Movies like Les Misérables (2019)
The best movies like Les Misérables (2019) are The Stronghold (2021), Close Enemies (2018) and Santosh (2024). If Les Misérables hooked you with its crime and drama, these 30 similar films are what to watch next, and every pick says why it matches.
Quick picks
- Highest ratedCity of God (2002)8.4/10 from 8,610 votes
- NewestCase 137 (2025)Released 2025
- In FrenchThe Stronghold (2021)Also in French
The Stronghold (2021)
Tired of the small-time grind, three Marseille cops get a chance to bust a major drug network. But lines blur when a key informant makes a big ask.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both thriller & crime
Worth the HypeMovies like thisClose Enemies (2018)
Driss and Manuel both grew up on the same council estate. An estate where the sense of belonging to your patch is much stronger than the sense of belonging to a country, a nation or a culture... Manuel has assimilated this belonging, and he has even benefited from it and built his life on it. Driss, meanwhile, has shunned it. They will both have to face up to the consequences of their decisions – because they will each have a price to pay…
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama & thriller
SnoozefestMovies like thisSantosh (2024)
A government scheme sees newly widowed Santosh inherit her husband’s job as a police constable in the rural badlands of Northern India. When a low-caste girl is found raped and murdered, she is pulled into the investigation under the wing of charismatic feminist inspector Sharma.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both thriller & crime
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisCase 137 (2025)
When Internal Affairs officer Stéphanie investigates a young man severely injured during a chaotic Paris demonstration and finds no police misconduct, the routine case hits close to home upon her discovering the victim is from her native town.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both crime & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisDheepan (2015)
Three war-torn strangers posing as a family flee Sri Lanka’s civil war to start over in a troubled Paris suburb, but their past traumas resurface as they struggle to survive in their new environment.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both crime & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisAthena (2022)
Hours after the tragic death of their youngest brother in unexplained circumstances, three siblings have their lives thrown into chaos.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both thriller & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisA.C.A.B. - All Cops Are Bastards (2012)
A look at the controversial riot cops unit, told through the stories of three veteran cops and a young recruit.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama & crime
Worth the HypeMovies like thisAsphalt Playground (2013)
Mitraillette is 12 years old and lives in Rose City, a housing estate he would not leave for anything. His whole world comprises his family, especially his 16 year-old cousin Isma, who has taken a fancy to Narcisse, the local crime boss. His older brother Djibril is 22, a student at the Sorbonne who dreams of becoming a lawyer. As for Mitraillette, he has his eye on Océane, the most beautiful girl in his school...
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Kingdom (2024)
Lesia, a teenager, is taken by a man to a villa where her fugitive father and his men are hiding. A war erupts, leading to death and a chase where father and daughter bond.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both crime & drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisCity of God (2002)
In the poverty-stricken favelas of Rio de Janeiro in the 1970s, two young men choose different paths. Rocket is a budding photographer who documents the increasing drug-related violence of his neighborhood, while José “Zé” Pequeno is an ambitious drug dealer diving into a dangerous life of crime.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama & crime
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisLes Misérables (2017)
With a gun at his belt and a truncheon in his hand, Pento has just joined the Seine-Saint-Denis anti-crime brigade. With his teammates, he develops specific methods.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama & crime
Worth the HypeMovies like thisLa Haine (1995)
After a chaotic night of rioting in a marginal suburb of Paris, three young friends, Vinz, Hubert and Saïd, wander around unoccupied waiting for news about the state of health of a mutual friend who has been seriously injured when confronting the police.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisPolisse (2011)
Paris, France. Fred and his colleagues, members of the BPM, the Police Child Protection Unit, dedicated to pursuing all sorts of offenses committed against the weakest, must endure the scrutiny of Melissa, a photographer commissioned to graphically document the daily routine of the team.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama & crime
Worth the HypeMovies like thisTsotsi (2005)
A young South African boy from the Johannesburg ghetto named Tsotsi, meaning Gangster, leaves home as a child to get away from his helpless parents. Now a teenage thug, Tsotsi finds a baby in the back seat of a car he's just stolen. He decides that it is his responsibility to care for the infant and in the process learns that maybe the criminal life isn’t the best way.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both crime & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisSimply Black (2020)
A failed 40 year old comedian wants to organize the first Black protests in France but meeting with other French celebrities of the Black community will make it a whole new adventure.
