Best movies like The Quiet American
Last updated March 2024
Looking for movies similar to The Quiet American? Provide your expertise to direct others towards tv shows and films you've seen before that they may enjoy also. Assist in enlarging the group of people proposing videos to each other. We appreciate your input!
Plot Summary:
A stylish political thriller where love and war collide in Southeast Asia. Set in early 1950s Vietnam, a young American becomes entangled in a dangerous love triangle when he falls for the beautiful mistress of a British journalist. As war is waged around them, these three only sink deeper into a world of drugs, passion, and betrayal where nothing is as it seems.
IMDB Rating: 7.0
IMDB Votes: 29000
Genere: Drama, Romance, Thriller, War
Country: UK, Germany, USA, Vietnam, Australia, France, Canada, New Zealand
Duration: 101 min
Plot tags: realistic, political, atmospheric, talky, intense, thought provoking, serious, period piece, political thriller, sincere
Best tv shows and movies like The Quiet American (2002):
Similar in 75%
The Year That Trembled (2002)
Plot Summary:
The Year That Trembled is a 1970 coming-of-age story set in the shadow of Kent State that focuses on a group of young characters facing the Vietnam Draft Lottery.
IMDB Rating: 5.1
IMDB Votes: 222
Genere: Drama, Romance, War
Country: USA
Duration: 104 min
Plot tags: sentimental, sincere, touching, emotional, serious, realistic, contemplative, independent film
![blank](http://wpfc.ml/b.gif)
Similar in 88%
The Fourth Protocol (1987)
Plot Summary:
Plan Aurora, led by Kim Philby is a plan that breaches the top-secret Fourth Protocol and turns the fears that shaped it into a living nightmare. A crack Soviet agent, placed under cover in a quiet English country town, begins to assemble a nuclear bomb, whilst MI5 agent John Preston attempts to prevent it's detonation.
IMDB Rating: 6.5
IMDB Votes: 11000
Genere: Thriller
Country: UK
Duration: 119 min
Plot tags: suspense, exciting, suspenseful, intense, serious, political, philosophical, political thriller, cult classic, realistic
Similar in 81%
Under Fire (1983)
Plot Summary:
Three U.S. journalists (Nick Nolte, Joanna Cassidy, Gene Hackman) get too close to one another and their work in 1979 Nicaragua.
IMDB Rating: 7.0
IMDB Votes: 8000
Genere: Drama, War
Country: USA, Mexico
Duration: 128 min
Plot tags: tense, realistic, political, atmospheric, serious, emotional, suspenseful, political thriller, cult classic, independent film
Similar in 90%
Half Moon Street (1986)
Plot Summary:
Dr. Lauren Slaughter, a research fellow at the Arab-Anglo Institute in London is utterly frustrated by her job. To supplement her income, she starts moonlighting at the Jasmine Escort Service, where she has more control over men and money than she does at the office. On one of her 'dates', Lauren meets the politician Lord Bulbeck who is trying to mediate a peace accord between the Arabs and Israelis. Bulbeck falls in love with his escort, and unwittingly, Lauren becomes a pawn in some very dirty politics.
IMDB Rating: 5.3
IMDB Votes: 3000
Genere: Drama, Thriller
Country: UK, USA
Duration: 90 min
Plot tags: political thriller, psychological, serious, realistic, suspense, independent film, sexual, erotic, light, romantic
Similar in 77%
Beyond the Limit (1983)
Plot Summary:
Set in a small politically unstable Latin American country, the story follows the half English and half Latino Dr. Eduardo Plarr, who left his home to find a better life. Along the way he meets an array of people, including British Consul Charley Fortnum, a representative in Latin America who is trying to keep Revolution from occurring. He is also a remorseful alcoholic. Another person the doctor meets is Clara, whom he immediately falls in love with, but there is a problem: Clara is Charley's wife.
