Movies Like If I Should Die Before I Wake
If you liked If I Should Die Before I Wake (1952), a drama and thriller movie directed by Carlos Hugo Christensen, 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 Strange Love of Martha Ivers (1946)
★ 7.1/10Also drama and thrillerThree 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…
- 2
Boy A (2008)
★ 7.1/10Also dramaFreed after a lengthy term in a juvenile detention center, convicted child killer Jack Burridge finds work as a deliveryman and begins dating co-worker Michelle. While out on the road one day, Jack notices a distressed…
- 3
The Whisper Man (2026)
★ 6.8/10Also drama and thrillerWhen his young son vanishes, a widower enlists help from his estranged father, a retired detective who put away the serial killer now linked to the case.
- 4
Boy Wonder (2010)
★ 6.3/10Also drama and thrillerA young Brooklyn boy witnesses the brutal murder of his mother and grows up obsessed with finding her killer. Thus begins his life as a quiet, straight-A student by day and a self-appointed hero at night. But what is a…
- 5
Cape Fear (1991)
★ 7.3/10Also drama and thrillerSam Bowden is a small-town corporate attorney. Max Cady is a tattooed, cigar-smoking, Bible-quoting, psychotic rapist. What do they have in common? 14 years ago, Sam was a public defender assigned to Max Cady's rape…
- 6
A Thousand and One (2023)
★ 6.6/10Also dramaStruggling but unapologetically living on her own terms, Inez is moving from shelter to shelter in mid-1990s New York City. With her 6-year-old son Terry in foster care and unable to leave him again, she kidnaps him so…
- 7
M (1951)
★ 6.5/10Also drama and thrillerIn the city, someone is murdering children. The police search is so intense, it is disturbing the 'normal' criminals, and the local hoods decide to help find the murderer as quickly as possible.
- 8
The Little Girl Who Lives Down the Lane (1976)
★ 7/10Also drama and thriller13-year-old Rynn Jacobs lives in a New England beach town. Whenever the landlady inquires after Rynn's father, she claims that he's not available. But when the landlady's son, Frank, won't leave Rynn alone, she teams…
- 9
The Clovehitch Killer (2018)
★ 6.4/10Also dramaA picture-perfect family is torn apart after Tyler finds a cache of disturbing images in his father's possession. He begins to suspect that the man he trusts most in the world may be responsible for the murder of 13…
- 10
Changeling (2008)
★ 7.6/10Also dramaLos Angeles, 1928. When single mother Christine Collins leaves for work, her son vanishes without a trace. Five months later, the police reunite mother and son. But when Christine suspects that the boy returned to her…
- 11
Oliver Twist (1948)
★ 7.6/10Also dramaWhen 9-year-old orphan Oliver Twist dares to ask his cruel taskmaster, Mr. Bumble, for a second serving of gruel, he's hired out as an apprentice. Escaping that dismal fate, young Oliver falls in with the street urchin…
- 12
Girl in the Basement (2021)
★ 7.6/10Also thrillerSara is a teen girl who is looking forward to her 18th birthday to move away from her controlling father Don. But before she could even blow out the candles, Don imprisons her in the basement of their home.
- 13
Oliver Twist (2005)
★ 6.8/10Also dramaAn orphan endures a harsh life in a workhouse before fleeing to London, where he falls in with a gang of juvenile pickpockets led by the criminal Fagin, and eventually finds a better life, exposing the cruelties of…
- 14
We Need to Talk About Kevin (2011)
★ 7.5/10Also drama and thrillerAfter her son Kevin commits a horrific act, troubled mother Eva reflects on her complicated relationship with her disturbed son as he grew from a toddler into a teenager.
- 15
Palmer (2021)
★ 8.1/10Also dramaAfter 12 years in prison, former high school football star Eddie Palmer returns home to put his life back together—and forms an unlikely bond with Sam, an outcast boy from a troubled home. But Eddie's past threatens to…
- 16
Sleepers (1996)
★ 7.6/10Also drama and thrillerTwo 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.
- 17
Nocturnal Animals (2016)
★ 7.4/10Also drama and thrillerSusan Morrow receives a book manuscript from her ex-husband – a man she left 20 years earlier – asking for her opinion of his writing. As she reads, she is drawn into the fictional life of Tony Hastings, a mathematics…
- 18
Mean Dreams (2016)
★ 6.4/10Also drama and thrillerWhen two youngsters meet and fall for each other, they must go on the run from the girl's corrupt father, who is also the sheriff of the town.
- 19
Barron's Cove (2025)
★ 7.1/10Also thriller and dramaWhen his young son is viciously murdered by a classmate, a grieving father with a history of violence kidnaps the child responsible, igniting a frenzied manhunt fueled by a powerful politician -- the father of the…
- 20
The Parts You Lose (2019)
★ 6.7/10Also drama and thrillerAn unlikely friendship unfolds between a young deaf boy, Wesley, and a fugitive criminal who takes refuge in an abandoned barn on the family’s rural North Dakota farm.