Movies like The Contender (2000)
The best movies like The Contender (2000) are Murder at 1600 (1997), Magpie (2024) and The Good Neighbor (2022). If The Contender hooked you with its drama and thriller, these 30 similar films are what to watch next, and every pick says why it matches.
Quick picks
- Highest ratedPurple Noon (1960)7.6/10 from 636 votes
- NewestA House of Dynamite (2025)Released 2025
Murder at 1600 (1997)
A secretary is found dead in a White House bathroom during an international crisis, and Detective Harlan Regis is in charge of the investigation. Despite resistance from the Secret Service, Regis partners with agent Nina Chance. As political tensions rise, they learn that the crime could be part of an elaborate cover-up. Framed as traitors, the pair, plus Regis' partner, break into the White House in order to expose the true culprit.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & thriller
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisMagpie (2024)
A couple's lives are thrown into disarray when their daughter is cast opposite a controversial major star.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both thriller & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Good Neighbor (2022)
A nightmarish evening unfolds for neighbors David and Robert when they accidentally hit a woman on her bike and flee the scene. While David is increasingly plagued by feelings of guilt, Robert shows no remorse and becomes overbearing and possessive.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both thriller & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Hummingbird Project (2019)
A pair of high-frequency traders go up against their old boss in an effort to make millions in a fiber-optic cable deal.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both thriller & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Truth About Emanuel (2013)
A troubled young woman becomes obsessed with her mysterious new neighbor, who bears a striking resemblance to the girl's dead mother.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & thriller
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Parallax View (1974)
An ambitious reporter gets in trouble while investigating a senator's assassination which leads to a vast conspiracy involving a multinational corporation behind every event in the world's headlines.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & thriller
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Pentagon Papers (2003)
This compelling political drama is based on the true story of high-ranking Pentagon official Daniel Ellsberg, who, during the Nixon era, strove to preserve American democracy by leaking top-secret documents to the New York Times and Washington Post. The documents in question would eventually become famous as the Pentagon Papers, which revealed the true reasons for U.S. involvement in Vietnam.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & thriller
SnoozefestMovies like thisHeatwave (2022)
A woman's life takes an unexpected turn when she falls for her boss's wife. She must soon defend herself as she becomes entangled in a web of malice.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both thriller & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisHorns (2013)
In the aftermath of his girlfriend's mysterious death, a young man awakens to strange horns sprouting from his temples.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & thriller
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Lords of Discipline (1983)
Will arrives for his last year at Military Academy, in the Deep South USA, in the 1960's. A black student, Pearce, has been accepted, for the first time and Will is asked to keep an eye out for the inevitable racism. The racists come in the form of The Ten, a secret group of the elite students. They want Pearce to leave on his own free will, but are prepared to torture him to make it 'his free will'. Will is forced to help Pearce and he is prepared to risk his own career to do so.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & thriller
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisAn Acceptable Loss (2019)
Former top U.S. security adviser Elizabeth "Libby" Lamm is threatened by associates from her dark past including Rachel Burke a steely, commanding politician with an unwavering knack for achieving her goals. Colluding with Rachel is Adrian, an unyielding, patriotic chief of staff. Martin harbors another type of obsession with Libby in this story of betrayal and regret.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both thriller & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisTyler Perry's Duplicity (2025)
High-powered attorney Marley faces her most personal case yet when she is tasked with uncovering the truth behind the murder of her best friend Fela’s husband. With the help of her boyfriend – a former cop turned private investigator – Marley’s search for what really happened leads her down a treacherous maze of deception and betrayal.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both thriller & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Good Doctor (2011)
Dr. Martin Blake, who has spent his life looking for respect, meets an 18-year-old patient named Diane, suffering from a kidney infection, and gets a much-needed boost of self-esteem. However, when her health starts improving, Martin fears losing her, so he begins tampering with her treatment, keeping Diane sick and in the hospital right next to him.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & thriller
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Independent (2022)
It's the final weeks of the most consequential presidential election in history. America is poised to elect either its first female president or its first viable independent candidate. Reporting history as it's made, an idealistic young journalist teams up with her idol, legendary journalist Nick Booker, to uncover a conspiracy that places the fate of the election, and the country, in their hands.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both thriller
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisA House of Dynamite (2025)
When a single, unattributed missile is launched at the United States, a race begins to determine who is responsible and how to respond.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both thriller
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisToo Big to Fail (2011)
An intimate look at the epochal financial crisis of 2008 and the powerful men and women who decided the fate of the world's economy in a matter of a few weeks.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisMax (2002)
