Movies Like Nickel Boys

If you liked Nickel Boys (2024), a drama and history movie directed by RaMell Ross, here are 20 movies with a similar feel, based on TMDB's recommendations. Each one links to its cast, trailer and where it's streaming.

1
The Trial of the Chicago 7 (2020)
★ 7.7/10Also drama and history
What was supposed to be a peaceful protest turned into a violent clash with the police. What followed was one of the most notorious trials in history.
2
Moonlight (2016)
★ 7.4/10Also drama
The tender, heartbreaking story of a young man’s struggle to find himself, told across three defining chapters in his life as he experiences the ecstasy, pain, and beauty of falling in love, while grappling with his…
3
Raging Bull (1980)
★ 7.9/10Also drama and history
The life of boxer Jake LaMotta, whose violence and temper that led him to the top in the ring destroyed his life outside of it.
4
Once Upon a Time in America (1984)
★ 8.4/10Also drama
A former Prohibition-era Jewish gangster returns to the Lower East Side of Manhattan over thirty years later, where he once again must confront the ghosts and regrets of his old life.
5
Bully (2001)
★ 6.7/10Also drama
A group of teenagers in South Florida enact a murder plot against their mutual bully, Bobby, who has emotionally, physically, and sexually abused them for years.
6
Midnight Cowboy (1969)
★ 7.5/10Also drama
Joe Buck is a wide-eyed hustler from Texas hoping to score big with wealthy New York City women; he finds a companion in Enrico "Ratso" Rizzo, an ailing swindler with a bum leg and a quixotic fantasy of escaping to…
7
12 Years a Slave (2013)
★ 7.9/10Also drama and history
In the pre-Civil War United States, Solomon Northup, a free black man from upstate New York, is abducted and sold into slavery. Facing cruelty as well as unexpected kindnesses Solomon struggles not only to stay alive…
8
Son of the South (2021)
★ 6.5/10Also history and drama
In civil rights era Montgomery, Alabama, Klansman's grandson Bob Zellner must choose which side of history to be on during the Movement. Defying his family and white Southern norms, he fought against social injustice…
9
The Hate U Give (2018)
★ 8.1/10Also drama
Raised in a poverty-stricken slum, a 16-year-old girl named Starr now attends a suburban prep school. After she witnesses a police officer shoot her unarmed best friend, she's torn between her two very different worlds…
10
The Basketball Diaries (1995)
★ 7.4/10Also drama
A high school basketball player’s life turns upside down after free-falling into the harrowing world of drug addiction.
11
The Shawshank Redemption (1994)
★ 8.7/10Also drama
Imprisoned in the 1940s for the double murder of his wife and her lover, upstanding banker Andy Dufresne begins a new life at the Shawshank prison, where he puts his accounting skills to work for an amoral warden…
12
Sleepers (1996)
★ 7.6/10Also drama
Two gangsters seek revenge on the state jail worker who during their stay at a youth prison sexually abused them. A sensational court hearing takes place to charge him for the crimes.
13
One Night in Miami... (2020)
★ 7/10Also drama
In the aftermath of Cassius Clay's defeat of Sonny Liston in 1964, the boxer meets with Malcolm X, Sam Cooke and Jim Brown to change the course of history in the segregated South.
14
The Strange Love of Martha Ivers (1946)
★ 7.1/10Also drama
Three childhood friends, Martha, Walter and Sam, share a terrible secret. Over time, the ambitious Martha and the pusillanimous Walter have married. She is a cold businesswoman; he is the district attorney: a perfect…
15
My Friend Dahmer (2017)
★ 6.5/10Also history and drama
Jeffrey Dahmer struggles with a difficult family life as a young boy. During his teenage years he slowly transforms, edging closer to the serial killer he was to become.
16
Panther (1995)
★ 6.3/10Also drama and history
In this sprawling, fictionalized history of the Black Panthers, 1960s Oakland becomes a war zone as the Panthers battle for the right to exist.
17
May December (2023)
★ 6.6/10Also drama
Twenty years after their notorious tabloid romance gripped the nation, a married couple buckles under the pressure when an actress arrives to do research for a film about their past.
18
Seberg (2019)
★ 5.9/10Also drama
An ambitious young FBI agent is assigned to investigate iconic actress Jean Seberg when she becomes embroiled in the tumultuous civil rights movement in late 1960s Los Angeles.
19
Malcolm X (1992)
★ 7.6/10Also drama and history
A tribute to the controversial black activist and leader of the struggle for black liberation. He hit bottom during his imprisonment in the '50s, he became a Black Muslim and then a leader in the Nation of Islam. His…
20
Precious: Based on the Novel 'Push' by Sapphire (2009)
★ 7.3/10Also drama
In Harlem in 1987, Claireece "Precious" Jones is a 16-year-old African American girl born into a life no one would want. She's pregnant for the second time by her absent father, and at home she must wait hand and foot…