Why it matches: Fans watch both
SnoozefestMovies like thisFor My Country (2023)
Aissa, a young officer of Algerian origin, tragically loses his life during a fresher initiation ritual at the prestigious French military academy of Saint-Cyr. As the death tears through his family, controversy arises over Aissa’s funeral plans when the Army refuses to take responsibility. Ismael, his older, rebellious brother, tries to keep the family united as they fight to win justice for Aissa.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisNight Shift (2020)
Three officers are tasked with escorting an illegal immigrant to Charles de Gaulle airport, where he will be forced onto a plane and sent back to his homeland. But when they find out about the truth, they have to make a difficult choice.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
SnoozefestMovies like thisA Gang Story (2011)
After growing up in a poor gypsy camp, Edmond Vidal, aka Momon, has retained a sense of family, unfailing loyalty and pride in his origins. Most of all, he has remained friends with Serge Suttel, with whom he first discovered prison life - for stealing cherries. The two of them inevitably got involved in organized crime. The team they formed, the Ganf Des Lyonnais, made them the most notorious armed robbers of the early 1970s. Their irresistible rise ended in 1974 with a spectacular arrest. Today, as he nears 60, Momon would like to forget that part of his life. He has found peace by retiring from the "business". He tends to his wife Janou, who suffered so in the past, and to his children and grandchildren, all of whom have great respect for this man of simple and universal values, so clear-headed and full of kindness. But then Serge Suttel, who has disowned nothing of his past, comes back into the picture.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both crime & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Hate U Give (2018)
Raised in a poverty-stricken slum, a 16-year-old girl named Starr now attends a suburban prep school. After she witnesses a police officer shoot her unarmed best friend, she's torn between her two very different worlds as she tries to speak her truth.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both crime & drama
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisThe Outsider (1983)
Philippe Jordan is a policeman prone to advancing the cause of justice by any means necessary. On his agenda is a powerful drug cartel working out of Paris and Marseilles, with a drug lord who is essentially inaccessible -- but not immortal.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both crime & thriller
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Class (2008)
Teacher and novelist François Bégaudeau plays a version of himself as he negotiates a year with his racially mixed students from a tough Parisian neighborhood.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like this36th Precinct (2004)
In Paris, two cops are competing for the vacant job of chief of police, in the middle of the search for a gang of violent thieves. The movie is directed by Olivier Marchal, a former police officer who spent 12 years with the French police before creating this story, taken in part from real events of the 1980s.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both crime & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisStreet Flow (2019)
Noumouké, from the suburb of Paris, is about to decide which brother's foot steps to follow - the lawyer student Soulaymaan or the gangster Demba.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama & crime
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisRhino (2021)
Ukraine, 1990s. Young Vova, cruel and tenacious, struggles to find his place among the ruthless members of the underworld in a city where crime and corruption reign.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama & crime
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Seed of the Sacred Fig (2024)
Investigating judge Iman grapples with paranoia amid political unrest in Tehran. When his gun vanishes, he suspects his wife and daughters, imposing draconian measures that strain family ties as societal rules crumble.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama & thriller
Worth the HypeMovies like thisGirlhood (2014)
Oppressed by her family setting, dead-end school prospects and the boys law in the neighborhood, Marieme starts a new life after meeting a group of three free-spirited girls. She changes her name, her dress code, and quits school to be accepted in the gang, hoping that this will be a way to freedom.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisParadise Now (2005)
Two childhood friends are recruited for a suicide bombing in Tel Aviv
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both crime & thriller
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Prey (2011)
A robber escapes from prison with a single objective in mind: to track down his former cellmate, a serial killer who intends to pin his crimes on him. A cop is sent after the robber who, despite his best efforts, soon becomes Public Enemy Number One. As the protagonists are driven to their limits, it becomes increasingly unclear who is the hunter and who is the prey.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both crime & thriller
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Fall of the American Empire (2018)
A shy and insecure delivery driver arrives on the scene of a robbery-gone-wrong and picks up two bags of cash and hides them in his truck. He is interrogated by two tough police detectives and manages to evade suspicion but he is warned that whoever owns the money will be looking for it. Only the help of a prostitute and a former biker recently released from jail might get him out of trouble.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both crime & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisBlack (2015)
Mavela, 15 years old, is a Black Bronx. She falls madly in love with Marwan, an extremely charismatic member of a rival gang, the 1080s. The young couple is forced to make a brutal choice between gang loyalty and the love they have for one another. An impossible dilemma.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like this
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Frequently asked questions
What are the best movies like Les Misérables?
The closest matches to Les Misérables are The Stronghold (2021), Close Enemies (2018) and Santosh (2024). Below are 27 more, each with the reason it matches.
What should I watch after Les Misérables?
People who watched Les Misérables most often go on to The Stronghold (2021), Close Enemies (2018) and Santosh (2024).
What is the highest-rated movie like Les Misérables?
City of God (2002), rated 8.4/10 by 8,610 TMDB users.
What is the newest movie like Les Misérables?
Case 137 (2025) is the most recent release on this list.
Are there French movies like Les Misérables?
Yes: The Stronghold (2021), Close Enemies (2018) and Santosh (2024).
How are movies similar to Les Misérables chosen?
First come films that Trakt’s viewers watch alongside Les Misérables, then TMDB’s recommendations and films it rates as similar in story and genre. Each pick says which signal put it there.