Best movies like Mercenary
Last updated March 2024
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Plot Summary:
Odyssey Saône, a young Wallisian of Caledonian origin, leaves everything behind to try his luck in France as a rugby player. Soane is thirsty for freedom, fighting for recognition that it lacks.
IMDB Rating: 6.5
IMDB Votes: 770
Genere: Drama, Sport
Country: France
Duration: 103 min
Plot tags:
Best tv shows and movies like Mercenary (2016):
Similar in 84%
Our Men (2021)
Plot Summary:
They come from all over the world but they have one thing in common : The Foreign Legion, their new family. Our Men tells these stories : stories of women who struggle to keep their love fire burning; stories of men who leave for battle; stories of loving couples on hostile ground.
IMDB Rating: 5.7
IMDB Votes: 269
Genere: Drama
Country: Belgium, France
Duration: 106 min
Plot tags:
Similar in 77%
Black Stone (2015)
Plot Summary:
While his parents are toiling away in a food processing plant in Seoul, Shon Sun is drafted in the army. But being prey to abuse, he deserts. Back in Seoul he finds out his parents have disappeared. Intent on finding them, he embarks on a journey through the contaminated jungle his father was born in.
IMDB Rating: 6.1
IMDB Votes: 91
Genere: Drama
Country: South Korea, France
Duration: 93 min
Plot tags: surreal, rough, suspense, suspenseful, crying
Similar in 80%
Cru (2014)
Plot Summary:
A tight knit group of young high school athletes have a terrible crash after winning the state championship -- a catastrophe that will shape all their lives. But as adults, some 15 years later, they come together again for a reunion that will open olds wounds, expose long-hidden secrets -- and pave the road to forgiveness and redemption.
IMDB Rating: 6.5
IMDB Votes: 308
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 85 min
Plot tags:
Similar in 81%
Secret Men's Business (1999)
Plot Summary:
Secret Men's Business explores the relationships and issues of 4 school-friends reunited after the death of a beloved school teacher. During a weekend of sun, surf, girls, wives and late night reminiscing, the friends begin to deal with certain truths which have been ignored for some time. As relationships and issues are explored, the friends face their own personal challenges amidst a contempt bourne out of familiarity.
IMDB Rating: 6.4
IMDB Votes: 265
Genere: Drama
Country: Australia
Duration: 96 min
Plot tags:
Similar in 81%
Good and Bad at Games (1983)
Plot Summary:
The story, told partly in flashback to 1968, concerns a clique of English public schoolboys who bully and humiliate an unpopular younger pupil (Cox) who is 'bad at games'. Ten years later Cox uses the naive and equal outsider Niles, who is only included in the clique because he is 'good at games', to find out more about the lead persecutor (Mount), in order to exact revenge.
IMDB Rating: 7.8
IMDB Votes: 102
Genere: Drama
Country: UK
Duration: 82 min
Plot tags:
Similar in 79%
Life (1996)
Plot Summary:
A highly cinematic adaptation of John Brumpton’s play about a group of inmates incarcerated in an isolated HIV-positive section of a prison.
IMDB Rating: 7.0
IMDB Votes: 74
Genere: Drama
Country: Australia
Duration: 85 min
Plot tags: independent film
Similar in 75%
A Minute of Silence (1998)
Plot Summary:
In a dying French mining town near the German border, the last miners are preparing to strike. Marek and Mimmo, two young miners and friends, have different views on the impending strike.
IMDB Rating: 5.8
IMDB Votes: 84
Genere: Drama
Country: France
Duration: 88 min
Plot tags:
Similar in 87%
Blushing Charlie (1970)
Plot Summary:
Truckdriver and bachelor Charlie meets homeless and seven months pregnant Pia. They both dream of finding someone to share their lives with. Charlie then faces a dilemma whether to take part in a demonstration in favor of Cuba, and in addition with his employer's truck.
IMDB Rating: 5.7
IMDB Votes: 69
Genere: Drama
Country: Sweden
Duration: 119 min
Plot tags: homoerotic
Similar in 89%
La Dream Team (2016)
Plot Summary:
When a fit of anger leads to a serious injury, a sidelined soccer star returns to his hometown and reluctantly agrees to train the local youth.
IMDB Rating: 5.5
IMDB Votes: 811
Genere: Comedy, Sport
Country: France
Duration: 95 min
Plot tags:
Similar in 76%
The Shiny Shrimps (2019)
Plot Summary:
Matthias Le Goff, an Olympic champion at the end of his career, makes a homophobic statement on TV. His punishment: coach the Shiny Shrimps, a flamboyant and amateur gay water-polo team. They have only one thing in mind: to qualify for the Gay Games in Croatia where the hottest international LGBT athletes compete. It's the start of a bumpy and joyful ride - Faster, Higher, Stronger.