IMDB Rating: 5.7
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Drama, Romance, Thriller
Country: UK, Mexico
Duration: 104 min
Plot tags: tense, serious, realistic, suspenseful, political thriller, biting, neo noir, suspense, tragic
Similar in 90%
The Human Factor (1979)
Plot Summary:
When Arthur Davis, a junior bachelor in the British secret service's African section, is seen taking a file with him to meet his girlfriend Cynthia- the brass fears he may be the leak to Moscow, and allows Dr. Percival to terminate the 'risk factor' by poisoning to avoid a scandal. In fact Davis's desk chief, Maurice Castle, is the double agent since the South African communists helped him smuggle out his black lover Sarah M., meanwhile his wife and mother of schoolboy Sam, to force him to cooperate with the Apartheid government. When Cornelius Muller, the South African official who failed to get him in Pretoria's power, visits London for the anti-communist operation Uncle Remus, he points out Castle still is the natural suspect.
IMDB Rating: 6.1
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Drama, Romance, Thriller
Country: UK
Duration: 115 min
Plot tags: political thriller, medical drama, independent film, exciting, serious, realistic, suspenseful, neo noir, romantic drama, suspense
Similar in 78%
Circle of Deceit (1981)
Plot Summary:
Georg Laschen leaves his family in West Germany to go work as a war correspondent in Beirut during the fights between Christians and Palestinians.
IMDB Rating: 7.1
IMDB Votes: 948
Genere: Drama, War
Country: West Germany, France
Duration: 108 min
Plot tags: political, sincere, rough, thought provoking, bleak, serious, realistic, disturbing
![blank](http://wpfc.ml/b.gif)
Similar in 90%
The Good German (2006)
Plot Summary:
An American journalist arrives in Berlin just after the end of World War Two. He becomes involved in a murder mystery surrounding a dead GI who washes up at a lakeside mansion during the Potsdam negotiations between the Allied powers. Soon his investigation connects with his search for his married pre-war German lover.
IMDB Rating: 6.0
IMDB Votes: 26000
Genere: Drama, Mystery, Romance, Thriller, War
Country: USA
Duration: 105 min
Plot tags: black and white, neo noir, atmospheric, suspenseful, serious, realistic, period piece, clever, stylized, political
Similar in 79%
An Unforgettable Summer (1994)
Plot Summary:
In 1925 Romania, young Marie-Therese Von Debretsy refuses the flirtatious advances of her husband's commanding officer. As a result, the cosmopolitan family is reassigned to a brutally bleak and dangerous outpost on the Bulgarian/Romanian frontier where both their relationship and humanity are severely tested.
IMDB Rating: 7.3
IMDB Votes: 1000
Genere: Drama, Romance, War
Country: Romania, France
Duration: 82 min
Plot tags: meditative, light, atmospheric, melancholic, talky, serious, realistic, costume drama, bleak, romantic
Similar in 81%
Indochine (1992)
Plot Summary:
The story starts in the 1930s at one of the largest rubber-tree plantations in Indochine (Vietnam). This plantation is owned by the French colonist Eliane, a proud woman who lives with her father and her native adoptive daughter Camille. She doesn't have a husband or a man in her life (apart from her father), but gets to know the young officer Jean-Baptiste when both want to buy the same painting at an auction. They have a short affair, but then she refuses to see him again. In the meantime it's Camille who has fallen in love with Jean-Baptiste and Eliane knows it. She makes sure he's sent to one of the most desolate outposts on some remote island, making sure that the two will never see each other again. Camille has no choice, but to marry the man she was promised to, but in the meantime she starts a search to find the man she really loves.
IMDB Rating: 7.0
IMDB Votes: 11000
Genere: Drama, Romance, War
Country: France
Duration: 160 min
Plot tags: visual, sentimental, atmospheric, epic, realistic, stylized, serious, anthology, art house, independent film
Similar in 89%
Before the Rain (1994)
Plot Summary:
The circularity of violence seen in a story that circles on itself. In Macedonia, during war in Bosnia, Christians hunt an ethnic Albanian girl who may have murdered one of their own. A young monk who's taken a vow of silence offers her protection. In London, a photographic editor who's pregnant needs to talk it out with her estranged husband and chooses a toney restaurant.
