Best movies like Night of the Pencils
Last updated March 2024
Looking for movies like Night of the Pencils? Leverage your insights to guide others toward films and tv shows you've watched previously that may also preoccupy them. Support increasing the cohort of people bringing up videos among each other. We appreciate your contribution!
Plot Summary:
The Night of the Pencils was a series of kidnappings and forced disappearances, followed by the torture, rape, and murder of a number of young students during the last Argentine dictatorship (known as the National Reorganization Process). The kidnappings took place over the course of several days beginning on September 16, 1976.
IMDB Rating: 7.3
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Crime, Drama, History, Thriller, War
Country: Argentina
Duration: 105 min
Plot tags: political, disturbing, manga, mindfuck
Best tv shows and movies like Night of the Pencils (1986):
Similar in 89%
Forgotten (2014)
Plot Summary:
José, a Bolivian retired general, is lying on his deathbed after a heart attack. Tormented by memories of his involvement in Operation Condor and invaded by deep remorse, he decides to tell his only son his biggest secrets in search of redemption.
IMDB Rating: 5.9
IMDB Votes: 160
Genere: Drama, History, War
Country: Bolivia
Duration: 112 min
Plot tags:
Similar in 88%
Marighella (2019)
Plot Summary:
Afro-Brazilian poet and politician, the legendary Carlos Marighella. Driven to fight against the erosion of civil and human rights following the CIA-backed military coup of 1964 and the brutal, racist right-wing dictatorship that followed, the revolutionary leaves behind his wife and son to take up arms, becoming a notorious enemy to the power structure.
IMDB Rating: 7.1
IMDB Votes: 56000
Genere: Action, Drama, History, Thriller
Country: Brazil
Duration: 155 min
Plot tags:
Similar in 88%
New Order (2020)
Plot Summary:
In the near future, a popular uprising in Mexico City interrupts a wedding held at the home of a wealthy family. After the riots have been quashed, they discover the bride has gone missing and plea with the military to help locate her.
IMDB Rating: 6.5
IMDB Votes: 9000
Genere: Crime, Drama, Sci-Fi, Thriller
Country: Mexico, France
Duration: 86 min
Plot tags: tense, captivating, social, surreal, mindfuck, independent film
Similar in 80%
Rebellion in Patagonia (1974)
Plot Summary:
In 1920, workmen of Patagonia (Argentina), grouped into anarchist and socialist societies, decide to strike demanding better working conditions. Among the workers there are numerous European immigrants acting as ideological ferment of their peers. The situation is unsustainable and Yrigoyen government sent from Buenos Aires, Lieutenant Colonel Zavala to impose order ... Based on the book "Los vengadores de la Patagonia trágica", written by Osvaldo Bayer.
IMDB Rating: 7.6
IMDB Votes: 1000
Genere: Drama, History, Western
Country: Argentina
Duration: 110 min
Plot tags: political
Similar in 78%
Baptism of Blood (2006)
Plot Summary:
In São Paulo, in the late 1960s, the convent of the Dominican friars became a trench of resistance to the military dictatorship that governs Brazil. Moved by Christian ideals, frets Betto, Oswaldo, Fernando, Ivo and Tito came to support the guerrilla group Ação Libertadora Nacional, commanded by Carlos Marighella.
IMDB Rating: 7.1
IMDB Votes: 741
Genere: Drama, History
Country: Brazil
Duration: 110 min
Plot tags:
Similar in 84%
The Moonhunter (2001)
Plot Summary:
The Moonhunter tells a true story of two young Thai revolutionaries. Seksan Prasertkul, a fearless student leader, who, in October 1973, commanded the biggest mass demonstration in modern Thai history. The event led to a popular uprising that toppled the military dictatorship and restored democracy. His life and that of his girlfriend, Chiranan Pitpreecha-a campus queen- took a drastic turn when they were caught in the wave of political violence, stirred up by remnants of the old ruling elite who still bid for the return of dictatorial rule. After the assassinations of many fellow activists, the two decided to join the illegal armed movement, led by the Communist Party of Thailand, fighting guerilla-style in the forests of Thailand. Seksan's dreams of redressing his country's grievances, however, were quickly shattered, for he found that his strain of idealism was not really shared by the party's old Guard.
IMDB Rating: 7.0
IMDB Votes: 87
Genere: Biography, Drama, History, War
Country: Thailand
Duration: 107 min
Plot tags: political
Similar in 88%
Ogro (1979)
Plot Summary:
At the close of 1973, Franco is still governing Spain with an iron hand. Opposition parties are forbidden; labor movements are repressed; and Basque nationalists are mercilessly hunted. The caudillo is aging, though, and the future of the régime is in question. Admiral Carrero Blanco is Franco’s natural successor. For the embattled clandestine Basque organization ETA, Carrero Blanco must die.