IMDB Rating: 6.5
IMDB Votes: 3000
Genere: Comedy, Drama, Sport
Country: France
Duration: 103 min
Plot tags: light, sincere, feel good, captivating, lgbt cinema, crying, freeze frame, queer cinema, gay cinema
Similar in 88%
Drive, He Said (1971)
Plot Summary:
Hector is a star basketball player for the College basketball team he plays for, the Leopards. His girlfriend, Olive, doesn't know whether to stay with him or leave him. And his friend, Gabriel, who may have dropped out from school and become a protestor, wants desperately not to get drafted for Vietnam.
IMDB Rating: 5.7
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Comedy, Drama, Sport
Country: USA
Duration: 90 min
Plot tags: independent film, sincere, serious, realistic, gloomy
Similar in 90%
City Without Baseball (2008)
Plot Summary:
The actual members of the Hong Kong Baseball Team all prove themselves to be natural actors by playing themselves in this fictional youth drama set in 2004. In a city where baseball culture is non-existent, these baseball players are a minority by choice. The experience teaches them to be free-thinkers in dealing with love, friendship and their own sexuality. It also enables them to find the will to live in the face of death and the strength to conquer losing in a spectatorless sport.
IMDB Rating: 5.4
IMDB Votes: 283
Genere: Drama, Sport
Country: Hong Kong
Duration: 101 min
Plot tags: intellectual, realistic, witty, disturbing
Similar in 85%
Accounts (1983)
Plot Summary:
The efforts of a widowed Scots family to keep the farmer's estate going after his death fail through poor accountancy.
IMDB Rating: 7.3
IMDB Votes: 49
Genere: Drama
Country: UK
Duration: 105 min
Plot tags:
Similar in 85%
Blind Spot (2019)
Plot Summary:
Dominick Brassan has the power to turn invisible, but rarely uses it. Instead he has kept it a shameful secret, hidden even from Viveka, his fiancée. But when his ability to control his gift gets out of hand, his life, friendships and relationships will be forever turned inside out.
IMDB Rating: 5.8
IMDB Votes: 317
Genere: Drama
Country: France
Duration: 104 min
Plot tags: urban fantasy
Similar in 87%
The Here After (2015)
Plot Summary:
When John returns home to his father after serving time in prison, he is looking forward to starting his life afresh. However, in the local community his crime is neither forgotten nor forgiven.
IMDB Rating: 6.4
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Drama
Country: Sweden, Poland, France
Duration: 102 min
Plot tags:
Similar in 76%
Wild (2007)
Plot Summary:
A young man sometimes acts like a dog.
IMDB Rating: 5.7
IMDB Votes: 55
Genere: Drama
Country: France
Duration: 80 min
Plot tags: queer cinema
Similar in 85%
Saturn Bowling (2022)
Plot Summary:
When their father dies, the ambitious police officer Guillaume offers the management of the bowling alley he inherited to his outcast half-brother Armand. The inheritance is cursed, and the two men wind up in a world of violence.
IMDB Rating: 5.8
IMDB Votes: 417
Genere: Drama, Thriller
Country: France, Belgium
Duration: 114 min
Plot tags:
Similar in 75%
Through The Fire (2018)
Plot Summary:
Centres around a Paris fire-fighter, an everyday hero, who, after being involved in a serious accident during a major fire, must rebuild his life with the love of his wife — and accept that, sometimes, even saviours need saving.
IMDB Rating: 6.9
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Drama
Country: France, Belgium
Duration: 116 min
Plot tags:
Similar in 83%
The End (2016)
Plot Summary:
Depardieu plays an unnamed hunter and we join him and his dog as they depart for a nearby forest to snare some rabbits - or perhaps he's hunting for something far more elusive? His excursion soon progresses from carefree meandering to a palpable sense of placelessness and it doesn't take long before the hunter's dog disappears and he finds himself lost.
IMDB Rating: 5.5
IMDB Votes: 314
Genere: Drama
Country: France
Duration: 85 min
Plot tags:
Similar in 88%
Sparring (2017)
Plot Summary:
Steve Landry, an aging boxer with more losses than wins, accepts to become a sparring partner for an emerging champion in a last-ditch attempt to stay relevant.
IMDB Rating: 6.4
IMDB Votes: 700
Genere: Drama, Sport
Country: France
Duration: 95 min
Plot tags:
Similar in 78%
Paperback Hero (1973)
Plot Summary:
A hockey player in a small town begins to lose his grip on reality, and starts to believe that he is a gunslinger in the Old West.