IMDB Rating: 7.9
IMDB Votes: 16000
Genere: Drama, Romance, War
Country: UK, France
Duration: 113 min
Plot tags: political, atmospheric, realistic, anthology, erotic, mystical, sentimental, sincere, emotional, disturbing
Similar in 76%
A Different Loyalty (2004)
Plot Summary:
In January 1963, British journalist Leo Cauffield suddenly disappears from his home in Beirut. His wife Sally knew that he was working part-time for British intelligence, but was not prepared to be told by the British embassy that they suspect he has defected to Communist Russia. As his wife puts together the pieces of the mysterious jigsaw of the past, tracking her passionate relationship with her husband and his history as former head of MI6’s counter-espionage section, her relentless search for the truth takes her to London, New York and finally Moscow.
IMDB Rating: 4.9
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Drama, Romance, Thriller
Country: Canada, UK, USA, Malta
Duration: 96 min
Plot tags: serious, realistic, suspenseful
![blank](http://wpfc.ml/b.gif)
Similar in 85%
Harrison's Flowers (2000)
Plot Summary:
Harrison Lloyd is a Pulitzer-winning photojournalist. His wife and family are making it hard for him to keep his mind on his work when he's in a war zone, and he wants to change jobs to something less stressful. But he's got one last assignment, in war-torn Yugoslavia, in 1991, at the height of the fighting. Word comes back that he apparently died in a building collapse, but his wife Sarah (also a journalist for Newsweek) refuses to believe that he's dead and goes looking for him. She's helped immensely by the photo-journalists Eric Kyle and Marc Stevenson that she runs into over there; together, they're determined to make it through the chaotic landscape to Vukovar, which is not only the nexus of the war but where she believes Harrison is located. Meanwhile, Harrison's son Cesar is looking after his father's prized greenhouse, keeping hope, and flowers, alive.
IMDB Rating: 7.1
IMDB Votes: 7000
Genere: Drama, Romance, War
Country: France
Duration: 130 min
Plot tags: disturbing, suspense, bleak, realistic, political, art house, brutal, serious, gloomy, crying
Similar in 83%
Gardens of Stone (1987)
Plot Summary:
A sergeant must deal with his desires to save the lives of young soldiers being sent to Vietnam. Continuously denied the chance to teach the soldiers about his experiences, he settles for trying to help the son of an old army buddy.
IMDB Rating: 6.4
IMDB Votes: 6000
Genere: Drama, Romance, War
Country: USA
Duration: 111 min
Plot tags: realistic, intense, harsh, bleak, sincere, touching, serious, emotional, contemplative, gloomy
Similar in 82%
A Bright Shining Lie (1998)
Plot Summary:
Something in his past keeps career Army man John Paul Vann from advancing past colonel. He views being sent to Vietnam as part of the US military advisory force a stepping stone to promotion. However, he disagrees vocally (and on the record) with the way the war is being run and is forced to leave the military. Returning to Vietnam as a civilian working with the Army, he comes to despise some South Vietnamese officers while he takes charge of some of the U.S. forces and continues his liaisons with Vietnamese women.
IMDB Rating: 6.4
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Drama, War
Country: USA
Duration: 118 min
Plot tags: serious, realistic, cult film
![blank](http://wpfc.ml/b.gif)
Similar in 89%
Good (2008)
Plot Summary:
The rise of national socialism in Germany should not be regarded as a conspiracy of madmen. Millions of "good" people found themselves in a society spiralling into terrible chaos. A film about then, which illuminates the terrors of now.
IMDB Rating: 6.1
IMDB Votes: 8000
Genere: Drama, Romance, War
Country: UK, Germany
Duration: 92 min
Plot tags: serious, realistic, disturbing, captivating, christian film, retro, political, sad, period piece, romantic drama
Similar in 79%
Charlotte Gray (2001)
Plot Summary:
This is a drama set in Nazi-occupied France at the height of World War II. Charlotte Gray tells the compelling story of a young Scottish woman working with the French Resistance in the hope of rescuing her lover, a missing RAF pilot. Based on the best-selling novel by Sebastian Faulks.