IMDB Rating: 7.1
IMDB Votes: 1000
Genere: Drama, Thriller
Country: Italy, Spain
Duration: 115 min
Plot tags:
Similar in 87%
Argentine Soldier Only Known by God (2016)
Plot Summary:
Argentine Soldier Only Known to God is a war fiction feature film, focused on the human drama of three young men from a small town in Traslasierra, Córdoba, who from very different ideological places are forever transformed by the Malvinas War.
IMDB Rating: 6.0
IMDB Votes: 214
Genere: Drama, History, War
Country: Argentina
Duration: 102 min
Plot tags: sincere, captivating, suspense, entertaining
Similar in 90%
Koblic (2016)
Plot Summary:
Tomás Kóblic, a former pilot and captain of the Argentinian Navy, disobeys an order and becomes a fugitive in order to survive. He chooses to hide in a small town in the south of the country, where his presence will catch the attention of the unscrupulous and violent local marshal.
IMDB Rating: 6.4
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Crime, Drama, Thriller
Country: Argentina, Spain
Duration: 92 min
Plot tags: suspense, captivating, disturbing, social, mindfuck, exciting
Similar in 83%
The Round-Up (1966)
Plot Summary:
Set in a detention camp in Hungary in 1869 at a time of guerilla campaigns against the ruling Austrians.
IMDB Rating: 7.6
IMDB Votes: 3000
Genere: Drama, History, War
Country: Hungary
Duration: 90 min
Plot tags: political, experimental, contemplative, anamorphic, visual, psychological, tense, rough, bleak, serious
Similar in 83%
1987: When the Day Comes (2017)
Plot Summary:
In 1987 Korea, under an oppressive military regime, a college student gets killed during a police interrogation involving torture. Government of officials are quick to cover up the death and order the body to be cremated. A prosecutor who is supposed to sign the cremation release, raises questions about a 21-year-old kid dying of a heart attack, and he begins looking into the case for truth. Despite a systematic attempt to silence everyone involved in the case, the truth gets out, causing an eruption of public outrage.
IMDB Rating: 7.8
IMDB Votes: 6000
Genere: Drama, History, Thriller
Country: South Korea
Duration: 129 min
Plot tags: psychological, tense, sincere, captivating, suspense, disturbing, social, banned
Similar in 90%
Garage Olimpo (1999)
Plot Summary:
A beautiful Argentine activist receives preferential treatment from a man supposed to torture her.
IMDB Rating: 7.3
IMDB Votes: 3000
Genere: Drama
Country: Italy, Argentina, France
Duration: 98 min
Plot tags: political, mindfuck, psychological, thought provoking, serious, realistic, disturbing
Similar in 80%
The East (2020)
Plot Summary:
A young Dutch soldier deployed to suppress post-WWII independence efforts in the Netherlands’ colony of Indonesia finds himself torn between duty and conscience when he joins an increasingly ruthless commander’s elite squad.
IMDB Rating: 6.9
IMDB Votes: 7000
Genere: Drama, Thriller, War
Country: Netherlands, Belgium, Indonesia, USA, France
Duration: 137 min
Plot tags: psychological, suspense, disturbing, controversial
Similar in 75%
Canoa: A Shameful Memory (1976)
Plot Summary:
A group of students take a bus to go to a small town, in order to finish a professional practice. All of them are friends, and they decide to sing some modern songs, while the other passengers are trying to sleep. One of the passengers gets angry and shouts "stop rowing", so they shut up. But when they arrive in the town, and after knowing the incident, everybody treats them as if they were criminals.
IMDB Rating: 7.8
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Adventure, Crime, Drama, Thriller
Country: Mexico
Duration: 115 min
Plot tags: disturbing, controversial, tense, rough, bleak, serious, realistic, suspenseful, crime drama, crime thriller
Similar in 85%
Lamb of God (2008)
Plot Summary:
The kidnapping 77-year-old man in Argentina forces his daughter to return to Buenos Aires after years of exile abroad.
