Movies like Hydra (2020)
The best movies like Hydra (2020) are Lust for Life (1956), Selena (1997) and Dalíland (2022). If Hydra hooked you, these 20 similar films are what to watch next, and every pick says why it matches.
Hydra
Quick picks
- Highest ratedEverybody’s Everything (2019)8.4/10 from 311 votes
- NewestMy Mom Jayne (2025)Released 2025
Lust for Life (1956)
An intense and imaginative artist, revered Dutch painter Vincent van Gogh possesses undeniable talent, but he is plagued by mental problems and frustrations with failure. Supported by his brother, Theo, the tormented Van Gogh eventually leaves Holland for France, where he meets volatile fellow painter Paul Gauguin and struggles to find greater inspiration.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Worth the HypeMovies like thisSelena (1997)
In this biographical drama, Selena Quintanilla is born into a musical Mexican-American family in Texas. Her father, Abraham, realizes that his young daughter is talented and begins performing with her at small venues. She finds success and falls for her guitarist, Chris Perez, who draws the ire of her father. Seeking mainstream stardom, Selena begins recording an English-language album which, tragically, she would never complete.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Worth the HypeMovies like thisDalíland (2022)
In 1973, a young gallery assistant goes on a wild adventure behind the scenes as he helps aging genius Salvador Dali prepare for a big show in New York.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
SnoozefestMovies like thisLove Is the Devil: Study for a Portrait of Francis Bacon (1998)
In the 1960s, British painter Francis Bacon surprises a burglar and invites him to share his bed. The burglar, a working class man named George Dyer, accepts. After the unique beginning to their love affair, the well-connected and volatile artist assimilates Dyer into his circle of eccentric friends, as Dyer's struggle with addiction strains their bond.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisManiac (2012)
As he helps a young artist with her upcoming exhibition, the owner of a mannequin shop's deadly, suppressed desires come to the surface.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisBettie Page Reveals All (2013)
The world's greatest pin-up model and cult icon, Bettie Page, recounts the true story of how her free expression overcame government witch-hunts to help launch America's sexual revolution. When she saw the film The Notorious Bettie Page, produced by HBO in 2006, the main person concerned reacted unequivocally: “Lies! Lies!” In a long interview recorded shortly before her death, the woman who entered the collective unconscious as the ultimate pin-up gave her version of events to director Mark Mori. In a gravelly voice, Bettie Page tells her own story and lifts the veil on areas often hidden by images that have made so many men and women fantasize since the 1950s: her abused childhood, an eclipse that lasted forty years, her mental illness. Through testimonies and unpublished archives, this documentary brings back to life a body and a face endlessly declined before our eyes, just as Bettie wanted: “I would like people to remember me as I was in the photos.”
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisEverybody’s Everything (2019)
The story of artist Lil Peep from his birth in Long Island and meteoric rise as a genre blending pop star & style icon, to his death due to an accidental opioid overdose in Arizona at just 21 years of age.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisFrida (2002)
A biography of artist Frida Kahlo, who channeled the pain of a crippling injury and her tempestuous marriage into her work.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Worth the HypeMovies like thisMiss Americana (2020)
A raw and emotionally revealing look at one of the most iconic artists of our time during a transformational period in her life as she learns to embrace her role not only as a songwriter and performer, but as a woman harnessing the full power of her voice.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Worth the HypeMovies like thisFur: An Imaginary Portrait of Diane Arbus (2006)
In 1958 New York Diane Arbus is a housewife and mother who works as an assistant to her husband, a photographer employed by her wealthy parents. Respectable though her life is, she cannot help but feel uncomfortable in her privileged world. One night, a new neighbor catches Diane's eye, and the enigmatic man inspires her to set forth on the path to discovering her own artistry.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisMy Mom Jayne (2025)
Through deeply personal interviews with her siblings and an examination of the photographs, letters, and belongings left behind, Mariska assembles a new portrait of her mother Jayne Mansfield, an extraordinary and complex woman.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisThe Two Mrs. Carrolls (1947)
