Best movies like Ganga Zumba
Last updated March 2024
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Plot Summary:
The life of a runaway slave who founded the Quilombo dos Palmares, an outlaw community of Brazilian slaves.
IMDB Rating: 6.6
IMDB Votes: 132
Genere: Drama, History
Country: Brazil
Duration: 100 min
Plot tags:
Best tv shows and movies like Ganga Zumba (1963):
Similar in 85%
I Am Not a Witch (2017)
Plot Summary:
Following a banal incident in her local village in Africa, 8-year old Shula is accused of witchcraft.
IMDB Rating: 6.9
IMDB Votes: 4000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: UK, France, Germany, Zambia
Duration: 93 min
Plot tags: art house, cult classic
Similar in 80%
Lucky (2011)
Plot Summary:
A 10-year-old South African orphan leaves his Zulu village to make his own life in the city... only to find no one will help him, except a formidable Indian woman.
IMDB Rating: 7.2
IMDB Votes: 265
Genere: Drama
Country: South Africa
Duration: 100 min
Plot tags:
Similar in 80%
Children of the Mountain (2016)
Plot Summary:
Against the picturesque Ghanaian backdrop, Children of the Mountain is an honest exploration of a mother’s will in the face of much adversity. When her baby is born with a cleft lip, cerebral palsy, and Down syndrome, Essuman is led to believe that she has a ‘dirty womb.’ Her promising future as a wife and mother is shattered as her lover disowns her and the community eyes her with suspicion.
IMDB Rating: 7.9
IMDB Votes: 75
Genere: Drama
Country: USA, Ghana
Duration: 90 min
Plot tags:
Similar in 83%
Grandmother (1989)
Plot Summary:
A small African village. The story focuses on Bila, a ten year old boy who befriends an old woman, Sana. Everybody calls her 'Witch' but Bila himself calls her 'Yaaba' (grandmother). When Bila's cousin Nopoko gets sick it is Sana's medicine that saves her.
IMDB Rating: 7.1
IMDB Votes: 739
Genere: Drama, Romance
Country: Burkina Faso, Switzerland, France, West Germany
Duration: 90 min
Plot tags: independent film, black cinema
Similar in 83%
Cantata de Chile (1976)
Plot Summary:
The story of the Santa María School massacre of miners in 1907.
IMDB Rating: 6.5
IMDB Votes: 36
Genere: Drama, History
Country: Cuba
Duration: 119 min
Plot tags: allegory
Similar in 86%
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 75%
Black Jesus (1968)
Plot Summary:
A thinly-disguised biography of African leader Patrice Lumumba, here called Lalubi. Lalubi, a Christ-like leader determined to save his people, by passive resistance, from the dictatorial regime propped up by European colonialists, is imprisoned and tortured, along with a thief who comes to a greater understanding through his contact with Lalubi.
IMDB Rating: 6.6
IMDB Votes: 310
Genere: Drama
Country: Italy
Duration: 89 min
Plot tags: political, grindhouse
Similar in 87%
Harvest: 3,000 Years (1975)
Plot Summary:
In this meditative film, the everyday lives of poor Ethiopian peasants are shown using documentary as well as storytelling techniques, and the drama arises out of the timeless but still contemporary issues of their lives.
IMDB Rating: 7.6
IMDB Votes: 216
Genere: Drama
Country: Ethiopia
Duration: 150 min
Plot tags: independent film
Similar in 78%
Berlin 1885: The Division of Africa (2010)
Plot Summary:
A docudrama depicting the Berlin Conference in which the Western powers decided the partition of Africa.
IMDB Rating: 7.1
IMDB Votes: 29
Genere: Drama, History
Country: France, Belgium, Germany
Duration: 85 min
Plot tags:
Similar in 86%
Sambizanga (1972)
Plot Summary:
Domingos is a member of an African liberation movement, arrested by the Portuguese secret police, after bloody events in Angola. He does not betray his companions, but is beaten to death in prison, and not knowing he is dead, his wife goes from a prison station to another, trying in vain to know where he is.
