Best movies like American History X

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Dogville (2003)

Plot Summary:

A barren soundstage is stylishly utilized to create a minimalist small-town setting in which a mysterious woman named Grace hides from the criminals who pursue her. The town is two-faced and offers to harbor Grace as long as she can make it worth their effort, so Grace works hard under the employ of various townspeople to win their favor. Tensions flare, however, and Grace's status as a helpless outsider provokes vicious contempt and abuse from the citizens of Dogville.

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A Prophet (2009)

Plot Summary:

Sentenced to six years in prison, Malik El Djebena (Tahar Rahim) is alone in the world and can neither read nor write. On his arrival at the prison, he seems younger and more brittle than the others detained there. At once he falls under the sway of a group of Corsicans who enforce their rule in the prison. As the 'missions' go by, he toughens himself and wins the confidence of the Corsican group.

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Imperium (2016)

Plot Summary:

Nate Foster, a young, idealistic FBI agent, goes undercover to take down a radical white supremacy terrorist group. The bright up-and-coming analyst must confront the challenge of sticking to a new identity while maintaining his real principles as he navigates the dangerous underworld of white supremacy. Inspired by real events.

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Bronson (2008)

Plot Summary:

A young man who was sentenced to 7 years in prison for robbing a post office ends up spending 30 years in solitary confinement. During this time, his own personality is supplanted by his alter ego, Charles Bronson.

Similar in 77%

Hate (1995)

Plot Summary:

Aimlessly whiling away their days in the concrete environs of their dead-end suburbia, Vinz, Hubert, and Said -- a Jew, African, and an Arab -- give human faces to France's immigrant populations, their bristling resentment at their social marginalization slowly simmering until it reaches a climactic boiling point. La Haine means Hate.

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A Guide to Recognizing Your Saints (2006)

Plot Summary:

Dito Montiel, a successful author, receives a call from his long-suffering mother, asking him to return home and visit his ailing father. Dito recalls his childhood growing up in a violent neighborhood in Queens, N.Y., with friends Antonio, Giuseppe, Nerf and Mike.

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The Believer (2001)

Plot Summary:

A hardcore American racist skinhead who, because of his intelligence, leads a gang dedicated to fighting the enemy: the supposed American-Jewish conspiracy for domination. However, he's hiding a secret: he's Jewish-born, a brilliant scholar whose questioning of the tenets of his faith has left him angry and confused, turning against those who he thinks have a tragic history of their own making.

Similar in 89%

Animal Factory (2000)

Plot Summary:

A young man goes to prison and a tough, older convict takes him under his wing as a mentor.

Similar in 79%

Romper Stomper (1992)

Plot Summary:

Nazi skinheads in Melbourne take out their anger on local Vietnamese, who are seen as threatening racial purity. Finally the Vietnamese have had enough and confront the skinheads in an all-out confrontation, sending the skinheads running. A woman who is prone to epileptic seizures joins the skins' merry band, and helps them on their run from justice, but is her affliction also a sign of impurity?.

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Higher Learning (1995)

Plot Summary:

Malik (Omar Epps) is an African-American student attending on a track scholarship; academics are not his strong suit, and he goes in thinking that his athletic abilities will earn him a free ride through college. Fudge (Ice Cube), a "professional student" who has been at Columbus for six years so far, becomes friendly with Malik and challenges his views about race and politics in America.

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This Is England (2006)

Plot Summary:

A story about a troubled boy growing up in England, set in 1983. He comes across a few skinheads on his way home from school, after a fight. They become his new best friends even like family. Based on experiences of director Shane Meadows.

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Gran Torino (2008)

Plot Summary:

Walt Kowalski is a widower who holds onto his prejudices despite the changes in his Michigan neighborhood and the world around him. Kowalski is a grumpy, tough-minded, unhappy old man who can't get along with either his kids or his neighbors. He is a Korean War veteran whose prize possession is a 1972 Gran Torino he keeps in mint condition. When his neighbor Thao, a young Hmong teenager under pressure from his gang member cousin, tries to steal his Gran Torino, Kowalski sets out to reform the youth. Drawn against his will into the life of Thao's family, Kowalski is soon taking steps to protect them from the gangs that infest their neighborhood.

Similar in 85%

Sleepers (1996)

Plot Summary:

Two 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.

Similar in 86%

Scum (1979)

Plot Summary:

This is the hard and shocking story of life in a British Borstal for young offenders. The brutal regime made no attempt to reform or improve the inmates and actively encouraged a power struggle between the 'tough' new inmate and the 'old hands'. The film was originally made as a BBC play but it was banned before ever being shown.