IMDB Rating: 6.7
IMDB Votes: 384
Genere: Crime, Drama
Country: Argentina, France
Duration: 90 min
Plot tags: rough, thought provoking, serious, captivating, suspenseful, disturbing, realistic
Similar in 77%
Chronicle of an Escape (2006)
Plot Summary:
The true story of four men who narrowly escaped death at the hands of Argentina's military death squads during the 1970s is brought to the screen in this thriller. In 1977, Claudio Tamburrini (Rodrigo de la Serna) was a goalie for a minor-league football team when he was abducted by members of the Argentine military police and taken to an unofficial detention center on the false suspicion that he was a terrorist. Over 30,000 people lost their lives at the hands of Argentinean authorities under the military junta that ruled the country between 1976 and 1983, and as he was tortured by intelligence agents looking for information he didn't have, Tamburrini fully expected to become another victim. After many sessions of brutal torture, Tamburrini and his fellow captives Guillermo (Nazareno Casero) and Tano (Martin Urruty) were being readied for execution when, in a final desperate act, Tamburrini dove out a window during a rainstorm.
IMDB Rating: 7.1
IMDB Votes: 4000
Genere: Crime, Thriller
Country: Argentina
Duration: 103 min
Plot tags: serious, realistic, sincere, disturbing, crime drama, thrilling, captivating, suspenseful
Similar in 90%
The Man Standing Next (2020)
Plot Summary:
In the 1970s, Korea is under the absolute control of the President Park who controls the KCIA, the organization with an edge over any branch of government. The director of KCIA, KIM Gyu-pyeong, is the seemingly most prospective second-in-command. In the midst of reign of fear, a former KCIA director, PARK Yong-gak who knows all about the government’s obscure operations, exiles to the U.S. where the investigation of ‘Koreagate’ is underway. As the tension escalates, the stifling political maneuvering by the all second-in-command’s unfolds.
IMDB Rating: 6.9
IMDB Votes: 4000
Genere: Drama, History, Thriller
Country: South Korea
Duration: 114 min
Plot tags: suspense, suspenseful, psychological, bad ending
Similar in 79%
Apartment 407 (2016)
Plot Summary:
Selling Isobel, a thriller based on true events, featuring the real victim in true life playing the main charter. It's about a woman who got locked in, drugged, held against her will and sold to numerous men for 3 days in an apartment in central London. It's a film about her fight for survival all the way to the gruesome end.
IMDB Rating: 5.8
IMDB Votes: 1000
Genere: Crime, Drama, Thriller
Country: USA, Sweden
Duration: 101 min
Plot tags: tense, suspense, disturbing, crime drama, independent film
Similar in 79%
The Clan (2015)
Plot Summary:
When it was first released in Argentina, Pablo Trapero’s film had the highest opening box-office of all time. The key to that success is simply that The Clan is based on one of the most shocking crimes in the country’s history, the Puccio Clan case. In 1985, the news broke that the Puccios, a well-established Catholic family with five children from San Isidro, an upper-class suburb of Buenos Aires, kidnapped and held people hostage for ransom in their own home. The film is a disturbing, impressive, and beautifully controlled interpretation of those events, with Guillermo Francella's magnificent depiction of the father, a performance for the ages.
IMDB Rating: 6.9
IMDB Votes: 14000
Genere: Biography, Crime, Drama, Thriller
Country: Argentina, Spain
Duration: 108 min
Plot tags: suspense, tense, captivating, psychological, social, hispanic
Similar in 87%
Of Love and Shadows (1994)
Plot Summary:
Irene is a magazine editor living under the shadow of the Pinochet dictatorship in Chile. Francisco is a handsome photographer and he comes to Irene for a job. As a sympathizer with the underground resistance movement, Francisco opens her eyes and her heart to the atrocities being committed by the state.
IMDB Rating: 5.0
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Drama, Romance, Thriller, War
Country: USA, Argentina
Duration: 105 min
Plot tags: erotic, political, scenic, eros, independent film, tense, serious, realistic, sexy, enigmatic
Similar in 79%
A Twelve-Year Night (2018)
Plot Summary:
Uruguay, 1973. Having been crushed by the military dictatorship, surviving members of the Tupamaro guerillas are imprisoned and tortured. They must find a way to endure the coming 12 years.
IMDB Rating: 7.5
IMDB Votes: 11000
Genere: Adventure, Biography, Crime, Drama, History
Country: Uruguay, Spain, Argentina, France, Germany
Duration: 122 min
Plot tags: psychological, captivating, realistic, tense, inspirational, political, sad, art house, informative
Similar in 90%
Blue-Eyed Butcher (2012)
Plot Summary:
Lifetime biopic based on the story of Susan Wright. Susan appeared to be the model wife and mother, living the fairytale life, literally married to Mr. Wright. In a shocking turn of events, the media dubs Susan Wright the "Blue-Eyed Butcher" when her loving husband is discovered buried in the backyard, with close to 200 stab wounds.
