Best movies like The Looking Glass War
Last updated March 2024
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Plot Summary:
From the John le Carre novel about a British spy who sends a Polish defector to East Germany to verify missile sites.
IMDB Rating: 5.8
IMDB Votes: 1000
Genere: Action, Drama, Thriller
Country: UK
Duration: 108 min
Plot tags: neo noir, political thriller, clever, bleak, serious, realistic, suspenseful, contemplative, talky, suspense
Best tv shows and movies like The Looking Glass War (1970):
Similar in 79%
The Berlin File (2013)
Plot Summary:
JUNG Jin-soo, a South Korean intelligence agent, comes across an unidentifiable operative, a 'ghost,' while surveilling a North Korean weapons deal in Berlin. The mystery figure is a North Korean secret agent, PYO Jong-seong, whose information cannot be found on any intelligence database. Jung quickly goes after Pyo to unveil his identity and gets himself embroiled in a vast international conspiracy. In the meanwhile, another North Korean operative, DONG Myung-soo, is dispatched to Berlin with a secret agenda to purge Pyo and take control of the North Korean embassy. Dong sets a trap to frame Pyo's wife, RYUN Jung-hee, for treason and tightens the noose around Pyo's neck. Pyo surveils his wife with hopes of clearing accusation against her but he plunges into deeper confusion when he discovers her secret.
IMDB Rating: 6.6
IMDB Votes: 8000
Genere: Action, Thriller
Country: South Korea
Duration: 121 min
Plot tags: tense, serious, suspenseful, stylized, political, suspense, twisted, realistic
Similar in 82%
The Chairman (1969)
Plot Summary:
An American scientist is sent to Red China to steal the formula for a newly developed agricultural enzyme. What he is not told by his bosses is that a micro-sized bomb has been planted in his brain so that should the mission ever look likely to fail, he can be eliminated at the push of a button!.
IMDB Rating: 5.6
IMDB Votes: 1000
Genere: Action, Drama, Thriller
Country: UK, USA
Duration: 93 min
Plot tags: exciting, serious, realistic, suspenseful, surprise ending, suspense, black comedy, microfilm
Similar in 82%
On Dangerous Ground (1996)
Plot Summary:
Vusi Madlazi returns to the South African village he left as a young boy (he was organizing against apartheid, and left in fear of his life) to bury his father. He meets up with his brother Ernest, who tells him their other brother Stephen couldn't be contacted. Vusi goes to Johannesburg to find him, but at first can only find his neighbor/girlfriend, Karin, a stripper. Vusi proceeds to learn how conditions have changed since the end of apartheid, not always for the better for black men.
IMDB Rating: 4.4
IMDB Votes: 245
Genere: Action, Thriller
Country: UK, Canada, Luxembourg
Duration: 100 min
Plot tags: exciting, tense, rough, serious, realistic, suspenseful
Similar in 80%
The Liquidator (1965)
Plot Summary:
Spy spoof about Boysie Oakes, a British secret agent who specialises in Liquidating. In actual fact he contracts out the work and pretends it is was himself. This leads to complications.
IMDB Rating: 5.9
IMDB Votes: 1000
Genere: Action, Comedy, Crime, Drama, Thriller
Country: UK
Duration: 105 min
Plot tags: eurospy
Similar in 89%
The Innocent (1993)
Plot Summary:
A young engineer is sent to post-WWII Berlin to help the Americans in spying on the Russians. In a time and place where discretion is still a man’s best friend, he falls in love with a mysterious woman who will take him on the dark side of evil.
IMDB Rating: 5.6
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Drama
Country: Germany, UK
Duration: 119 min
Plot tags: sexual, political thriller, independent film, exciting, sexy, serious, realistic, suspenseful
Similar in 82%
Bullet to Beijing (1995)
Plot Summary:
When long-time British agent Harry Palmer loses his job because the Cold War is over, he's promptly approached by a Russian bossman, Alex. In St. Petersburg Alex tells Harry of his plan for Russia's future, which is threatened because a deadly biochemical weapon called the Red Death has been stolen from him. He'll pay Harry handsomely to retrieve it. An ex-spy friend tips Harry off that it's being sent to Beijing by train, aboard which we begin to learn whose side everyone's really on.
IMDB Rating: 5.4
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Action, Thriller
Country: Canada, UK, USA, Russia
Duration: 101 min
Plot tags: serious, realistic, suspenseful, exciting, political thriller, cynical, fast, independent film, eurospy
Similar in 83%
A Dandy in Aspic (1968)
Plot Summary:
Double-agent Alexander Eberlin is assigned by the British to hunt out a Russian spy, known to them as Krasnevin. Only Eberlin knows that Krasnevin is none other than himself! Accompanying him on his mission is a ruthless partner, who gradually discovers his secret as Eberlin tries to maneuver himself out of a desperate situation.