IMDB Rating: 5.9
IMDB Votes: 224
Genere: Drama, Sport
Country: Canada
Duration: 93 min
Plot tags: independent film
Similar in 85%
True Blue (1996)
Plot Summary:
The story of the year the Oxford and Cambridge boat race changed from a gentleman's race to one where winning was everything.
IMDB Rating: 6.2
IMDB Votes: 431
Genere: Drama, Sport
Country: UK
Duration: 118 min
Plot tags: independent film, sincere, uplifting, touching, feel good, serious, captivating, emotional, realistic
Similar in 81%
The Boys (1997)
Plot Summary:
Every Monday night The Boys put on skates and leave their troubled lives behind.
IMDB Rating: 6.6
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Comedy, Drama, Sport
Country: Canada
Duration: 107 min
Plot tags: humorous, realistic, not serious, semi serious, sexy, clever, intellectual, enigmatic, feel good, unusual plot structure
Similar in 78%
Paratroopers (1977)
Plot Summary:
Not everyone is born to be a soldier. Not even in Israel, where universal conscription is the tradition. This movie is about a Sad Sack in the Israeli army, incompetent to complete training and yet incompetent to extricate himself.
IMDB Rating: 6.9
IMDB Votes: 91
Genere: Drama
Country: Israel
Duration: 90 min
Plot tags: psychological, thought provoking, bleak, serious, realistic
Similar in 76%
This Sporting Life (1963)
Plot Summary:
In Northern England in the early 1960s, Frank Machin is mean, tough and ambitious enough to become an immediate star in the rugby league team run by local employer Weaver.
IMDB Rating: 7.5
IMDB Votes: 7000
Genere: Drama, Sport
Country: UK
Duration: 134 min
Plot tags: serious, realistic, psychological, sentimental, thought provoking, captivating, existential, mind blowing, twisted, sincere
Similar in 88%
When Saturday Comes (1996)
Plot Summary:
Jimmy Muir comes from a typical gritty, northern town where there are only two options: working down the pit or in a factory. But Jimmy has other ideas - he dreams of becoming a professional footballer. Confronted by a bitter and unsupportive father, hard drinking friends and a lifetime of bad habits...has Jimmy the will to achieve his ultimate goal?.
IMDB Rating: 6.0
IMDB Votes: 3000
Genere: Drama, Sport
Country: UK
Duration: 98 min
Plot tags: sincere, bleak, serious, realistic, gloomy
Similar in 85%
Running Brave (1983)
Plot Summary:
The story of Billy Mills the American Indian that came from obscurity, to win the 10,000 meter long distance foot race in the Tokyo Olympics.
IMDB Rating: 6.7
IMDB Votes: 755
Genere: Biography, Drama, Sport
Country: Canada
Duration: 106 min
Plot tags: inspirational, period piece, uplifting, touching, serious, captivating, emotional, realistic
Similar in 80%
Number One (1969)
Plot Summary:
A former football hero cannot accept his career is over. He loses himself in alcohol and women.
IMDB Rating: 5.5
IMDB Votes: 686
Genere: Drama, Sport
Country: USA
Duration: 105 min
Plot tags: retro, independent film, humorous, realistic, semi serious, ambiguous ending, cult film
Similar in 78%
Underdog (2014)
Plot Summary:
23-year-old "Dino" (Bianca Kronlöf) dreams of a different life. Like an abundance of Swedes her age, she has fled the mass unemployment of her home country in search of a more worthwhile existence in a nouveau-riche Oslo. But her new life is caught in deadlock - Dino finds herself stuck in a destructive loop of temporary jobs, financial trouble and hard partying. A broken arm incidentally leads to a position as a housekeeper in a Norwegian middle-class home. Dino is thrown into a reality very far from her own. During a few sultry summer weeks she ends up the centre of an odd love triangle, an unpredictable struggle for affection as well as dominance. "Underdog" is a tender and raw story of privilege and longing, yet at the same time a humorous and unmerciful observation of the shifted power balance between Sweden and Norway - an actuality where Swedes have become the Norwegians' servants.
IMDB Rating: 6.2
IMDB Votes: 882
Genere: Drama
Country: Sweden, Norway
Duration: 97 min
Plot tags: realistic, psychological, sentimental, captivating, touching, serious
Similar in 80%
Happening (2021)
Plot Summary:
An adaptation of Annie Ernaux's eponymous novel, looking back on her experience with abortion when it was still illegal in France in the 1960s.
IMDB Rating: 7.4
IMDB Votes: 11000
Genere: Drama
Country: France
Duration: 100 min
Plot tags: sad, independent film, crying, cult film