Movies Like The Mauritanian

If you liked The Mauritanian (2021), a drama and thriller movie directed by Kevin Macdonald, 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 Stanford Prison Experiment (2015)
★ 6.8/10Also thriller and drama
In 1971, Stanford's Professor Philip Zimbardo conducts a controversial psychology experiment in which college students pretend to be either prisoners or guards, but the proceedings soon get out of hand. Based on a true…
2
Muhammad Ali's Greatest Fight (2013)
★ 6.4/10Also drama
Muhammad Ali’s historic Supreme Court battle from behind closed doors. When Ali was drafted into the Vietnam War at the height of his boxing career, his claim to conscientious objector status led to a controversial…
3
Kiss of the Spider Woman (1985)
★ 7/10Also drama
The story of two radically different men thrown together in a Latin American prison cell. One is Valentin, a journalist being tortured for his political beliefs. The other is Molina, a gay window-dresser who fills…
4
Midnight Express (1978)
★ 7.4/10Also drama
Billy Hayes is caught attempting to smuggle drugs out of a country. The courts decide to make an example of him, sentencing him to more than 30 years in prison. Hayes has two opportunities for release: the appeals made…
5
Escape from Alcatraz (1979)
★ 7.5/10Also drama and thriller
San Francisco Bay, January 18, 1960. Frank Lee Morris is transferred to Alcatraz, a maximum security prison located on a rocky island. Although no one has ever managed to escape from there, Frank and other inmates…
6
Shutter Island (2010)
★ 8.2/10Also drama and thriller
World War II soldier-turned-U.S. Marshal Teddy Daniels investigates the disappearance of a patient from a hospital for the criminally insane, but his efforts are compromised by troubling visions and a mysterious doctor.
7
Emancipation (2022)
★ 7.7/10Also drama
Inspired by the gripping true story of a man who would do anything for his family—and for freedom. When Peter, an enslaved man, risks his life to escape and return to his family, he embarks on a perilous journey of…
8
Cool Hand Luke (1967)
★ 7.7/10Also drama
When petty criminal Luke Jackson is sentenced to two years in a Florida prison farm, he doesn't play by the rules of either the sadistic warden or the yard's resident heavy, Dragline, who ends up admiring the new guy's…
9
Palmetto (1998)
★ 6/10Also thriller
After being released from prison on a bum charge, Harry Barber is out for payback to regain his lost two years. He's hired by Mrs. Malroux to fake the kidnapping of her stepdaughter (the daughter of a dying…
10
Nothing but the Truth (2008)
★ 6.9/10Also drama and thriller
When reporter Rachel Armstrong writes a story that reveals the identity of a covert CIA operative, the government demands that Rachel reveal her source. She defies the special prosecutor and is thrown in jail…
11
Body of Lies (2008)
★ 6.6/10Also drama and thriller
The CIA’s hunt is on for the mastermind of a wave of terrorist attacks. Roger Ferris is the agency’s man on the ground, moving from place to place, scrambling to stay ahead of ever-shifting events. An eye in the sky…
12
Papillon (1973)
★ 7.8/10Also drama
A man befriends a fellow criminal as the two of them begin serving their sentence on a dreadful prison island, which inspires the man to plot his escape.
13
The Woman in Cabin 10 (2025)
★ 6.2/10Also thriller
On a lavish yacht for an assignment, a journalist sees a passenger go overboard. But when no one believes her, she risks her life to uncover the truth.
14
The Last Castle (2001)
★ 7.2/10Also drama and thriller
A court-martialed general rallies together 1200 inmates to rise against the system that put him away.
15
Escape from Pretoria (2020)
★ 7.2/10Also drama and thriller
South Africa, 1978. Tim Jenkin and Stephen Lee, two white political activists from the African National Congress imprisoned by the apartheid regime, put a plan in motion to escape from the infamous Pretoria Prison.
16
Nowhere to Run (1993)
★ 6.6/10Also drama and thriller
Escaped convict Sam Gillen single-handedly takes on ruthless developers who are determined to evict a widow with two young children.
17
Monster (2021)
★ 6.4/10Also drama
The story of Steve Harmon, a 17-year-old honor student whose world comes crashing down around him when he is charged with felony murder.
18
Room (2015)
★ 8/10Also drama and thriller
Held captive for 7 years in an enclosed space, a woman and her young son finally gain their freedom, allowing the boy to experience the outside world for the first time.
19
The Silence of the Lambs (1991)
★ 8.3/10Also thriller and drama
Clarice Starling is a top student at the FBI's training academy. Jack Crawford wants Clarice to interview Dr. Hannibal Lecter, a brilliant psychiatrist who is also a violent psychopath, serving life behind bars for…
20
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…