Movies like Deadly Swords in Search of Hidden Gold (1983)
The best movies like Deadly Swords in Search of Hidden Gold (1983) are Munich - The Edge of War (2021), Radium Girls (2020) and Humanity and Paper Balloons (1937). If Deadly Swords in Search of Hidden Gold hooked you with its drama and history, these 30 similar films are what to watch next, and every pick says why it matches.
Quick picks
- Highest ratedHarakiri (1962)8.5/10 from 1,325 votes
- NewestGolden Kamuy -The Abashiri Prison Raid- (2026)Released 2026
- In JapaneseHumanity and Paper Balloons (1937)Also in Japanese
Munich - The Edge of War (2021)
At the tense 1938 Munich Conference, former friends who now work for opposing governments become reluctant spies racing to expose a Nazi secret.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & history
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisRadium Girls (2020)
Young women toiling in a factory are exposed to hazardous material which takes a disastrous toll on their health.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & history
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisHumanity and Paper Balloons (1937)
In a slum in Edo Japan, a ronin hopes that his deceased father's former master will hire him while a disgraced hairdresser attempts to regain his pride by kidnapping the daughter of a wealthy pawnbroker, who is set to be married.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & history
Worth the HypeMovies like thisOranges and Sunshine (2010)
The story of Margaret Humphreys, a social worker from Nottingham, who uncovers one of the most significant social scandals in recent times – the forced migration of children from the United Kingdom to Australia and other Commonwealth countries. Almost singlehandedly, Margaret reunited thousands of families, brought authorities to account and worldwide attention to an extraordinary miscarriage of justice.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & history
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisSnow Flower and the Secret Fan (2011)
A story set in 19th century China and centered on the lifelong friendship between two girls who develop their own secret code as a way to contend with the rigid cultural norms imposed on women.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & history
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisChûshingura (1962)
After their lord is tricked into committing ritual suicide, forty-seven samurai warriors await the chance to avenge their master and reclaim their honor.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both history & drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisAdventures of a Mathematician (2021)
The warmhearted story of Polish immigrant and mathematician Stan Ulam, who moved to the U.S. in the 1930s. Stan deals with the difficult losses of family and friends all while helping to create the hydrogen bomb and the first computer.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & history
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Book of Daniel (2013)
Taken into slavery after the fall of Jerusalem in 605 B.C., Daniel is forced to serve the most powerful king in the world, King Nebuchadnezzar. Faced with imminent death, Daniel proves himself a trusted Advisor and is placed among the king's wise men. Threatened by death at every turn Daniel never ceases to serve the king until he is forced to choose between serving the king or honoring God. With his life at stake, Daniel has nothing but his faith to stand between him and the lions' den.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & history
Worth the HypeMovies like thisJulia (1977)
At the behest of an old and dear friend, playwright Lillian Hellman undertakes a dangerous mission to smuggle funds into Nazi Germany.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & history
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisSamurai Assassin (1965)
Japan, 1860. The men of the Mito clan, victims of the Ansei purge, anxiously prowl around the Sakurada Gate of Edo Castle with the intention of assassinating Naosuke Ii of Hikone, tairō of the Tokugawa shogunate and responsible for their misfortune.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & history
Worth the HypeMovies like thisPanther (1995)
In this sprawling, fictionalized history of the Black Panthers, 1960s Oakland becomes a war zone as the Panthers battle for the right to exist.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & history
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisShattered Glass (2003)
Stephen Glass is a staff writer for the respected current events and policy magazine The New Republic and a freelance feature writer for publications such as Rolling Stone, Harper's and George. By the mid-90s, Glass' articles had turned him into one of the most sought-after young journalists in Washington, but a bizarre chain of events - chronicled in Buzz Bissinger's September 1998 Vanity Fair article - suddenly stopped his career in its tracks.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & history
Worth the HypeMovies like thisGolden Kamuy -The Abashiri Prison Raid- (2026)
As each group pursues their mission, a fierce battle unfolds over the tattooed prisoners. Who is friend, and who is foe? The fight leads them all to Abashiri Prison, where Noppera-bo, the man who holds all the answers, is locked away...
