Movies like City of God (2002)
The best movies like City of God (2002) are Vitória (2025), Paid in Full (2002) and Elite Squad (2007). If City of God hooked you with its drama and crime, these 30 similar films are what to watch next, and every pick says why it matches.
Quick picks
- Highest ratedThe Godfather (1972)8.7/10 from 23,971 votes
- NewestVitória (2025)Released 2025
Vitória (2025)
Nina is an elderly woman who lives alone and feels distressed by the increasing violence in her neighborhood. Amidst conflicts with her neighbors, she decides to film the movement of drug traffickers from her window, hoping to assist the police. After months of recording suspicious activities, her initiative attracts the attention of a journalist, who approaches Nina and offers to support her in her mission.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & crime
Worth the HypeMovies like thisPaid in Full (2002)
Ace is an impressionable young man working for a dry cleaning business. His friend, drug dealer Mitch, goes to prison. In an unrelated incident, he finds some cocaine in a pants pocket. Soon, Ace finds himself dealing cocaine for Lulu. Via lucky breaks and solid interpersonal skills, Ace moves to the top of the Harlem drug world. Of course, unfaithful employees and/or rivals conspire to bring about Ace's fall.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both crime & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisElite Squad (2007)
In 1997, before the visit of the pope to Rio de Janeiro, Captain Nascimento from BOPE (Special Police Operations Battalion) is assigned to eliminate the risks of the drug dealers in a dangerous slum nearby where the pope intends to be lodged.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & crime
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisMy Name Ain't Johnny (2008)
The true story of João Guilherme Estrella ("Johnny"), a young middle-class bon vivant who became a big-time cocaine dealer in Rio de Janeiro in the early 1990s.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both crime & drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisBound by Honor (1993)
Based on the true life experiences of poet Jimmy Santiago Baca, the film focuses on half-brothers Paco and Cruz, and their bi-racial cousin Miklo. It opens in 1972, as the three are members of an East L.A. gang known as the "Vatos Locos", and the story focuses on how a violent crime and the influence of narcotics alter their lives. Miklo is incarcerated and sent to San Quentin, where he makes a "home" for himself. Cruz becomes an exceptional artist, but a heroin addiction overcomes him with tragic results. Paco becomes a cop and an enemy to his "carnal", Miklo.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both crime & drama
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisEnd of Watch (2012)
Two young officers are marked for death after confiscating a small cache of money and firearms from the members of a notorious cartel during a routine traffic stop.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both crime & drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe Bikeriders (2024)
After a chance encounter, headstrong Kathy is drawn to Benny, member of Midwestern motorcycle club the Vandals. As the club transforms into a dangerous underworld of violence, Benny must choose between Kathy and his loyalty to the club.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both crime & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisBelly (1998)
Tommy Bundy and Sincere are best friends as well as infamous and ruthless criminals and shot-callers in the hood. Respected by many but feared by all. As the police are closing in on them and new players are looking for a come up, will their reign last?
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both crime & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe General (1998)
The real-life story of Dublin folk hero and criminal Martin Cahill, who pulled off two daring robberies in Ireland with his team, but attracted unwanted attention from the police, the I.R.A., the U.V.F., and members of his own team.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both crime & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisAmerican Gangster (2007)
Loosely based on the criminal career of Frank Lucas, a gangster from La Grange, North Carolina, who smuggled heroin into the United States on American service planes returning from the Vietnam War, before being detained by a task force led by Newark Detective Richie Roberts.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & crime
Worth the HypeMovies like thisShottas (2002)
A raw urban drama about two friends raised on the dangerous streets of Kingston, Jamaica. Biggs and Wayne take on the "Shotta" way of life to survive. As young boys, they begin a life of crime, eventually moving to the US where they begin a ruthless climb from the bottom. They remain bound to each other by their shottas loyalty as they aggressively take control of the Jamaican underworld.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both crime & drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe Grissom Gang (1971)
Violent crime caper set in 1930s Kansas in which a gang kidnap an heiress and attempt to recover a ransom. However, the scheme is jeopardised when the leader falls in love with their beautiful captive.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both crime & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisAl Capone (1959)
In this unusually accurate biography, small-time hood Al Capone comes to Chicago at the dawn of Prohibition to be the bodyguard of racketeer Johnny Torrio. Capone's rise in Chicago gangdom is followed through murder, extortion, and political fraud. He becomes head of Chicago's biggest "business," but moves inexorably toward his downfall and ignominious end.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both crime & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisColombiana (2011)
After witnessing her parents’ murder as a child in Bogota, Cataleya Restrepo grows up to be a stone-cold assassin. She works for her uncle as a hitman by day, but her personal time is spent engaging in vigilante murders that she hopes will lead her to her ultimate target: the mobster responsible for her parents' death.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both crime & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisShaft (1971)