IMDB Rating: 6.2
IMDB Votes: 1000
Genere: Action, Drama, Thriller
Country: UK
Duration: 107 min
Plot tags: neo noir, rough, serious, realistic, suspenseful, psychological thriller, political thriller, romantic drama, eurospy, british noir
Similar in 87%
To Commit a Murder (1967)
Plot Summary:
A writer gets wrapped up in espionage.
IMDB Rating: 5.9
IMDB Votes: 113
Genere: Action, Crime, Drama, Thriller
Country: France, West Germany, Italy
Duration: 93 min
Plot tags: exciting, rough, serious, realistic, suspenseful, eurospy
Similar in 88%
Midnight Man (1997)
Plot Summary:
British soldiers force a recently captured IRA terrorist to cooperate with them and then assign him to go undercover with a gang of terrorists and prevent them from killing the U.S. President. But the spy isn't in long before he realizes that the first plot is but a ruse for a more sinister scheme that could result in trouble between China and Great Britain. - Written by Ørnås.
IMDB Rating: 4.7
IMDB Votes: 226
Genere: Action, Drama, Thriller
Country: UK, Canada, Luxembourg, USA
Duration: 104 min
Plot tags: independent film, exciting, serious, realistic, suspenseful
Similar in 83%
The Defector (1966)
Plot Summary:
Professor Bower, an American physicist, is effectively blackmailed by a shady CIA agent named Adams to help the CIA obtain secret microfilm from a defecting Russian scientist. The reluctant Bower travels to East Germany undercover as an antiques collector where he encounters Heinzmann, an East German fellow physicist, who is also a secret agent. Heinzmann is aware of Bower's meeting with Adams and his intention to steal the microfilm, however their mutual respect for one another's tactics complicate the proceedings.
IMDB Rating: 5.7
IMDB Votes: 804
Genere: Drama, Thriller
Country: France, West Germany
Duration: 100 min
Plot tags: exciting, rough, serious, realistic, suspenseful, eurospy, microfilm
Similar in 80%
Billion Dollar Brain (1967)
Plot Summary:
A former British spy stumbles into in a plot to overthrow Communism with the help of a supercomputer. But who is working for whom?.
IMDB Rating: 5.9
IMDB Votes: 6000
Genere: Crime, Drama, Thriller
Country: UK
Duration: 111 min
Plot tags: political thriller, psychotronic, suspense, serious, realistic, suspenseful, fast, surprise ending, eurospy, vintage
Similar in 88%
The Naked Runner (1967)
Plot Summary:
Sam Laker is an American industrialist, working in Britain, who has just been awarded an international award for industrial design. He is planning to travel to East Germany to attend a trade show and show off his invention, taking his 10 year old son with him for a holiday. Meanwhile a British Intelligence officer who served with Laker in the Second World War decides to use the opportunity of Laker's trip and his lack of an intelligence profile to coerce him into carrying out an assassination.
IMDB Rating: 5.9
IMDB Votes: 540
Genere: Drama, Thriller
Country: UK
Duration: 101 min
Plot tags: atmospheric, serious, realistic, suspenseful, independent film, microfilm
Similar in 83%
Danger Route (1967)
Plot Summary:
Jonas Wilde, a British secret agent licensed to kill, wants to resign from his murderous work, but his superiors pressure him into taking on a new assignment-the assassination of a defecting Soviet scientist. In the course of the dangerous mission, he discovers a mole has infiltrated British intelligence.
IMDB Rating: 5.5
IMDB Votes: 493
Genere: Action, Drama, Thriller
Country: UK
Duration: 92 min
Plot tags: political thriller, grindhouse, exciting, serious, realistic, suspenseful, psychotronic, freeze frame, eurospy
Similar in 82%
Funeral in Berlin (1966)
Plot Summary:
Colonel Stok, a Soviet intelligence officer responsible for security at the Berlin Wall, appears to want to defect but the evidence is contradictory. Stok wants the British to handle his defection and asks for one of their agents, Harry Palmer, to smuggle him out of East Germany.
IMDB Rating: 6.8
IMDB Votes: 8000
Genere: Thriller
Country: UK
Duration: 102 min
Plot tags: political thriller, suspenseful, visually stunning, serious, realistic, psychotronic, psychological, exciting, tense, parody
Similar in 89%
The Jigsaw Man (1983)
Plot Summary:
Philip Kimberly, the former head of the British Secret Service who defected to Russia, is given plastic surgery and sent back to Britain by the KGB to retrieve some vital documents. With the documents in hand, he instead plays off MI6 and the KGB against each other.