Struggling artist Geoffrey Carroll meets Sally while on holiday in the country. A romance develops, but he doesn't tell her he's already married. Suffering from mental illness, Geoffrey returns home where he paints an impression of his wife as the angel of death and then promptly poisons her. He marries Sally but after a while he finds a strange urge to paint her as the angel of death too and history seems about to repeat itself.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisFinding Vivian Maier (2014)
Vivian Maier's photos were seemingly destined for obscurity, lost among the clutter of the countless objects she'd collected throughout her life. Instead these images have shaken the world of street photography and irrevocably changed the life of the man who brought them to the public eye. This film brings to life the interesting turns and travails of the improbable saga of John Maloof's discovery of Vivian Maier, unravelling this mysterious tale through her documentary films, photographs, odd collections and personal accounts from the people that knew her. What started as a blog to show her work quickly became a viral sensation in the photography world. Photos destined for the trash heap now line gallery exhibitions, a forthcoming book and this documentary film.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Worth the HypeMovies like thisPollock (2000)
In August of 1949, Life Magazine ran a banner headline that begged the question: "Jackson Pollock: Is he the greatest living painter in the United States?" The film is a look back into the life of an extraordinary man, a man who has fittingly been called "an artist dedicated to concealment, a celebrity who nobody knew." As he struggled with self-doubt, engaging in a lonely tug-of-war between needing to express himself and wanting to shut the world out, Pollock began a downward spiral.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisPariah (2011)
A Brooklyn teenager juggles conflicting identities and risks friendship, heartbreak, and family in a desperate search for sexual expression.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisScandalous Sex (2004)
A daughter seeks to restore the reputation of her disgraced father, a wronged college professor. With help of a professional student, she must overcome an ambitious sorority bitch and corrupt college dean.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisMapplethorpe: Look at the Pictures (2016)
Nude men in rubber suits, close-ups of erections, objects shoved in the most intimate of places—these are photographs taken by Robert Mapplethorpe, known by many as the most controversial photographer of the twentieth century. Openly gay, Mapplethorpe took images of male sex, nudity, and fetish to extremes that resulted in his work still being labelled by some as pornography masquerading as art. But less talked about are the more serene, yet striking portraits of flowers, sculptures, and perfectly framed human forms that are equally pioneering and powerful.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisPicture Perfect (1997)
A young advertising executive's life becomes increasingly complicated when, in order to impress her boss, she pretends to be engaged to a man she has just met.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
SnoozefestMovies like thisSomewhere in Time (1980)
Young writer Richard Collier is met on the opening night of his first play by an old lady who begs him to "Come back to me". Mystified, he tries to find out about her, and learns that she is a famous stage actress from the early twentieth century. Becoming more and more obsessed with her, by self-hypnosis he manages to travel back in time—where he meets her.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Worth the HypeMovies like this3 Women (1977)
Two co-workers, one a vain woman and the other an awkward teenager, share an increasingly bizarre relationship after becoming roommates.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
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Frequently asked questions
What are the best movies like Hydra?
The closest matches to Hydra are Lust for Life (1956), Selena (1997) and Dalíland (2022). Below are 17 more, each with the reason it matches.
What should I watch after Hydra?
Start with Lust for Life (1956), the closest match to Hydra.
What is the highest-rated movie like Hydra?
Everybody’s Everything (2019), rated 8.4/10 by 311 TMDB users.
What is the newest movie like Hydra?
My Mom Jayne (2025) is the most recent release on this list.
Are there English movies like Hydra?
Yes: Lust for Life (1956), Selena (1997) and Dalíland (2022).
How are movies similar to Hydra chosen?
First come films that Trakt’s viewers watch alongside Hydra, then TMDB’s recommendations and films it rates as similar in story and genre. Each pick says which signal put it there.