Cool Black private eye John Shaft is hired by a crime lord to find and retrieve his kidnapped daughter.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both crime & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisCity of Men (2007)
Best buddies Acerola and Laranjinha, about to turn 18, discover things about their missing fathers' pasts which will shatter their solid friendship, in the middle of a war between rival drug gangs from Rio's favelas.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisCode of Silence (1985)
A Chicago cop is caught in the middle of a gang war while his own comrades shun him because he wants to take an irresponsible cop down.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both crime
SnoozefestMovies like thisTrespass (1992)
Two Arkansas firemen, Vince and Don, get hold of a map that leads to a cache of stolen gold in an abandoned factory in East St. Louis. What they don't know is that the factory is on the turf of a local gang, who come by to execute one of their enemies. Vince sees the shooting, the gang spots Vince, and extended mayhem ensues. As Vince and Don try to escape, gang leader King James argues with his subordinate Savon about how to get rid of the trespassers.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both crime
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisHard Target (1993)
When a woman's father goes missing, she enlists a local to aid in her search. The pair soon discover that her father has died at the hands of a wealthy sportsman who hunts homeless men as a form of recreation.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both crime
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Big Heat (1953)
After the suspicious suicide of a fellow cop, tough homicide detective Dave Bannion takes the law into his own hands when he sets out to smash a vicious crime syndicate.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both crime
Worth the HypeMovies like thisScarface (1983)
After getting a green card in exchange for assassinating a Cuban government official, Tony Montana stakes a claim on the drug trade in Miami. Viciously murdering anyone who stands in his way, Tony eventually becomes the biggest drug lord in the state, controlling nearly all the cocaine that comes through Miami. But increased pressure from the police, wars with Colombian drug cartels and his own drug-fueled paranoia serve to fuel the flames of his eventual downfall.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both crime & drama
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisThe Godfather (1972)
Spanning the years 1945 to 1955, a chronicle of the fictional Italian-American Corleone crime family. When organized crime family patriarch, Vito Corleone barely survives an attempt on his life, his youngest son, Michael steps in to take care of the would-be killers, launching a campaign of bloody revenge.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama & crime
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisThe Godfather Part II (1974)
In the continuing saga of the Corleone crime family, a young Vito Corleone grows up in Sicily and in 1910s New York. In the 1950s, Michael Corleone attempts to expand the family business into Las Vegas, Hollywood and Cuba.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama & crime
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisThe Godfather Part III (1990)
In the midst of trying to legitimize his business dealings in 1979 New York and Italy, aging mafia don, Michael Corleone seeks forgiveness for his sins while taking a young protege under his wing.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both crime & drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisOliver Twist (2005)
An orphan endures a harsh life in a workhouse before fleeing to London, where he falls in with a gang of juvenile pickpockets led by the criminal Fagin, and eventually finds a better life, exposing the cruelties of poverty and child labor in Victorian England.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both crime & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisLucky Number Slevin (2006)
Slevin is mistakenly put in the middle of a personal war between the city’s biggest criminal bosses. Under constant watch, Slevin must try not to get killed by an infamous assassin and come up with an idea of how to get out of his current dilemma.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama & crime
Worth the HypeMovies like thisSnatch (2000)
Unscrupulous boxing promoters, violent bookies, a Russian gangster, incompetent amateur robbers, and supposedly Jewish jewellers fight to track down a priceless stolen diamond.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both crime
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe Untouchables (1987)
Elliot Ness, an ambitious prohibition agent, is determined to take down Al Capone. In order to achieve this goal, he forms a group given the nickname “The Untouchables”.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both crime
Worth the HypeMovies like thisDirty Dancing (1987)
Expecting the usual tedium that accompanies a summer in the Catskills with her family, 17-year-old Frances 'Baby' Houseman is surprised to find herself stepping into the shoes of a professional hoofer—and unexpectedly falling in love.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisLost in Translation (2003)
Two lost souls visiting Tokyo -- the young, neglected wife of a photographer and a washed-up movie star shooting a TV commercial -- find an odd solace and pensive freedom to be real in each other's company, away from their lives in America.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like this
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Frequently asked questions
What are the best movies like City of God?
The closest matches to City of God are Vitória (2025), Paid in Full (2002) and Elite Squad (2007). Below are 27 more, each with the reason it matches.
What should I watch after City of God?
Start with Vitória (2025), the closest match to City of God.
What is the highest-rated movie like City of God?
The Godfather (1972), rated 8.7/10 by 23,971 TMDB users.
What is the newest movie like City of God?
Vitória (2025) is the most recent release on this list.
How are movies similar to City of God chosen?
First come films that Trakt’s viewers watch alongside City of God, then TMDB’s recommendations and films it rates as similar in story and genre. Each pick says which signal put it there.