IMDB Rating: 5.6
IMDB Votes: 1000
Genere: Biography, Crime, Drama, Thriller
Country: USA
Duration: 85 min
Plot tags: suspense, bleak, suspenseful, disturbing
Similar in 79%
The Official Story (1985)
Plot Summary:
After the end of the Dirty War, a high school teacher sets out to find out who the mother of her adopted daughter is.
IMDB Rating: 7.7
IMDB Votes: 11000
Genere: Drama, History
Country: Argentina
Duration: 112 min
Plot tags: political, captivating, sincere, suspenseful, disturbing, sad, emotional, realistic, light, epic
Similar in 82%
State of Siege (1972)
Plot Summary:
Like most of Costa-Gavras' political thrillers, the French State of Siege is based on a true story. The incident dramatized herein is the kidnapping of a U.S. official somewhere in Latin America. The director's sympathies clearly lie with the kidnappers, especially since the official (played by Yves Montand), ostensibly an expert in traffic control, has been assigned as special advisor to the government's secret police, training these worthies in the art of the torturing of political prisoners. Uruguay was the country where this story actually took place; though no names are given, there's little doubting the identity of Costa-Gavras' fictional locale. Despite its up-to-date radicalism, State of Siege adheres to time-honored Hollywood formula, with ugly, vulgar bad guys vs. handsome, articulate good guys.
IMDB Rating: 7.7
IMDB Votes: 6000
Genere: Crime, Drama, Mystery, Thriller
Country: France, Italy, West Germany
Duration: 130 min
Plot tags: political, social, political thriller, tense, rough, serious, captivating, realistic, suspenseful, talky
Similar in 86%
April Captains (2000)
Plot Summary:
Story of the 1974 coup that overthrew the right-wing Portuguese dictatorship--which continued the fascist policies of long-time dictator Antonio Salazar--and of two young army captains who were involved in it.
IMDB Rating: 7.1
IMDB Votes: 3000
Genere: Drama, History, War
Country: Portugal, Spain, Italy, France
Duration: 123 min
Plot tags: tense, rough, serious, thought provoking, realistic, inspirational, political
Similar in 88%
The Mauritanian (2021)
Plot Summary:
A detainee at the U.S military's Guantanamo Bay detention center is held without charges for over a decade and seeks help from a defense attorney for his release.
IMDB Rating: 7.4
IMDB Votes: 59000
Genere: Biography, Crime, Drama, History, Thriller, War
Country: UK, USA
Duration: 129 min
Plot tags: thought provoking, suspense, tense, captivating, inspirational, serious, social, dramatic, disturbing, art house
Similar in 77%
Hunger (2008)
Plot Summary:
The story of Bobby Sands, the IRA member who led the 1981 hunger strike in which Republican prisoners tried to win political status. It dramatises events in the Maze prison in the six weeks prior to Sands’ death.
IMDB Rating: 7.5
IMDB Votes: 73000
Genere: Biography, Crime, Drama, Thriller
Country: UK, Ireland
Duration: 96 min
Plot tags: disturbing, bleak, political, sincere, depressing, art house, lyrical, rough, serious, visual
Similar in 85%
Salvador (1986)
Plot Summary:
A second rated journalist from the US tries his luck in El Salvador during the military dictatorship in the 1980s.
IMDB Rating: 7.4
IMDB Votes: 23000
Genere: Drama, History, Thriller, War
Country: UK, Mexico, USA
Duration: 122 min
Plot tags: suspense, political, tense, harsh, factual, rough, thought provoking, bleak, serious, captivating
Similar in 80%
The Report (2019)
Plot Summary:
The story of Daniel Jones, lead investigator for the US Senate’s sweeping study into the CIA's Detention and Interrogation Program, which was found to be brutal, immoral and ineffective. With the truth at stake, Jones battled tirelessly to make public what many in power sought to keep hidden.
IMDB Rating: 7.2
IMDB Votes: 49000
Genere: Biography, Crime, Drama, History, Thriller
Country: USA
Duration: 119 min
Plot tags: political, uplifting, psychological, ambiguous ending, enigmatic, political thriller, informative, non-linear, philosophical, interesting
Similar in 85%
Missing (1982)
Plot Summary:
Based on the real-life experiences of Ed Horman. A conservative American businessman travels to a South American country to investigate the sudden disappearance of his son after a right-wing military takeover. Accompanied by his son's wife he uncovers a trail of cover-ups that implicate the US State department which supports the right-wing dictatorship.
IMDB Rating: 7.7
IMDB Votes: 23000
Genere: Biography, Drama, History, Mystery, Thriller
Country: USA, Mexico
Duration: 122 min
Plot tags: political, political thriller, emotional, talky, tense, thought provoking, suspenseful, disturbing, serious, poignant