Movies Like The Last Emperor
If you liked The Last Emperor (1987), a drama and history movie directed by Bernardo Bertolucci, 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
Empire of the Sun (1987)
★ 7.5/10Also drama and historyJamie Graham, a privileged English boy, is living in Shanghai when the Japanese invade and force all foreigners into prison camps. Jamie is captured with an American sailor, who looks out for him while they are in the…
- 2
The Way Back (2010)
★ 7/10Also drama and historyA small band of multicultural convicts stages a daring escape from a WWII-era Siberian gulag, and embarks on a treacherous journey across five countries in a desperate race for freedom and survival.
- 3
The Zone of Interest (2023)
★ 7/10Also drama and historyThe commandant of Auschwitz, Rudolf Höss, and his wife Hedwig, strive to build a dream life for their family in a house and garden next to the camp.
- 4
Victoria & Abdul (2017)
★ 6.9/10Also drama and historyQueen Victoria strikes up an unlikely friendship with a young Indian clerk named Abdul Karim.
- 5
The Gathering Storm (2002)
★ 6.7/10Also drama and historyA love story offering an intimate look inside the marriage of Winston and Clementine Churchill during a particularly troubled, though little-known, moment in their lives.
- 6
Munich - The Edge of War (2021)
★ 6.9/10Also drama and historyAt the tense 1938 Munich Conference, former friends who now work for opposing governments become reluctant spies racing to expose a Nazi secret.
- 7
47 Ronin (2013)
★ 6.2/10Also dramaKai—an outcast—joins Oishi, the leader of 47 outcast samurai. Together they seek vengeance upon the treacherous overlord who killed their master and banished their kind. To restore honour to their homeland, the…
- 8
Tetro (2009)
★ 6.8/10Also dramaIn Buenos Aires, 17-year-old Bennie seeks out his estranged brother Tetro, a once-promising writer haunted by their family’s past. As Bennie uncovers Tetro’s hidden manuscript, old secrets and rivalries resurface…
- 9
The Great Escape (1963)
★ 7.9/10Also dramaThe Nazis, exasperated at the number of escapes from their prison camps by a relatively small number of Allied prisoners, relocate them to a high-security 'escape-proof' camp to sit out the remainder of the war…
- 10
Emperor (2012)
★ 6.2/10Also drama and historyAs the Japanese surrender at the end of WWII, Gen. Fellers is tasked with deciding if Emperor Hirohito will be hanged as a war criminal. Influencing his ruling is his quest to find Aya, an exchange student he met years…
- 11
Tenzing (2026)
★ 8.3/10Also drama and historyA determined man embarks on a high-stakes quest—and defies seemingly impossible odds—to fulfill his dream of being the first to reach the summit of Mount Everest.
- 12
Kundun (1997)
★ 6.8/10Also drama and historyFrom childhood to adulthood, Tibet's fourteenth Dalai Lama deals with Chinese oppression and other problems.
- 13
Gandhi (1982)
★ 7.6/10Also drama and historyIn the early years of the 20th century, Mohandas K. Gandhi, a British-trained lawyer, forsakes all worldly possessions to take up the cause of Indian independence. Faced with armed resistance from the British…
- 14
Queen of the Desert (2015)
★ 5.8/10Also drama and historyA chronicle of Gertrude Bell's life, a traveler, writer, archaeologist, explorer, cartographer, and political attaché for the British Empire in the Near and Middle East at the dawn of the twentieth century. Her…
- 15
The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas (2008)
★ 7.8/10Also drama and historyWhen his family moves from their home in Berlin to a strange new house in Poland, young Bruno befriends Shmuel, a boy who lives on the other side of the fence where everyone seems to be wearing striped pajamas. Unaware…
- 16
The Left Hand of God (1955)
★ 6.3/10Also dramaA man in priestly robes, seemingly the long-awaited Father O'Shea, arrives at a little-frequented Catholic mission in 1947 China. Though the man seems curiously uncomfortable with his priestly duties, his tough tactics…
- 17
Shattered Glass (2003)
★ 7/10Also drama and historyStephen 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'…
- 18
Richard Jewell (2019)
★ 7.4/10Also dramaRichard Jewell thinks quick, works fast, and saves hundreds, perhaps thousands, of lives after a domestic terrorist plants several pipe bombs and they explode during a concert, only to be falsely suspected of the crime…
- 19
Nixon (1995)
★ 6.8/10Also drama and historyA look at President Richard M. Nixon—a man carrying the fate of the world on his shoulders while battling the self-destructive demands from within—spanning his troubled boyhood in California to the shocking Watergate…
- 20
Springsteen: Deliver Me from Nowhere (2025)
★ 6.6/10Also dramaBruce Springsteen, a young musician on the cusp of global superstardom, struggles to reconcile the pressures of success with the ghosts of his past.