IMDB Rating: 7.0
IMDB Votes: 614
Genere: Drama
Country: Angola, France
Duration: 97 min
Plot tags: independent film
Similar in 76%
Sleeping Sickness (2011)
Plot Summary:
Ebbo and Vera Velten have spent the better part of the past twenty years living in different African countries. Ebbo is the manager of a sleeping sickness programme. His work is fulfilling. Vera, however, feels increasingly lost in Yaounde’s ex-pat community. She can’t bear the separation from her 14-year-old daughter, Helen, who is attending boarding school in Germany. Ebbo must give up his life in Africa or he risks losing the woman he loves. But his fear of returning to a land now remote to him increases with each passing day. Years later. Alex Nzila, a young French doctor of Congolese origin, travels to Cameroon to evaluate a development project. It’s been a long time since he set foot on this continent, but, instead of finding new prospects, he encounters a destructive, lost man. Like a phantom, Ebbo slips away from his evaluator.
IMDB Rating: 6.2
IMDB Votes: 695
Genere: Drama
Country: Germany, France, Netherlands
Duration: 91 min
Plot tags: atmospheric, emotional, psychological, serious, realistic, contemplative, gloomy
Similar in 87%
Zama (2017)
Plot Summary:
Based on the novel by Antonio Di Benedetto. Don Diego de Zama, a Spanish officer of the 17th century settled in Asunción, awaits his transfer to Buenos Aires.
IMDB Rating: 6.7
IMDB Votes: 7000
Genere: Drama, History
Country: Argentina, Brazil, Spain, Dominican Republic, France, Netherlands, Mexico, Switzerland, USA, Portugal, Lebanon
Duration: 115 min
Plot tags: art house, artsy, avant garde, independent film, existential, cult classic
Similar in 86%
Ceddo (1977)
Plot Summary:
When King Demba War sides with the Muslims, the Ceddo kidnap his daughter, Princess Dior Yacine, to protest their forcible conversion to Islam.
IMDB Rating: 6.7
IMDB Votes: 1000
Genere: Drama
Country: Senegal, France
Duration: 120 min
Plot tags:
Similar in 85%
Adwa (1999)
Plot Summary:
In 1896, Ethiopia, an African nation, largely armed with spears and knives, defeats a well-equipped and organized Italian military bent on colonization.
IMDB Rating: 8.0
IMDB Votes: 71
Genere: Documentary, Drama, War
Country: USA, Germany, Ethiopia
Duration: 97 min
Plot tags: independent film
Similar in 84%
Gold Coast (2015)
Plot Summary:
Young anti-colonial idealist Wulff leaves for Danish Guinea to set up a coffee plantation but not everything goes according to plan.
IMDB Rating: 5.3
IMDB Votes: 706
Genere: Drama, History, Romance
Country: Denmark, Sweden, Ghana
Duration: 114 min
Plot tags:
Similar in 77%
The Last Supper (1976)
Plot Summary:
A pious plantation owner attempts to teach Christianity to 12 of his slaves by inviting them to participate in a reenactment of the Last Supper.
IMDB Rating: 7.5
IMDB Votes: 680
Genere: Drama, History
Country: Cuba
Duration: 120 min
Plot tags: mind bending, psychedelic, surreal, thought provoking, clever, serious, realistic, witty, disturbing, cynical
Similar in 80%
Carlota Joaquina, Princess of Brazil (1995)
Plot Summary:
A hot blooded Spanish princess plots to conquer her enemies and become queen.
IMDB Rating: 6.7
IMDB Votes: 1000
Genere: Comedy, History
Country: Brazil
Duration: 100 min
Plot tags: offbeat, humorous, captivating, realistic, semi serious
Similar in 78%
Sankofa (1993)
Plot Summary:
A self-absorbed Black American fashion model on a photo shoot in Africa is spiritually transported back to a plantation in the West Indies where she experiences first-hand the physical and psychic horrors of chattel slavery, and eventually the redemptive power of community and rebellion as she becomes a member of a freedom-seeking Maroon colony.
