Best movies like High Plains Drifter

Similar in 81%

The Sons of Katie Elder (1965)

Plot Summary:

The Elder boys return to Clearwater, Texas for their Mother's funeral. John the eldest is a well known gunfighter and trouble follows him wherever he goes. The boys try to get back their ranch from the towns gunsmith who won it from their father in a card game with which he was shortly murdered there after but not before getting through the troubles that come with the Elders name.

Similar in 78%

Breakheart Pass (1975)

Plot Summary:

At the height of the frontier era, a train races through the Rocky Mountains on a classified mission to a remote army post. But one by one the passengers are being murdered, and their only hope is the mysterious John Deakin, who's being transported to face trial for murder.

Similar in 77%

Red Fighter (1966)

Plot Summary:

The sole survivor of a bloody massacre vows revenge on his attackers and on the men who killed his wife.

Similar in 80%

The Return of Sabata (1971)

Plot Summary:

Master gunslinger Sabata arrives in Hobsonville, a town completely owned by McIntock, a robber baron who is taxing the inhabitants for the cost of future improvements to the town. Or that's what McIntock says he'll do with the money.

Similar in 82%

Jane Got a Gun (2015)

Plot Summary:

After her outlaw husband returns home shot with eight bullets and barely alive, Jane reluctantly reaches out to an ex-lover who she hasn't seen in over ten years to help her defend her farm when the time comes that her husband's gang eventually tracks him down to finish the job.

Similar in 87%

For a Few Dollars More (1965)

Plot Summary:

Two bounty hunters are in pursuit of "El Indio," one of the most wanted fugitives in the western territories, and his gang.

Similar in 79%

Hang 'Em High (1968)

Plot Summary:

Marshall Jed Cooper survives a hanging, vowing revenge on the lynch mob that left him dangling. To carry out his oath for vengeance, he returns to his former job as a lawman. Before long, he's caught up with the nine men on his hit list and starts dispensing his own brand of Wild West justice.

Similar in 82%

Ambush at Dark Canyon (2012)

Plot Summary:

U.S. Marshall Duke Donovan is imprisoned, accused of being an accomplice in a bank robbery. After discovering that his partner is planning to kill his wife, he must escape prison in time to save his wife and clear his name.

Similar in 79%

Lawman (1971)

Plot Summary:

While passing through the town of Bannock, a bunch of drunken cattlemen go overboard with their celebrating and accidentally kill an old man with a stray shot. They return home to Sabbath unaware of his death. Bannock lawman Jered Maddox later arrives there to arrest everyone involved on a charge of murder. Sabbath is run by land baron Vince Bronson, a benevolent despot, who, upon hearing of the death, offers restitution for the incident.

Similar in 77%

One-Eyed Jacks (1961)

Plot Summary:

Running from the law after a bank robbery in Mexico, Dad Longworth finds an opportunity to take the stolen gold and leave his partner Rio to be captured. Years later, Rio escapes from the prison where he has been since, and hunts down Dad for revenge. Dad is now a respectable sheriff in California, and has been living in fear of Rio's return.

Similar in 89%

Nevada Smith (1966)

Plot Summary:

Nevada Smith is the young son of an Indian mother and white father. When his father is killed by three men over gold, Nevada sets out to find them and kill them. The boy is taken in by a gun merchant. The gun merchant shows him how to shoot and to shoot on time and correct.

Similar in 84%

Joe Kidd (1972)

Plot Summary:

A band of Mexicans find their U. S. land claims denied and all the records destroyed in a courthouse fire. Their leader, Louis Chama, encourages them to use force to regain their land. A wealthy landowner wanting the same decides to hire a gang of killers with Joe Kidd to track Chama.

Similar in 86%

The Outlaw Josey Wales (1976)

Plot Summary:

After avenging his family's brutal murder, Wales is pursued by a pack of soldiers. He prefers to travel alone, but ragtag outcasts are drawn to him - and Wales can't bring himself to leave them unprotected.

Similar in 82%

Young Guns (1988)

Plot Summary:

A group of young gunmen, led by Billy the Kid, become deputies to avenge the murder of the rancher who became their benefactor. But when Billy takes their authority too far, they become the hunted.

Similar in 77%

Pale Rider (1985)

Plot Summary:

A small gold mining camp is terrorised by a ruthless land owner wanting to take their land. Clint Eastwood arrives riding a pale horse just as a young girl is praying to God to help the miners. He is revealed to be a preacher with mysterious and possible otherworldly origins who teams up with the miners to defeat the land owner and the corrupt sheriff.

Similar in 89%

Hatfields & McCoys (2012)

Plot Summary:

Anse Hatfield and Randall McCoy, close friends and comrades until near the end of the Civil War, return to their neighboring homes to increasing tensions, misunderstandings and resentments.