IMDB Rating: 6.4
IMDB Votes: 13000
Genere: Drama, Romance, Thriller, War
Country: UK, Australia, Germany
Duration: 121 min
Plot tags: sexy, sentimental, romantic, captivating, realistic, intense, political thriller, serious, gloomy, fairy tale
Similar in 83%
The Parallax View (1974)
Plot Summary:
An ambitious reporter, investigating a senator's assassination, realizes witnesses to the shooting are systematically dying and discovers a multi-million dollar corporation which serves as a front for the recruitment of political assassins.
IMDB Rating: 7.1
IMDB Votes: 21000
Genere: Drama, Thriller
Country: USA
Duration: 102 min
Plot tags: atmospheric, disturbing, suspenseful, psychological, neo noir, political, intense, political thriller, serious, realistic
Similar in 77%
The Green Berets (1968)
Plot Summary:
Col. Mike Kirby picks two teams of crack Green Berets for a mission in South Vietnam. First off is to build and control a camp that is trying to be taken by the enemy the second mission is to kidnap a North Vietnamese General.
IMDB Rating: 5.6
IMDB Votes: 14000
Genere: Drama, War
Country: USA
Duration: 142 min
Plot tags: realistic, serious, thought provoking, captivating, retro, exciting, sentimental, sexy, epic, bad ending
Similar in 88%
Imagining Argentina (2003)
Plot Summary:
Set during the unsettling disappearances in Buenos Aires during the dictatorship of the 1970s, the film involves theater director Carlos Rueda and his wife Cecilia. Shortly after Cecilia writes an editorial commentary questioning the mysterious abductions, she is herself abducted and taken into police custody.
IMDB Rating: 6.1
IMDB Votes: 4000
Genere: Drama, Romance, Thriller
Country: Spain, UK, USA, Argentina
Duration: 107 min
Plot tags: tense, bleak, serious, psychological, suspenseful, suspense, inspirational, romantic, political, romantic drama
![blank](http://wpfc.ml/b.gif)
Similar in 80%
The Constant Gardener (2005)
Plot Summary:
Justin Quayle is a low-level British diplomat who has always gone about his work very quietly, not causing any problems. But after his radical wife Tessa is killed he becomes determined to find out why, thrusting himself into the middle of a very dangerous conspiracy.
IMDB Rating: 7.4
IMDB Votes: 147000
Genere: Drama, Mystery, Romance, Thriller
Country: UK, Germany, Kenya, France, USA, Switzerland
Duration: 129 min
Plot tags: political thriller, suspenseful, tense, political, suspense, thought provoking, heartbreaking, depressing, captivating, psychological
Similar in 85%
The Statement (2003)
Plot Summary:
The film is set in France in the 1990s, the French were defeated by the Germans early in World War II, an armistice was signed in 1940 which effectively split France into a German occupied part in the North and a semi-independent part in the south which became known as Vichy France. In reality the Vichy government was a puppet regime controlled by the Germans. Part of the agreement was that the Vichy Government would assist with the 'cleansing' of Jews from France. The Vichy government formed a police force called the Milice, who worked with the Germans.
IMDB Rating: 6.2
IMDB Votes: 5000
Genere: Drama, Thriller
Country: Canada, France, UK
Duration: 114 min
Plot tags: tense, suspenseful, political, intense, serious, cult classic, bleak, realistic, psychological, brutal
Similar in 77%
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%
Doctor Zhivago (1965)
Plot Summary:
Doctor Zhivago is the filmed adapation of the Russian novel by Boris Pasternak from director David Lean that was an international success and today deemed a classic. Omar Sharif and Julie Christie play two protagonists who in fact love each other yet because of their current situation cannot find a way be together.
IMDB Rating: 7.9
IMDB Votes: 81000
Genere: Drama, Romance, War
Country: Italy, UK, USA
Duration: 197 min
Plot tags: epic, atmospheric, emotional, romantic, scenic, costume drama, visual, sentimental, serious, realistic
Similar in 80%
The Year of Living Dangerously (1982)
Plot Summary:
Australian journalist Guy Hamilton travels to Indonesia to cover civil strife in 1965. There, on the eve of an attempted coup, he befriends a Chinese Australian photographer with a deep connection to and vast knowledge of the Indonesian people and also falls in love with a British national.