IMDB Rating: 5.1
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Thriller
Country: UK
Duration: 94 min
Plot tags: political thriller, serious, realistic, suspenseful, independent film
Similar in 86%
The Serpent (1973)
Plot Summary:
Vlassov is a Soviet spy who defects in France. He is whisked to the U.S, where Allan Davies takes over the case. After polygraph tests and cross-examinations, Vlassov names several Western European agents who are also spying for the Soviets. Davies wants to take the listed agents into custody; meanwhile, those on the list start dying under mysterious circumstances.
IMDB Rating: 6.2
IMDB Votes: 1000
Genere: Drama, Thriller
Country: France, Italy, West Germany
Duration: 124 min
Plot tags: political thriller, psychological, serious, realistic, suspenseful, eurospy
Similar in 75%
The Little Drummer Girl (1984)
Plot Summary:
An American Actress with a penchant for lying is forceably recruited by Mosad, the Israeli intelligence agency to trap a Palestinian bomber, by pretending to be the girlfriend of his dead brother.
IMDB Rating: 6.1
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 130 min
Plot tags: political thriller, realistic, suspenseful, tense, serious, political, eighties
Similar in 83%
Torn Curtain (1966)
Plot Summary:
During the Cold War, an American scientist appears to defect to East Germany as part of a cloak and dagger mission to find the formula for a resin solution, but the plan goes awry when his fiancee, unaware of his motivation, follows him across the border.
IMDB Rating: 6.6
IMDB Votes: 29000
Genere: Drama, Romance, Thriller
Country: USA
Duration: 128 min
Plot tags: suspense, tense, suspenseful, stylized, political thriller, enigmatic, psychological, serious, realistic, clever
Similar in 76%
The Deadly Affair (1967)
Plot Summary:
Charles Dobbs is a British secret agent investigating the apparent suicide of Foreign Office official Samuel Fennan. Dobbs suspects that Fennan's wife, Elsa, a survivor of a Nazi Germany extermination camp, might have some clues, but other officials want Dobbs to drop the case. So Dobbs hires a retiring inspector, Mendel, to quietly make inquiries. Dobbs isn't at all sure as there are a number of anomalies that simply can't be explained away. Dobbs is also having trouble at home with his errant wife, whom he very much loves, having frequent affairs. He's also pleased to see an old friend, Dieter Frey, who he recruited after the war. With the assistance of a colleague and a retired policeman, Dobbs tries to piece together just who is the spy and who in fact assassinated Fennan.
IMDB Rating: 6.7
IMDB Votes: 4000
Genere: Crime, Drama, Mystery, Romance, Thriller
Country: UK
Duration: 115 min
Plot tags: tense, serious, suspenseful, psychological, exciting, enigmatic, neo noir, political, dark, slasher
Similar in 83%
The Quiller Memorandum (1966)
Plot Summary:
Two British agents are murdered by a mysterious Neonazi organization in West Berlin. The British Secret Service sends agent Quiller to investigate. Soon Quiller is confronted with Neonazi chief "Oktober" and involved in a dangerous game where each side tries to find out the enemy's headquarters at any price.
IMDB Rating: 6.3
IMDB Votes: 4000
Genere: Crime, Drama, Mystery, Thriller
Country: UK
Duration: 104 min
Plot tags: neo noir, political thriller, independent film, exciting, serious, realistic, suspenseful, stylized, eurospy
Similar in 77%
The Secret Agent (1996)
Plot Summary:
London of the late 19th century is a haven for political exiles of all sorts - refugees, partisans, anarchists. Verloc has made his living spying for the Russian goverment, an agent provacateur of sorts, while simultaneously providing information to the London police, specifically Chief Inspector Heat. When the new Russian ambassador demands he prove his worth or lose his salary, Verloc sets off a tragic chain of events that involves his pretty young wife Winnie, her retarded brother Stevie, and a figure called the Professor, whose fascination with explosives and destruction makes him the person to call on when Verloc needs a bomb.