Similar in 85%

3:10 to Yuma (2007)

Plot Summary:

In Arizona in the late 1800s, infamous outlaw Ben Wade and his vicious gang of thieves and murderers have plagued the Southern Railroad. When Wade is captured, Civil War veteran Dan Evans, struggling to survive on his drought-plagued ranch, volunteers to deliver him alive to the "3:10 to Yuma", a train that will take the killer to trial.

Similar in 84%

The Good, the Bad and the Ugly (1966)

Plot Summary:

While the Civil War rages between the Union and the Confederacy, three men – a quiet loner, a ruthless hit man and a Mexican bandit – comb the American Southwest in search of a strongbox containing $200,000 in stolen gold.

Similar in 78%

The Wild Bunch (1969)

Plot Summary:

Aging outlaw Pike Bishop (William Holden) prepares to retire after one final robbery. Joined by his gang, which includes Dutch Engstrom (Ernest Borgnine) and brothers Lyle (Warren Oates) and Tector Gorch (Ben Johnson), Bishop discovers the heist is a setup orchestrated in part by his old partner, Deke Thornton (Robert Ryan). As the remaining gang takes refuge in Mexican territory, Thornton trails them, resulting in fierce gunfights with plenty of casualties.

Similar in 87%

A Fistful of Dollars (1964)

Plot Summary:

The Man With No Name enters the Mexican village of San Miguel in the midst of a power struggle among the three Rojo brothers and sheriff John Baxter. When a regiment of Mexican soldiers bearing gold intended to pay for new weapons is waylaid by the Rojo brothers, the stranger inserts himself into the middle of the long-simmering battle, selling false information to both sides for his own benefit.

Similar in 86%

Unforgiven (1992)

Plot Summary:

William Munny is a retired, once-ruthless killer turned gentle widower and hog farmer. To help support his two motherless children, he accepts one last bounty-hunter mission to find the men who brutalized a prostitute. Joined by his former partner and a cocky greenhorn, he takes on a corrupt sheriff.

Similar in 85%

Death Rides a Horse (1967)

Plot Summary:

Death Rides a Horse (aka Da uomo a uomo, or As Man to Man) is a 1967 spaghetti western directed by Giulio Petroni, written by Luciano Vincenzoni, and starring Lee Van Cleef and John Phillip Law. Bill Meceita, a boy whose family was murdered in front of him by a gang, sets out 15 years later to exact revenge. On his journey, he finds himself continually sparring and occasionally cooperating with Ryan, a gunfighter on his own quest for vengeance, who knows more than he says about Bill's tragedy. The film has lapsed into public domain.

Similar in 89%

Once Upon a Time in the West (1968)

Plot Summary:

This classic western masterpiece is an epic film about a widow whose land and life are in danger as the railroad is getting closer and closer to taking them over. A mysterious harmonica player joins forces with a desperado to protect the woman and her land.

Similar in 85%

Tombstone (1993)

Plot Summary:

Legendary marshal Wyatt Earp, now a weary gunfighter, joins his brothers Morgan and Virgil to pursue their collective fortune in the thriving mining town of Tombstone. But Earp is forced to don a badge again and get help from his notorious pal Doc Holliday when a gang of renegade brigands and rustlers begins terrorizing the town.

Similar in 82%

Django (1966)

Plot Summary:

Django is a 1966 Italian spaghetti Western film directed by Sergio Corbucci and starring Franco Nero in the eponymous role. The film earned a reputation as being one of the most violent films ever made up to that point and was subsequently refused a certificate in Britain until 1993, when it was eventually issued an 18 certificate. Subsequent to this the film was downgraded to a 15 certificate in 2004. Although the name is referenced in over thirty "sequels" from the time of the film's release until the mid 1980s in an effort to capitalize on the success of the original, none of these films were official, featuring neither Corbucci nor Nero. Nero did reprise his role as Django in 1987's Django 2: Il Grande Ritorno (Django Strikes Again), in the only official sequel to be written by Corbucci.

Similar in 88%

True Grit (2010)

Plot Summary:

Following the murder of her father by hired hand Tom Chaney, 14-year-old farm girl Mattie Ross sets out to capture the killer. To aid her, she hires the toughest U.S. Marshal she can find, a man with "true grit," Reuben J. "Rooster" Cogburn. Mattie insists on accompanying Cogburn, whose drinking, sloth, and generally reprobate character do not augment her faith in him. Against his wishes, she joins him in his trek into the Indian Nations in search of Chaney. They are joined by Texas Ranger LaBoeuf, who wants Chaney for his own purposes. The unlikely trio find danger and adventure on the journey, and each has his or her "grit" tested.

Similar in 81%

Hostiles (2017)

Plot Summary:

A legendary Native American-hating Army captain nearing retirement in 1892 is given one last assignment: to escort a Cheyenne chief and his family through dangerous territory back to his Montana reservation.