IMDB Rating: 7.1
IMDB Votes: 23000
Genere: Drama, Romance, War
Country: Australia, USA
Duration: 115 min
Plot tags: political, atmospheric, thought provoking, sad, art house, sensual, historically accurate, tense, clever, serious
Similar in 84%
The Ipcress File (1965)
Plot Summary:
This espionage thriller represents a landmark in spy movies introducing the sly, dry intelligence agent Harry Palmer. The story, centers on Palmer's investigation into British Intelligence security. He's soon enmeshed in a world of double-dealing, kidnap and murder and finds a traitor is operating at the heart of the secret service. Will the mysterious 'Ipcress File' reveal who the traitor is?.
IMDB Rating: 7.2
IMDB Votes: 17000
Genere: Drama, Thriller
Country: UK
Duration: 109 min
Plot tags: atmospheric, suspenseful, suspense, exciting, tense, enigmatic, clever, realistic, cynical, retro
Similar in 82%
Body of Lies (2008)
Plot Summary:
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 – a satellite link – watches Ferris. At the other end of that real-time link is the CIA’s Ed Hoffman, strategizing events from thousands of miles away. And as Ferris nears the target, he discovers trust can be just as dangerous as it is necessary for survival.
IMDB Rating: 7.0
IMDB Votes: 237000
Genere: Action, Drama, Thriller
Country: USA, UK
Duration: 128 min
Plot tags: clever, political, exciting, tense, realistic, political thriller, serious, suspense, entertaining, enigmatic
Similar in 76%
Syriana (2005)
Plot Summary:
The Middle Eastern oil industry is the backdrop of this tense drama, which weaves together numerous story lines. Bennett Holiday is an American lawyer in charge of facilitating a dubious merger of oil companies, while Bryan Woodman, a Switzerland-based energy analyst, experiences both personal tragedy and opportunity during a visit with Arabian royalty. Meanwhile, veteran CIA agent Bob Barnes uncovers an assassination plot with unsettling origins.
IMDB Rating: 6.9
IMDB Votes: 133000
Genere: Drama, Thriller
Country: USA, United Arab Emirates
Duration: 128 min
Plot tags: political thriller, suspense, cerebral, political, tense, realistic, intense, thought provoking, serious, disturbing
Similar in 82%
Allied (2016)
Plot Summary:
In 1942, an intelligence officer in North Africa encounters a female French Resistance fighter on a deadly mission behind enemy lines. When they reunite in London, their relationship is tested by the pressures of war.
IMDB Rating: 7.1
IMDB Votes: 166000
Genere: Action, Drama, History, Romance, Thriller, War
Country: UK, USA
Duration: 124 min
Plot tags: suspense, sexy, emotional, exciting, tense, romantic, suspenseful, scenic, intense, factual
Similar in 86%
Flame & Citron (2008)
Plot Summary:
During Nazi occupation, red-headed Bent Faurschou-Hviid ("Flame") and Jørgen Haagen Schmith ("Citron"), assassins in the Danish resistance, take orders from Winther, who's in direct contact with Allied leaders. One shoots, the other drives. Until 1944, they kill only Danes; then Winther gives orders to kill Germans. When a target tells Bent that Winther's using them to settle private scores, doubt sets in, complicated by Bent's relationship with the mysterious Kitty Selmer, who may be a double agent. Also, someone in their circle is a traitor. Can Bent and Jørgen kill an über-target, evade capture, and survive the war? And is this heroism, naiveté, or mere hatred?.
IMDB Rating: 7.2
IMDB Votes: 20000
Genere: Action, Drama, History, Romance, Thriller, War
Country: Denmark, Germany, Norway, France, Sweden, Finland, Czech Republic
Duration: 130 min
Plot tags: realistic, sincere, period piece, tense, atmospheric, factual, brutal, intense, suspenseful, psychological