years of groundbreaking plays and musicals, the struggle for gay rights, addiction and recovery, finding true love, and the relentless pursuit of inspiration.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Whose Streets? (2017)
A nonfiction account of the Ferguson uprising told by the people who lived it, this is an unflinching look at how the killing of 18-year-old Michael Brown inspired a community to fight back—and sparked a global movement.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
White Right: Meeting the Enemy (2017)
Emmy award-winning filmmaker Deeyah Khan joins the frontline of the race wars in America, sitting down face-to-face with Neo-Nazis and fascists.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Mercury 13 (2018)
After rigorous testing in 1961, a small group of skilled female pilots are asked to step aside when only men are selected for spaceflight.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisMichael Moore in TrumpLand (2016)
Oscar-winner Michael Moore dives right into hostile territory with his daring and hilarious one-man show, deep in the heart of TrumpLand in the weeks before the 2016 election.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
SnoozefestMovies like thisThe Long Shadow (2018)
When filmmaker and investigative journalist Frances Causey, a daughter of the South, set out to explore the continuing racial divisions in the US, what she discovered was that the politics of slavery didn't end with the Civil War. In an astonishingly candid look at the United States' original sin, The Long Shadow traces slavery's history from America's founding up through its insidious ties to racism today.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Point and Shoot (2014)
At first glance, Matthew VanDyke—a shy Baltimore native with a sheltered upbringing and a tormenting OCD diagnosis—is the last person you’d imagine on the front lines of the 2011 Libyan revolution. But after finishing grad school and escaping the U.S. for "a crash course in manhood," a winding path leads him just there. Motorcycling across North Africa and the Middle East and spending time as an embedded journalist in Iraq, Matthew lands in Libya, forming an unexpected kinship with a group of young men who transform his life. Matthew joins his friends in the rebel army against Gaddafi, taking up arms (and a camera). Along the way, he is captured and held in solitary confinement for six terrifying months.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Winnie (2017)
While her husband served a life sentence, paradoxically kept safe and morally uncontaminated, Winnie Mandela rode the raw violence of apartheid, fighting on the front line and underground. This is the untold story of the mysterious forces that combined to take her down, labeling him a saint, her, a sinner.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
The Final Year (2018)
Featuring unprecedented access inside the White House and State Department, The Final Year offers an uncompromising view of the inner workings of the Obama Administration as they prepare to leave power after eight years.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Worth the HypeMovies like thisAn Inconvenient Sequel: Truth to Power (2017)
A decade after An Inconvenient Truth brought climate change into the heart of popular culture comes the riveting and rousing follow-up that shows just how close we are to a real energy revolution. Vice President Al Gore continues his tireless fight, traveling around the world training an army of climate champions and influencing international climate policy. Cameras follow him behind the scenes—in moments private and public, funny and poignant—as he pursues the empowering notion that while the stakes have never been higher, the perils of climate change can be overcome with human ingenuity and passion.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisJane (2017)
Drawing from never-before-seen footage that has been tucked away in the National Geographic archives, director Brett Morgen tells the story of Jane Goodall, a woman whose chimpanzee research revolutionized our understanding of the natural world.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe King (2018)
A cultural portrait of the American dream at a critical time in the nation’s history. Set against the 2016 American election, The King takes a musical road trip across the country in Elvis Presley's 1963 Rolls Royce.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Cuba and the Cameraman (2017)
This revealing portrait of Cuba follows the lives of Fidel Castro and three Cuban families affected by his policies over the last four decades.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Worth the HypeMovies like thisJim: The James Foley Story (2016)
In August, 2014, a video of the public execution of American photojournalist James Foley rippled across the globe. Foley wore an orange jumpsuit as he knelt beside an ISIS militant dressed in black. That image challenged the world to deal with a new face of terror. And it tested one American family. Seen through the lens of filmmaker Brian Oakes, Foley’s close childhood friend, Jim takes us from small-town New England to the adrenaline-fueled front lines of Libya and Syria, where Foley pushed the limits of danger to report on the plight of civilians impacted by war.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Worth the HypeMovies like thisMaya Angelou: And Still I Rise (2016)
A celebration of Dr. Maya Angelou by weaving her words with rare and intimate archival photographs and videos, which paint hidden moments of her exuberant life during some of America’s most defining civil rights moments. From her upbringing in the Depression-era South to her swinging soirees with Malcolm X in Ghana to her inaugural speech for President Bill Clinton, we are given special access to interviews with Dr. Angelou whose indelible charm and quick wit make it easy to love her.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Created Equal: Clarence Thomas in His Own Words (2020)
Justice Thomas tells his entire life’s story, looking directly at the camera, speaking frankly to the audience. Unscripted and without narration, the documentary takes the viewer through a complex and often painful life, dealing with race, faith, power, jurisprudence, and personal resilience.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
I Am Paul Walker (2018)
Exploring the life and legacy of actor Paul Walker, the Southern California native who cut his teeth as child actor before breaking out in the blockbuster Fast and Furious franchise.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisMaiden (2019)
In a moving portrait of resilience, Alex Holmes chronicles the unprecedented journey of 24-year-old Tracy Edwards and the first all-female sailing crew to enter the Whitbread Round the World Race.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both documentary
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Frequently asked questions
What are the best movies like King in the Wilderness?
The closest matches to King in the Wilderness are MLK/FBI (2020), Half the Picture (2018) and John Lewis: Good Trouble (2020). Below are 27 more, each with the reason it matches.
What should I watch after King in the Wilderness?
People who watched King in the Wilderness most often go on to MLK/FBI (2020), Half the Picture (2018) and John Lewis: Good Trouble (2020).
What is the highest-rated movie like King in the Wilderness?
RBG (2018), rated 7.5/10 by 318 TMDB users.
What is the newest movie like King in the Wilderness?
Sunday Best: The Untold Story of Ed Sullivan (2023) is the most recent release on this list.
Are there English movies like King in the Wilderness?
Yes: MLK/FBI (2020), Half the Picture (2018) and John Lewis: Good Trouble (2020).
How are movies similar to King in the Wilderness chosen?
First come films that Trakt’s viewers watch alongside King in the Wilderness, then TMDB’s recommendations and films it rates as similar in story and genre. Each pick says which signal put it there.