Best movies like Living in Paradise
Last updated March 2024
Looking for movies similar to Living in Paradise? Leverage your insights to help others toward movies and tv series you've watched before that they might like too. Help broaden the circle of people recommending videos to each other. We value your engagement!
Plot Summary:
Set in France in 1961-1962 during the Algerian War, Living in Paradise is a thought-provoking examination of the lives of North African immigrants trying to find a place in the social system of Western Europe.
IMDB Rating: 6.5
IMDB Votes: 152
Genere: Drama, History, War
Country: France, Algeria, Belgium, Norway
Duration: 105 min
Plot tags:
Best tv shows and movies like Living in Paradise (1998):
Similar in 79%
Eden (2001)
Plot Summary:
In 1939, Kalman, an ambitious young businessman, leaves Europe to join his sister Samantha in Palestine. She lives with Dov, an idealistic architect obsessed with the Bauhaus style. With their friends, they form a group, which discusses the future Israeli State. A loose adaptation of Arthur Miller's novel "Homely Girl, A Life".
IMDB Rating: 4.7
IMDB Votes: 292
Genere: Drama, Romance, War
Country: Italy, Israel, France
Duration: 91 min
Plot tags:
Similar in 80%
Nuit noire, 17 octobre 1961 (2005)
Plot Summary:
Parisian authorities clash with the Front de Libération Nationale (FLN) in director Alain Tasma’s recounting of one of the darkest moments of the Algerian War of Independence. As the war wound to a close and violence persisted in the streets of Paris, the FLN and its supporters adopted the tactic of murdering French policemen in hopes of forcing a withdrawal. When French law enforcement retaliated by brutalizing Algerians and imposing a strict curfew, the FLN organizes a peaceful demonstration that drew over 11,000 supporters, resulting in an order from the Paris police chief to take brutal countermeasures. Told through the eyes of both French policemen as well as Algerian protestors, Tasma’s film attempts to get to the root of the tragedy by presenting both sides of the story.
IMDB Rating: 7.4
IMDB Votes: 176
Genere: Drama, History
Country: France
Duration: 120 min
Plot tags:
Similar in 88%
Land in Between (1996)
Plot Summary:
SILHOUETTE: Nigerian prostitutes dealing with miscellaneous customers EUGLEN & GERTIAN: Daily recruitment of Albanian immigrants seeking work but without working residency permit. SELF SERVICE: a night with Ahmed, egyptian illegal gas station attender, who has been living in italy for many years.
IMDB Rating: 6.6
IMDB Votes: 208
Genere: Drama
Country: Italy
Duration: 78 min
Plot tags: semi documentary, independent film
Similar in 87%
Akseli and Elina (1970)
Plot Summary:
A former Red Rebellion leader returns home after being imprisoned for his participation in the Finnish Civil War, but soon finds out that wartime mindsets still linger in the heads of people.
IMDB Rating: 6.8
IMDB Votes: 508
Genere: Drama, History, War
Country: Finland
Duration: 137 min
Plot tags: epic, family saga, pre war
Similar in 80%
Here, Beneath the North Star (1968)
Plot Summary:
Täällä Pohjantähden alla is based on the book with the same title. It is a story of the little village. The movie starts in the 1890's and it ends to the Finnish civil war in 1918. Story concentrates around a tenant farmer family, although it gives us a good look at the society at whole. While the class struggle depends, people of the village are driven to bloody civil war.
IMDB Rating: 7.5
IMDB Votes: 1000
Genere: Drama, History, War
Country: Finland
Duration: 186 min
Plot tags: epic
Similar in 89%
Jani gal (2007)
Plot Summary:
An Iraqi Kurdish man is released from jail. He has been arrested by mistake when he went to find a midwife to help his pregnant wife, years ago. As he has been arrested during a demonstration the authorities thought he is one of the opposition group leaders.
IMDB Rating: 7.8
IMDB Votes: 212
Genere: Drama, History
Country: Iraq, Iran
Duration: 100 min
Plot tags:
Similar in 79%
Mother (1991)
Plot Summary:
Henri Verneuil was born Achod Malakian of Armenian parentage on October 15, 1920, in Rodosto, Turkey, and his family fled to France and settled in Marseilles when he was a young child. He later recounted his childhood experience in the novel Mayrig, which he dedicated to his mother and made into this 1991 film with the same name.