IMDB Rating: 7.0
IMDB Votes: 784
Genere: Drama
Country: USA, Ghana, Burkina Faso, UK, Germany, Ethiopia
Duration: 125 min
Plot tags: inspirational, independent film, thought provoking, serious, captivating, realistic, disturbing
Similar in 79%
Roots: The Gift (1988)
Plot Summary:
In December 1775, Cletus Moyer is a free black Northerner in colonial America, helping slaves escape captivity. In the days just prior to Christmas, a group of bounty hunters captures Moyer. Because of his capture, dozens of slaves who have already left their plantations are in danger of being captured as well. Moyer implores two slaves from a nearby plantation to take his place: Kunta Kinte, a Mandinka in his mid-twenties who was captured in what is now Gambia, and Fiddler, an elderly man who was born into slavery. Kunta is eager to help (and to escape himself), but Fiddler is unwilling, fearful of the consequences if they are caught.
IMDB Rating: 6.7
IMDB Votes: 627
Genere: Drama, History
Country: USA
Duration: 100 min
Plot tags: historical drama
Similar in 84%
Bamako (The Court) (2006)
Plot Summary:
Melé is a bar singer, her husband Chaka is out of work and the couple is on the verge of breaking up... In the courtyard of the house they share with other families, a trial court has been set up. African civil society spokesmen have taken proceedings against the World Bank and the IMF whom they blame for Africa's woes... Amidst the pleas and the testimonies, life goes on in the courtyard. Chaka does not seem to be concerned by this novel Africa's desire to fight for its rights.
IMDB Rating: 6.7
IMDB Votes: 1000
Genere: Drama
Country: France, Mali, USA
Duration: 115 min
Plot tags: touching, serious, realistic, captivating, social, biting, allegory, suspense
Similar in 88%
Roll Of Thunder, Hear My Cry (1978)
Plot Summary:
With the land to hold them together, nothing can tear the Logans apart. Why is the land so important to Cassie's family? It takes the events of one turbulent year- the year of the night riders and the burnings, the year a white girl humiliates Cassie in public simply because she is black- to show Cassie that having a place of their own is the Logan family's lifeblood. It is the land that gives the Logans their courage and pride- no matter how others may degrade them, the Logans possess something no one can take away.
IMDB Rating: 5.6
IMDB Votes: 336
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 95 min
Plot tags: historical drama
Similar in 78%
Adanggaman (2000)
Plot Summary:
In West Africa during the late 17th century, King Adanggaman leads a war against his neighboring tribes, ordering his soldiers to torch enemy villages, kill the elderly and capture the healthy tribesmen to sell to the European slave traders. When his village falls prey to one of Adanggaman's attacks, Ossei manages to escape, but his family is murdered except for his captured mother. Chasing after the soldiers in an effort to free her, Ossei is befriended by a fierce warrior named Naka.
IMDB Rating: 6.9
IMDB Votes: 197
Genere: Drama
Country: France, Switzerland, Côte d'Ivoire, Burkina Faso, Italy
Duration: 90 min
Plot tags: disturbing, thought provoking, serious, suspenseful, tense, atmospheric, captivating, realistic, contemplative, baroque
Similar in 90%
The Kitchen Toto (1987)
Plot Summary:
The son of a priest slain by the Mau Mau moves in with a police officer and his wife in 1950 Kenya.
IMDB Rating: 6.2
IMDB Votes: 266
Genere: Drama
Country: UK
Duration: 96 min
Plot tags: independent film, grindhouse, sincere, thought provoking, serious, realistic, disturbing, biting, suspense
Similar in 80%
Black Shack Alley (1983)
Plot Summary:
Martinique, in the early 1930s. Young José and his grandmother live in a small village. Nearly everyone works cutting cane and barely earning a living. The overseer can fine a worker for the smallest infraction. The way to advance is to do well in school. José studies hard and succeeds in an exam allowing him to attend school in the capital. With only a partial scholarship, the tuition is very costly. José and his grandmother move to Fort-de-France to make José's studies easier.