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & history
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe Scarlet and the Black (1983)
Fr. Hugh O'Flaherty is a Vatican official in 1943-45 who has been hiding downed pilots, escaped prisoners of war, and Italian resistance families. His activities become so large that the Nazis decide to assassinate him the next time he leaves the Vatican.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & history
Worth the HypeMovies like thisBushido (2024)
Kakunoshin, renowned for his skills with a sword and in the game of go, embodies the samurai code. Falsely accused of a theft, he is forced to become a lowly ronin. Years later, when a case of missing gold pulls him into a new web of intrigue, Kakunoshin uncovers the truth behind his downfall. With the real culprit exposed, the go board flips, and a hellstorm of righteous vengeance follows.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & history
Worth the HypeMovies like thisYojimbo (1961)
A nameless ronin, or samurai with no master, enters a small village in feudal Japan where two rival businessmen are struggling for control of the local gambling trade. Taking the name Sanjuro Kuwabatake, the ronin convinces both silk merchant Tazaemon and sake merchant Tokuemon to hire him as a personal bodyguard, then artfully sets in motion a full-scale gang war between the two ambitious and unscrupulous men.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisThe Challenge (1982)
Rick, a down-and-out American boxer, is hired to transport a sword to Japan, unaware that the whole thing is a set up in a bitter blood-feud between two brothers, one who follows the traditional path of the samurai and the other a businessman. At the behest of the businessman, Rick undertakes samurai training from the other brother, but joins his cause. He also becomes romantically involved with the samurai's daughter.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
SnoozefestMovies like thisRurouni Kenshin Part I: Origins (2012)
In 1868, after the Bakumatsu war ends, the ex-assassin Kenshin Himura traverses Japan with an inverted sword, to defend the needy without killing.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both history
Worth the HypeMovies like thisKilling (2018)
In mid-19th century Edo period, a masterless rōnin named Mokunoshin Tsuzuki resides in a peaceful village among those he helps. However, as the prevalent peace and tranquility are sure to be replaced by war and conflict across the land, the swordsman feels restlessness creeping upon him.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisGirl in the Box (2016)
The true story of 20-year-old Colleen Stan, a hitchhiking woman abducted by a young couple and held captive for seven years, during which time she's tortured and forced to live as a slave to her captors.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisKagemusha (1980)
A feudal epic presenting the tale of a petty thief who is recruited to impersonate Shingen, an aging warlord, in order to avoid attacks by competing clans. The impostor becomes comfortable living his life among nobility, but his responsibilities to his station grow more demanding the longer he occupies it.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama & history
Worth the HypeMovies like thisWhen the Last Sword Is Drawn (2003)
Kanichiro Yoshimura is a samurai and family man who can no longer support his wife and children on the low pay he receives from his small-town clan. He is forced by his love for his family to leave for the city in search of higher pay to support them.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama & history
Worth the HypeMovies like thisHarakiri (1962)
Down-on-his-luck veteran Tsugumo Hanshirō enters the courtyard of the prosperous House of Iyi. Unemployed, and with no family, he hopes to find a place to commit seppuku—and a worthy second to deliver the coup de grâce in his suicide ritual. The senior counselor for the Iyi clan questions the ronin’s resolve and integrity, suspecting Hanshirō of seeking charity rather than an honorable end. What follows is a pair of interlocking stories which lay bare the difference between honor and respect, and promises to examine the legendary foundations of the Samurai code.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama & history
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisMumon: The Land of Stealth (2017)
Raised suckling poison arrows among the sparring Iga ninja factions, Mumon is a carefree 16th-century mercenary. When the ninja council makes a power play to defeat the young Nobukatsu Oda struggling to step into his father’s warlord shoes as they expand rule across the country, Mumon jumps into the fray to satisfy his new bride Okuni’s demand that he make good on his promises of wealth. Yet Mumon soon finds what is worth fighting for beyond money or nation.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both history
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisSeven Samurai (1954)
A samurai answers a village's request for protection after he falls on hard times. The town needs protection from bandits, so the samurai gathers six others to help him teach the people how to defend themselves, and the villagers provide the soldiers with food.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisSamurai Cat: The Movie (2014)
The ever versatile Kazuki Kitamura stars as masterless samurai Kyutaro Madarame, a feared swordsman who has fallen on hard times in old Edo. Caught between two warring gangs in an epic battle of cat lovers and dog lovers, he begrudgingly accepts the canine faction's offer to assassinate the opposite leader's beloved pet: an adorable white cat. Yet upon raising his lethal sword, he cannot bring himself to go through with the act, and the cat melts his ronin heart. But before finding peace as a newly minted cat person, the still fearsome Madarame will have to take on both gangs in a classic samurai street brawl.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both history
Samurai Secret Agent (1983)
A master swordsman is ordered to go undercover on a mission to find and destroy a cannon factory being used by two samurai clans that try to usurp power and gain the position of shogun for one of their own.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Sanjuro (1962)
In this companion piece and sequel to "Yojimbo," jaded samurai Sanjuro helps an idealistic group of young warriors weed out their clan's evil influences, and in the process turns their image of a proper samurai on its ear.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisThe Twilight Samurai (2002)
Seibei Iguchi leads a difficult life as a low ranking samurai at the turn of the nineteenth century. A widower with a meager income, Seibei struggles to take care of his two daughters and senile mother. New prospects seem to open up when the beautiful Tomoe, a childhood friend, comes back into he and his daughters' life, but as the Japanese feudal system unravels, Seibei is still bound by the code of honor of the samurai and by his own sense of social precedence. How can he find a way to do what is best for those he loves?
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisIzo (2004)
Izo is an assassin in the service of a Tosa lord and Imperial supporter. After killing dozens of the Shogun's men, Izo is captured and crucified. Instead of being extinguished, his rage propels him through the space-time continuum to present-day Tokyo. Here Izo transforms himself into a new, improved killing machine.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like this
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Frequently asked questions
What are the best movies like Deadly Swords in Search of Hidden Gold?
The closest matches to Deadly Swords in Search of Hidden Gold are Munich - The Edge of War (2021), Radium Girls (2020) and Humanity and Paper Balloons (1937). Below are 27 more, each with the reason it matches.
What should I watch after Deadly Swords in Search of Hidden Gold?
Start with Munich - The Edge of War (2021), the closest match to Deadly Swords in Search of Hidden Gold.
What is the highest-rated movie like Deadly Swords in Search of Hidden Gold?
Harakiri (1962), rated 8.5/10 by 1,325 TMDB users.
What is the newest movie like Deadly Swords in Search of Hidden Gold?
Golden Kamuy -The Abashiri Prison Raid- (2026) is the most recent release on this list.
Are there Japanese movies like Deadly Swords in Search of Hidden Gold?
Yes: Humanity and Paper Balloons (1937), Chûshingura (1962) and Samurai Assassin (1965).
How are movies similar to Deadly Swords in Search of Hidden Gold chosen?
First come films that Trakt’s viewers watch alongside Deadly Swords in Search of Hidden Gold, then TMDB’s recommendations and films it rates as similar in story and genre. Each pick says which signal put it there.