IMDB Rating: 7.4
IMDB Votes: 4000
Genere: Drama
Country: France
Duration: 157 min
Plot tags: saga
Similar in 82%
The Mother of Kings (1987)
Plot Summary:
Made in 1982, shelved for five years. Story opens with Lucja Krol's husband under the tram. She gives birth to her fourth son on the floor of their new apartment. Neighbor Wiktor, a communist intellectual, befriends the poverty-stricken family but is soon arrested and sent to jail. During the war Lucja narrowly escapes a Nazi roundup at the black market. Her sons hold ardent Communist meetings in their apartment, with her blessing. Lucja works hard, but without complaint. After the war, Klemens is inexplicably arrested, accused by the new regime of being a collaborator. Wiktor, now a high-ranking party member, trying to defend him, himself falls into disgrace. Klemens is tortured to "confess" and dies in jail, a Communist to the end. Lucja is never told about his fate.
IMDB Rating: 7.2
IMDB Votes: 303
Genere: Drama, History, War
Country: Poland
Duration: 127 min
Plot tags: intellectual, pre war
Similar in 89%
Stand-by (2000)
Plot Summary:
A woman remains in an airport after her husband announces he wants a divorce, just before they are to board a plane for Argentina. Unwilling to turn to her sister and emotionally traumatized she makes the airport her home, making money by working as a prostitute. She strikes up a friendship with a café worker Marco.
IMDB Rating: 6.9
IMDB Votes: 318
Genere: Drama
Country: France
Duration: 125 min
Plot tags: touching, serious, realistic, offbeat, independent film
Similar in 86%
Nasser 56 (1996)
Plot Summary:
Nasser 56 is a 1996 Egyptian historical film directed by Mohamed Fadel, starring Ahmed Zaki. The film focuses on the nationalization of the Suez Canal by Egypt's second President, Gamal Abdel Nasser, and the subsequent invasion of Egypt by Israel, the United Kingdom, and France.
IMDB Rating: 6.6
IMDB Votes: 977
Genere: Biography, Drama, History, War
Country: Egypt
Duration: 142 min
Plot tags: black and white, political
Similar in 75%
Nothing to Report (1973)
Plot Summary:
In 1956, the professional army of France lacks the manpower to keep the peace in Algeria, the colony which the country is determined to hold on to at any price. For this reason, reservists are called up and subject to an intense period of training before being sent to the front. Rémy March, Alain Charpentier and Raymond Dax are three such young men who have no interest in the military escapade and are reluctant conscripts. What they witness in Algeria will appall and transform them. Rape, torture, executions... there is no end to the atrocities in which they become unwilling participants. No wonder the French military are so willing to proclaim that there is nothing to report.
IMDB Rating: 6.9
IMDB Votes: 204
Genere: Drama, War
Country: France, Italy, Tunisia
Duration: 110 min
Plot tags: tense, rough, bleak, serious, captivating, realistic, suspenseful, disturbing
Similar in 76%
Little Senegal (2000)
Plot Summary:
Passionné par l'histoire de son peuple, Alloune, un vieux guide du musée africain "La Maison des Esclaves" à Gorée, part en pèlerinage pour retrouver les descendants de ses ancêtres aux Etats-Unis. Cet émouvant voyage va le mener des côtes de Caroline du Sud au quartier de Harlem où vit la communauté africaine, Little Senegal. Alloune, animé par l'idée de réunir sa famille par delà les siècles et les frontières, remonte jusqu'à une lointaine cousine, Ida, qui ignore tout de son passé. Le vieil homme croise également les chemins de son neveu Hassan, chauffeur de taxi clandestin, de sa fiancée Biram, d'Eileen, enceinte et fugueuse, et de Karim, qui cherche à faire un mariage blanc pour obtenir la carte verte. Tous les quatre comprennent mal la quête d'Alloune.
