Movies like Shtetl (1996)
The best movies like Shtetl (1996) are One Life (2023), Alpha (2018) and Sunshine (1999). If Shtetl hooked you, these 20 similar films are what to watch next, and every pick says why it matches.
Quick picks
- Highest ratedOne Life (2023)7.8/10 from 1,016 votes
- NewestEleanor the Great (2025)Released 2025
One Life (2023)
British stockbroker Nicholas Winton visits Czechoslovakia in the 1930s and forms plans to assist in the rescue of Jewish children before the onset of World War II, in an operation that came to be known as the Kindertransport.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Worth the HypeMovies like thisAlpha (2018)
In the prehistoric past, Keda, a young and inexperienced hunter, struggles to return home after being separated from his tribe when bison hunting goes awry. On his way back he will find an unexpected ally.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisSunshine (1999)
The fate of a Hungarian Jewish family throughout the 20th century.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisDisobedience (2018)
New York photographer Ronit flies to London after learning about the death of her estranged father. Ronit is returning to the same Orthodox Jewish community that shunned her decades earlier for her childhood attraction to Esti, a female friend. Their fortuitous and happy reunion soon reignites their burning passion as the two women explore the boundaries of faith and sexuality.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisJakob the Liar (1999)
In 1944 Poland, a Jewish shop keeper named Jakob is summoned to ghetto headquarters after being caught out after curfew. While waiting for the German Kommondant, Jakob overhears a German radio broadcast about Russian troop movements. Returned to the ghetto, the shopkeeper shares his information with a friend and then rumors fly that there is a secret radio within the ghetto.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisA Real Pain (2024)
Mismatched cousins David and Benji reunite for a tour through Poland to honor their beloved grandmother. The adventure takes a turn when the pair's old tensions resurface against the backdrop of their family history.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisA Christmas Prince: The Royal Baby (2019)
Christmas brings the ultimate gift to Aldovia: a royal baby. But first, Queen Amber must help her family and kingdom by finding a missing peace treaty.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisEleanor the Great (2025)
94-year-old Eleanor Morgenstein tries to rebuild her life after the death of her best friend. As a result, she moves back to New York City after living in Florida for decades.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisSophie's Choice (1982)
Stingo, a young writer, moves to Brooklyn in 1947 to begin work on his first novel. As he becomes friendly with Sophie and her lover Nathan, he learns that she is a Holocaust survivor. Flashbacks reveal her harrowing story, from pre-war prosperity to Auschwitz. In the present, Sophie and Nathan's relationship increasingly unravels as Stingo grows closer to Sophie and Nathan's fragile mental state becomes ever more apparent.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Worth the HypeMovies like thisRadio Days (1987)
The Narrator tells us how the radio influenced his childhood in the days before TV. In the New York City of the late 1930s to the New Year's Eve 1944, this coming-of-age tale mixes the narrator's experiences with contemporary anecdotes and urban legends of the radio stars.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Worth the HypeMovies like thisAvalon (1990)
A Polish-Jewish family comes to the U.S. at the beginning of the twentieth century. There, the family and their children try to make themselves a better future in the so-called promised land.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisSchool Ties (1992)
When David Greene receives a football scholarship to a prestigious prep school in the 1950s, he feels pressure to hide the fact that he is Jewish from his classmates and teachers, fearing that they may be anti-Semitic. He quickly becomes the big man on campus thanks to his football skills, but when his Jewish background is discovered, his worst fears are realized and his friends turn on him with violent threats and public ridicule.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisBlade of the 47 Ronin (2022)
A new class of warriors emerges among the Samurai clans to keep a sought-after sword from falling into the wrong hands.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisTorn Curtain (1966)
During the Cold War, an American scientist appears to defect to East Germany as part of a cloak and dagger mission to find the formula for a resin solution—but the plan goes awry when his fiancee, unaware of his motivation, follows him across the border.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Believer (2001)
A hardcore US racist skinhead who, because of his intelligence, leads a gang dedicated to fighting the enemy: the supposed American-Jewish conspiracy for domination. However, he's hiding a secret: he's Jewish-born, a brilliant scholar whose questioning of the tenets of his faith has left him angry and confused, turning against those who he thinks have a tragic history of their own making.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisMisha and the Wolves (2021)
A woman’s Holocaust memoir takes the world by storm, but a fallout with her publisher-turned-detective reveals her story as an audacious deception created to hide a darker truth.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Station Agent (2003)
When his only friend dies, a man born with dwarfism moves to rural New Jersey to live a life of solitude, only to meet a chatty hot dog vendor and a woman dealing with her own personal loss.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Worth the HypeMovies like thisTrue Stories (1986)
A small but growing Texas town, filled with strange and musical characters, celebrates its sesquicentennial and converge on a local parade and talent show.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisEverything Is Illuminated (2005)
A young Jewish American man endeavors—with the help of eccentric, distant relatives—to find the woman who saved his grandfather during World War II—in a Ukrainian village which was ultimately razed by the Nazis.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Worth the HypeMovies like thisWhite Men Can't Jump (1992)
Two street basketball hustlers try to con each other, then team up for a bigger score.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Popcorn FlickMovies like this
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Frequently asked questions
What are the best movies like Shtetl?
The closest matches to Shtetl are One Life (2023), Alpha (2018) and Sunshine (1999). Below are 17 more, each with the reason it matches.
What should I watch after Shtetl?
Start with One Life (2023), the closest match to Shtetl.
What is the highest-rated movie like Shtetl?
One Life (2023), rated 7.8/10 by 1,016 TMDB users.
What is the newest movie like Shtetl?
Eleanor the Great (2025) is the most recent release on this list.
Are there English movies like Shtetl?
Yes: One Life (2023), Alpha (2018) and Sunshine (1999).
How are movies similar to Shtetl chosen?
First come films that Trakt’s viewers watch alongside Shtetl, then TMDB’s recommendations and films it rates as similar in story and genre. Each pick says which signal put it there.