IMDB Rating: 5.6
IMDB Votes: 3000
Genere: Drama, Thriller
Country: UK
Duration: 95 min
Plot tags: psychological, harsh, realistic, suspenseful, tense, serious, political thriller, bleak, light, romantic
Similar in 75%
Legacy (2013)
Plot Summary:
Set in the 1970s London during the height of the Cold War when a young spy discovers the disturbing truth about his father's complex past. Based on Alan Judd's 2001 novel Legacy, the second in the Thoroughgood series after 1981's A Breed Of Heroes (adapted by the BBC in 1994). As the three day week, petrol rationing and industrial strife plunge Britain into a state of emergency, MI6 trainee spy Charles Thoroughgood is asked to reconnect with an old university friend, Russian diplomat Viktor Koslov, with a view to 'turning' him. Viktor has his own agenda, though, and reveals a shocking truth about Charles's own family that threatens to derail him, both personally and professionally. He is catapulted into a dangerous personal odyssey to uncover the truth but finds himself drawn into a lethal KGB plot to mount an attack within the UK. His life is further complicated by a relationship with the wife of another agent, which forces him to realise that betrayal can take many forms.
IMDB Rating: 5.7
IMDB Votes: 461
Genere: Drama, Mystery, Thriller
Country: UK
Duration: 90 min
Plot tags: serious, captivating, tense, realistic, suspenseful
Similar in 90%
The Russia House (1990)
Plot Summary:
An expatriate British publisher unexpectedly finds himself working for British intelligence to investigate people in Russia.
IMDB Rating: 6.1
IMDB Votes: 17000
Genere: Drama, Romance, Thriller
Country: USA
Duration: 123 min
Plot tags: political, stylized, sentimental, sex comedy, sincere, thought provoking, serious, realistic, suspenseful, contemplative
Similar in 78%
Enigma (1982)
Plot Summary:
Five highly-trained KGB agents are sent to the west to assassinate several Soviet dissidents. In order to stop the diabolical plot, an American agent must infiltrate Soviet intelligence and obtain information from a Russian computer.
IMDB Rating: 5.9
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Drama, Thriller
Country: UK, France
Duration: 122 min
Plot tags: suspenseful, intense, serious, realistic, political, political thriller, independent film, exciting, romantic, atmospheric
Similar in 75%
The Spy Who Came in from the Cold (1965)
Plot Summary:
British agent Alec Leamas refuses to come in from the cold war during the 1960s, choosing to face another mission, which may prove to be his final one.
IMDB Rating: 7.5
IMDB Votes: 18000
Genere: Drama, Thriller
Country: UK
Duration: 112 min
Plot tags: political, black and white, suspense, grim, clever, bleak, realistic, talky, political thriller, retro
Similar in 84%
The Executioner (1970)
Plot Summary:
A British intelligence agent must track down a fellow spy suspected of being a double agent.
IMDB Rating: 6.0
IMDB Votes: 450
Genere: Drama, Thriller
Country: UK
Duration: 107 min
Plot tags: exciting, rough, serious, realistic, suspenseful, talky, suspense, eurospy
Similar in 75%
The Operative (2019)
Plot Summary:
A young Western woman is recruited by the Mossad to go undercover in Tehran where she becomes entangled in a complex triangle with her handler and her subject.
IMDB Rating: 5.8
IMDB Votes: 7000
Genere: Action, Drama, Mystery, Thriller
Country: France, Israel, Germany, USA, UK
Duration: 116 min
Plot tags: psychological, exciting, suspense, powerful
Similar in 76%
Topaz (1969)
Plot Summary:
A French intelligence agent becomes embroiled in the Cold War politics first with uncovering the events leading up to the 1962 Cuban Missle Crisis, and then back to France to break up an international Russian spy ring.
IMDB Rating: 6.2
IMDB Votes: 19000
Genere: Drama, Thriller
Country: USA
Duration: 143 min
Plot tags: suspense, tense, suspenseful, psychological, political thriller, enigmatic, psychological thriller, exciting, retro, art house
Similar in 85%
The Ipcress File (1965)
Plot Summary:
This espionage thriller represents a landmark in spy movies introducing the sly, dry intelligence agent Harry Palmer. The story, centers on Palmer's investigation into British Intelligence security. He's soon enmeshed in a world of double-dealing, kidnap and murder and finds a traitor is operating at the heart of the secret service. Will the mysterious 'Ipcress File' reveal who the traitor is?.
IMDB Rating: 7.2
IMDB Votes: 17000
Genere: Drama, Thriller
Country: UK
Duration: 109 min
Plot tags: atmospheric, suspenseful, suspense, exciting, tense, enigmatic, clever, realistic, cynical, retro
Similar in 82%
Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy (2011)
Plot Summary:
In the bleak days of the Cold War, espionage veteran George Smiley is forced from semi-retirement to uncover a Soviet mole within his former colleagues at the heart of MI6.
IMDB Rating: 7.0
IMDB Votes: 210000
Genere: Drama, Mystery, Thriller
Country: UK, France, Germany, USA
Duration: 127 min
Plot tags: suspense, clever, tense, confusing, bleak, non-linear, atmospheric, thought provoking, period piece, political