IMDB Rating: 7.3
IMDB Votes: 1000
Genere: Drama, History
Country: France, Martinique
Duration: 103 min
Plot tags: serious, realistic
Similar in 84%
Race to Freedom: The Underground Railroad (1994)
Plot Summary:
A number of slaves risk their lives to escape their masters with their only help coming from the famous secret slave escape network.
IMDB Rating: 6.8
IMDB Votes: 185
Genere: Drama, History
Country: Canada
Duration: 91 min
Plot tags: political, edutainment, sincere, atmospheric, serious, captivating, realistic
Similar in 82%
The Middle Passage (2000)
Plot Summary:
A realistic look at the horrors of the slave trade, told entirely through the voice of a dead African slave whose spirit haunts the ocean route.
IMDB Rating: 6.1
IMDB Votes: 135
Genere: Drama, History
Country: France, Martinique
Duration: 78 min
Plot tags: sentimental, rough, serious, realistic, suspenseful, experimental
Similar in 90%
Slavers (1977)
Plot Summary:
A story about slave hunting, colonialism, revenge and love.
IMDB Rating: 4.6
IMDB Votes: 169
Genere: Adventure, Drama, History, War
Country: West Germany
Duration: 98 min
Plot tags:
Similar in 79%
Black Venus (2010)
Plot Summary:
The story of Saartjes Baartman, a Black domestic who, in 1808, left Southern Africa, then ruled by Dutch settlers, for Europe, following her boss Hendrick Caesar , hoping to find fame and fortune there. Once in London her master turned manager does nothing but exhibit her as a freak in a phony and humiliating carnival show. After a series of troubles caused by their act, Caesar, Saartje and their new friend, bear-tamer Réaux, head for Paris where once again, and against her will, she has to mimic savagery and expose her body, first in carnivals, then in the aristocratic salons of Paris, later on among the libertines and finally in brothels where she ends up being a prostitute. In the meantime, French anatomists will have taken an interest in her unusual anatomy (enormous buttocks and labia) only to declare her the missing link from ape to man. In 1815, aged only 27, she dies alone, of a combination of pneumonia and venereal disease.
IMDB Rating: 6.8
IMDB Votes: 3000
Genere: Drama, History
Country: France, Belgium
Duration: 162 min
Plot tags: serious, captivating, thought provoking, realistic, erotic, existential horror, gloomy, iconic, tragic
Similar in 81%
The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman (1974)
Plot Summary:
In February, 1962, as the civil rights movement reaches Bayonne, Louisiana, a New York journalist arrives to interview Jane Pittman, who has just turned 110. She tells him her story dating back to her earliest memories before slavery ended. In between the chapters of her life, the present-day struggles of Blacks in Bayonne, urged on by Jimmy, are dramatized.
IMDB Rating: 7.8
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Drama, History
Country: USA
Duration: 110 min
Plot tags: political, epic, sincere, uplifting, thought provoking, touching, serious, captivating, emotional, realistic
Similar in 78%
Amistad (1997)
Plot Summary:
In 1839, the slave ship Amistad set sail from Cuba to America. During the long trip, Cinque leads the slaves in an unprecedented uprising. They are then held prisoner in Connecticut, and their release becomes the subject of heated debate. Freed slave Theodore Joadson wants Cinque and the others exonerated and recruits property lawyer Roger Baldwin to help his case. Eventually, John Quincy Adams also becomes an ally.
IMDB Rating: 7.3
IMDB Votes: 82000
Genere: Biography, Drama, History
Country: USA
Duration: 155 min
Plot tags: touching, emotional, period piece, epic, dramatic, compassionate, factual, uplifting, serious, captivating