In 1918, a young, disillusioned Adolf Hitler strikes up a friendship with a Jewish art dealer while weighing a life of passion for art vs. talent at politics
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisAn American Affair (2008)
In the early 1960s, teenager Adam Stafford (Cameron Bright) becomes obsessed with his new neighbor, Catherine Caswell (Gretchen Mol), a divorcée and free spirit. Stafford spies on Caswell as she meets with strange men, and, despite the warnings of his conservative parents, he begins working for her as a gardener. Amid rumors of her affair with President Kennedy, the two become close, but political intrigue surrounding her acquaintances soon infringes on their friendship.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
SnoozefestMovies like thisVice (2018)
George W. Bush picks Dick Cheney, the CEO of Halliburton Co., to be his Republican running mate in the 2000 presidential election. No stranger to politics, Cheney's impressive résumé includes stints as White House chief of staff, House Minority Whip and Defense Secretary. When Bush wins by a narrow margin, Cheney begins to use his newfound power to help reshape the country and the world.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisFast Track: No Limits (2008)
Four young thrill-seekers race cars on the streets of Germany.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both thriller
SnoozefestMovies like thisGone (2006)
A contemporary psychological thriller in which a young British couple travelling through the Australian outback become involved with a mysterious and charismatic American whose motive for imposing his friendship upon them becomes increasingly suspect and sinister.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama & thriller
SnoozefestMovies like thisD.C. Sniper: 23 Days of Fear (2003)
Based on the known events that shook the United States for 23 days in 2002. Within 24 hours six people were killed by a sniper in Maryland County. A man and his son get overlooked in all settings where shootings occur. The police, in cooperation with the FBI follows the wrong track of a white van, while the murderers act with impunity and panic seizes the population
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama & thriller
Fine Dead Girls (2002)
Iva and Marija, a young lesbian couple, rent an apartment in Zagreb, in a building that seems to provide a quiet and safe environment for their love, but over time the atmosphere in the building becomes more and more threatening. The elder landlady Olga dominates the building. Other tenants include her calm husband, her grown-up son Daniel who has a crush on Iva, the prostitute Lidija, an abused housewife, a widower keeping the corpse of his newly deceased wife, a gynecologist performing abortions in one flat of the house, and an ex-soldier who regularly plays martial music at night. After Olga finds out that Iva and Marija are lesbians, the situation escalates .
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both thriller & drama
Three (2005)
After a yachting accident, a millionaire and his wife are shipwrecked on a desert island along with their former deckhand, Manuel.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama & thriller
SnoozefestMovies like thisHannibal (2001)
After having successfully eluded the authorities for years, Hannibal peacefully lives in Italy in disguise as an art scholar. Trouble strikes again when he's discovered leaving a deserving few dead in the process. He returns to America to make contact with now disgraced Agent Clarice Starling, who is suffering the wrath of a malicious FBI rival as well as the media.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama & thriller
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Quiet Earth (1985)
After a top-secret experiment misfires, a scientist may be the only man left alive in the world.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama & thriller
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Day the Earth Stood Still (2008)
A representative of an alien race that went through drastic evolution to survive its own climate change, Klaatu comes to Earth to assess whether humanity can prevent the environmental damage they have inflicted on their own planet. When barred from speaking to the United Nations, he decides humankind shall be exterminated so the planet can survive.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama & thriller
SnoozefestMovies like thisA Simple Plan (1998)
Captivated by the lure of sudden wealth, the quiet rural lives of two brothers erupt into conflicts of greed, paranoia and distrust when over $4 million in cash is discovered at the remote site of a downed small airplane. Their simple plan to retain the money while avoiding detection opens a Pandora's box when the fear of getting caught triggers panicked behavior and leads to virulent consequences.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama & thriller
Worth the HypeMovies like thisPurple Noon (1960)
Tom Ripley is a talented mimic, moocher, forger and all-around criminal improviser; but there's more to Tom Ripley than even he can guess.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama & thriller
Worth the HypeMovies like thisNightcap (2000)
Mika, heiress to a Swiss chocolate company, is married to celebrated pianist André and stepmother to his son, Guillaume, whose mother died in a car wreck on his tenth birthday. Their lives are interrupted by the unexpected arrival of Jeanne, a young woman who has learned she was almost switched with Guillaume at birth.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both thriller & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like this
Like The Contender and something else?
Blend two favourites and we’ll find the films in between.
Frequently asked questions
What are the best movies like The Contender?
The closest matches to The Contender are Murder at 1600 (1997), Magpie (2024) and The Good Neighbor (2022). Below are 27 more, each with the reason it matches.
What should I watch after The Contender?
Start with Murder at 1600 (1997), the closest match to The Contender.
What is the highest-rated movie like The Contender?
Purple Noon (1960), rated 7.6/10 by 636 TMDB users.
What is the newest movie like The Contender?
A House of Dynamite (2025) is the most recent release on this list.
Are there English movies like The Contender?
Yes: Murder at 1600 (1997), Magpie (2024) and The Good Neighbor (2022).
How are movies similar to The Contender chosen?
First come films that Trakt’s viewers watch alongside The Contender, then TMDB’s recommendations and films it rates as similar in story and genre. Each pick says which signal put it there.