IMDB Rating: 6.9
IMDB Votes: 437
Genere: Drama
Country: Algeria, France, Germany
Duration: 97 min
Plot tags: touching, serious, realistic, sincere
Similar in 86%
The Colonel (2006)
Plot Summary:
A "Reformed Colonel" is found dead in Paris, a couple of decades after Algeria's struggle for independence was won from France. Lieutenant Galois is assigned the investigation of this murder. She receives the diary of Lieutenent Guy Rossi who served under The Colonel in Algeria in 1956, and has been reported as missing in action since 1957. The revelations found in Rossi's diary go far beyond The Colonel's actions in Algeria, and give an insight on how dirty Algeria's War for Independence really was.
IMDB Rating: 7.0
IMDB Votes: 551
Genere: Crime, Drama, History, War
Country: France, Belgium
Duration: 110 min
Plot tags: rough, serious, realistic, suspenseful, captivating
Similar in 84%
Hard Feelings (1981)
Plot Summary:
It's 1963 and teenage Barnie has problems. School bullies are after him, his family is dysfunctional and his girl Leslie screws around. On the run from bullies, he hides in the African-American part of town and meets cute Winona.
IMDB Rating: 5.7
IMDB Votes: 69
Genere: Drama
Country: Canada, USA
Duration: 105 min
Plot tags:
Similar in 77%
Outside the Law (2010)
Plot Summary:
After losing their family home in Algeria in the 1920s, three brothers and their mother are scattered across the globe. Messaoud joins the French army fighting in Indochina; Abdelkader becomes a leader of the Algerian independence movement in France and Saïd moves to Paris to make his fortune in the shady clubs and boxing halls of Pigalle.
IMDB Rating: 6.6
IMDB Votes: 4000
Genere: Crime, Drama, War
Country: France, Algeria, Belgium, Tunisia, Italy
Duration: 138 min
Plot tags: atmospheric, realistic, political, tense, captivating, psychological, sincere, rough, serious, beautiful
Similar in 82%
Betrayal (1993)
Plot Summary:
After the war, in Bucharest, a young Romanian poet arrested for having written an article denouncing Stalinist crimes, will save his life by accepting to become a hostage of the regime.
IMDB Rating: 7.1
IMDB Votes: 123
Genere: Drama, History
Country: France, Switzerland, Spain, Romania
Duration: 103 min
Plot tags:
Similar in 79%
Timepiece (1996)
Plot Summary:
Set in the 1940's, James Earl Jones as an an old clockmaker faces racism and is tried for murder when the racist is killed. However, Kevin Kilner comes forward and claims to have commmitted the crime in self defense. All the while, Kilner's family life is in disarray with various crises including his daughter catching meningitis.
IMDB Rating: 6.7
IMDB Votes: 514
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 100 min
Plot tags: thought provoking, serious, realistic
Similar in 86%
Intimate Enemies (2007)
Plot Summary:
A drama following a French platoon during Algeria's war of independence.
IMDB Rating: 6.9
IMDB Votes: 3000
Genere: Drama, History, War
Country: France, Morocco
Duration: 111 min
Plot tags: rough, realistic, serious, disturbing, sexy, bleak
Similar in 77%
The Cardinal (1963)
Plot Summary:
A young Catholic priest from Boston confronts bigotry, Naziism, and his own personal conflicts as he rises to the office of cardinal.
IMDB Rating: 6.7
IMDB Votes: 3000
Genere: Drama, History, War
Country: USA
Duration: 175 min
Plot tags: religious drama, epic, sincere, serious, captivating, emotional, realistic
Similar in 90%
Live and Become (2005)
Plot Summary:
In 1980 the black Falashas in Ethiopia are recognised as genuine Jews and are secretly carried to Israel. The day before the transport the son of a Jewish mother dies. In his place and with his name (Schlomo) she takes a Christian 9-year-old boy.
IMDB Rating: 7.8
IMDB Votes: 6000
Genere: Drama
Country: France, Israel, Belgium, Italy
Duration: 140 min
Plot tags: sincere, touching, psychological, serious, contemplative, sexy, indie film, realistic, gloomy, cult film
Similar in 80%
Heat Wave (1990)
Plot Summary:
A rookie black journalist investigates the tensions of the Watts section of Los Angeles in the bloody summer of 1965.