Similar in 83%

South Central (1992)

Plot Summary:

A man is put to prison for 10 years. Coming out of prison he wants to live a normal life and stop with crime but his son has yet followed the criminal path of his father.

Similar in 75%

Crash (2004)

Plot Summary:

Los Angeles citizens with vastly separate lives collide in interweaving stories of race, loss and redemption.

Similar in 86%

Shot Caller (2017)

Plot Summary:

A newly-released prison gangster is forced by the leaders of his gang to orchestrate a major crime with a brutal rival gang on the streets of Southern California.

Similar in 82%

Training Day (2001)

Plot Summary:

On his first day on the job as a narcotics officer, a rookie cop works with a rogue detective who isn't what he appears.

Similar in 77%

City of God (2002)

Plot Summary:

Cidade de Deus is a shantytown that started during the 1960s and became one of Rio de Janeiro’s most dangerous places in the beginning of the 1980s. To tell the story of this place, the movie describes the life of various characters, all seen by the point of view of the narrator, Buscapé. Buscapé was raised in a very violent environment. Despite the feeling that all odds were against him, he finds out that life can be seen with other eyes.

Similar in 83%

Once Upon a Time in America (1984)

Plot Summary:

A former Prohibition-era Jewish gangster returns to the Lower East Side of Manhattan over thirty years later, where he once again must confront the ghosts and regrets of his old life.

Similar in 80%

Blow (2001)

Plot Summary:

A boy named George Jung grows up in a struggling family in the 1950's. His mother nags at her husband as he is trying to make a living for the family. It is finally revealed that George's father cannot make a living and the family goes bankrupt. George does not want the same thing to happen to him, and his friend Tuna, in the 1960's, suggests that he deal marijuana. He is a big hit in California in the 1960's, yet he goes to jail, where he finds out about the wonders of cocaine. As a result, when released, he gets rich by bringing cocaine to America. However, he soon pays the price.

Similar in 79%

Pulp Fiction (1994)

Plot Summary:

A burger-loving hit man, his philosophical partner, a drug-addled gangster's moll and a washed-up boxer converge in this sprawling, comedic crime caper. Their adventures unfurl in three stories that ingeniously trip back and forth in time.

Similar in 82%

Mississippi Burning (1988)

Plot Summary:

Two FBI agents investigating the murder of civil rights workers during the 60s seek to breach the conspiracy of silence in a small Southern town where segregation divides black and white. The younger agent trained in FBI school runs up against the small town ways of his, former Sheriff, partner.

Similar in 90%

Taxi Driver (1976)

Plot Summary:

A mentally unstable Vietnam War veteran works as a night-time taxi driver in New York City where the perceived decadence and sleaze feeds his urge for violent action, attempting to save a preadolescent prostitute in the process.

Similar in 81%

Requiem for a Dream (2000)

Plot Summary:

The hopes and dreams of four ambitious people are shattered when their drug addictions begin spiraling out of control. A look into addiction and how it overcomes the mind and body.

Similar in 75%

Gangs of New York (2002)

Plot Summary:

It's 1863. America was born in the streets. Amsterdam Vallon returns to the Five Points of America to seek vengeance against the psychotic gangland kingpin, Bill the Butcher, who murdered his father years earlier. With an eager pickpocket by his side and a whole new army, Vallon fights his way to seek vengeance on the Butcher and restore peace in the area.

Similar in 80%

No Country for Old Men (2007)

Plot Summary:

Llewelyn Moss stumbles upon dead bodies, $2 million and a hoard of heroin in a Texas desert, but methodical killer Anton Chigurh comes looking for it, with local sheriff Ed Tom Bell hot on his trail. The roles of prey and predator blur as the violent pursuit of money and justice collide.

Similar in 79%

Fight Club (1999)

Plot Summary:

A ticking-time-bomb insomniac and a slippery soap salesman channel primal male aggression into a shocking new form of therapy. Their concept catches on, with underground "fight clubs" forming in every town, until an eccentric gets in the way and ignites an out-of-control spiral toward oblivion.

Similar in 79%

Se7en (1995)

Plot Summary:

Two homicide detectives are on a desperate hunt for a serial killer whose crimes are based on the "seven deadly sins" in this dark and haunting film that takes viewers from the tortured remains of one victim to the next. The seasoned Det. Sommerset researches each sin in an effort to get inside the killer's mind, while his novice partner, Mills, scoffs at his efforts to unravel the case.

Similar in 90%

The Green Mile (1999)

Plot Summary:

A supernatural tale set on death row in a Southern prison, where gentle giant John Coffey possesses the mysterious power to heal people's ailments. When the cellblock's head guard, Paul Edgecomb, recognizes Coffey's miraculous gift, he tries desperately to help stave off the condemned man's execution.