IMDB Rating: 6.8
IMDB Votes: 213
Genere: Drama, History
Country: USA
Duration: 100 min
Plot tags: tense, rough, thought provoking, bleak, serious, realistic, disturbing
Similar in 77%
The Man on the Shore (1993)
Plot Summary:
Early 1960s Haiti during Duvallier's dictatorship seen through the eyes of a young girl whose family heavily suffered.
IMDB Rating: 6.5
IMDB Votes: 132
Genere: Drama, History, War
Country: France, Canada, Haiti, Germany
Duration: 106 min
Plot tags: thought provoking, bleak, serious, captivating, realistic, disturbing
Similar in 77%
The Battle of Canudos (1997)
Plot Summary:
The film adaptation of Nobel Prize winning author, Mario Vargas Llosa's epic, The War At The End Of the World (La guerra del fin del mundo).
IMDB Rating: 6.9
IMDB Votes: 786
Genere: Drama, History, War
Country: Brazil
Duration: 170 min
Plot tags: political, sincere, epic, serious, captivating, emotional, realistic
Similar in 77%
Guns at Batasi (1964)
Plot Summary:
An anachronistic martinet RSM on a remote Colonial African army caught in a local coup d'etat must use his experience to defend those in his care.
IMDB Rating: 7.1
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Drama, History, War
Country: UK
Duration: 103 min
Plot tags: exciting, thought provoking, serious, captivating, emotional, realistic, suspenseful
Similar in 87%
Let Joy Reign Supreme (1975)
Plot Summary:
France, 1719. Louis 14th died four years ago, Philippe d'Orleans is the regent. He is a liberal and a libertine. His right-hand man, Dubois, an atheistic and cupid priest, as libertine as Philippe, tries to take advantage of a little rebellion lead by a Breton squire (Pontallec) and of the famine to become archbishop... Description of the life of the court in this period of transition where the French Revolution smoulders.
IMDB Rating: 7.0
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Drama, History, War
Country: France
Duration: 119 min
Plot tags: anthology, historical drama, serious, realistic, weird, period drama
Similar in 81%
De Gaulle (2020)
Plot Summary:
Paris, June 1940. The de Gaulle couple is confronted with the military and political collapse of France. Charles de Gaulle joins London while Yvonne, his wife, finds herself with her three children on the road of the exodus.
IMDB Rating: 6.1
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Biography, Drama, History, War
Country: France
Duration: 108 min
Plot tags: captivating, suspense, suspenseful, psychological, exciting, tense, interesting
Similar in 84%
Fort Saganne (1984)
Plot Summary:
In 1911, a willful and determined man from peasant stock named Charles Saganne enlists in the military and is assigned to the Sahara Desert under the aristocratic Colonel Dubreuilh.
IMDB Rating: 6.3
IMDB Votes: 1000
Genere: Drama, History, War
Country: France
Duration: 180 min
Plot tags: epic, exciting, serious, realistic
Similar in 79%
Days of Glory (2006)
Plot Summary:
During WWII, four North African men enlist in the French army to liberate that country from Nazi oppression, and to fight French discrimination.
IMDB Rating: 7.0
IMDB Votes: 15000
Genere: Action, Drama, War
Country: Algeria, France, Morocco, Belgium
Duration: 123 min
Plot tags: realistic, emotional, rough, serious, political, suspense, romantic, suspenseful, crying, intellectual
Similar in 89%
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 78%
The Garden of the Finzi-Continis (1970)
Plot Summary:
In late 1930s Ferrara, Italy, the Finzi-Continis are a leading family: wealthy, aristocratic, and urbane; they are also Jewish. Their adult children, Micol and Alberto, gather a diverse circle of friends for tennis and parties at their villa with its lovely grounds, and try to keep the rest of the world at bay. But tensions between them all grow as anti-Semitism rises in Fascist Italy, and even the Finzi-Continis will have to confront the Holocaust.
IMDB Rating: 7.3
IMDB Votes: 8000
Genere: Drama, History, War
Country: Italy, West Germany
Duration: 94 min
Plot tags: disturbing, compassionate, breathtaking, emotional, talky, sentimental, thought provoking, touching, serious, captivating