Best movies like The Man on the Wall
Last updated March 2024
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Plot Summary:
An East German man finds a way to cross the border between East and West Berlin. But when he succeeds in bringing his wife out as well, things are not quite as expected.
IMDB Rating: 6.3
IMDB Votes: 81
Genere: Drama
Country: West Germany
Duration: 105 min
Plot tags:
Best tv shows and movies like The Man on the Wall (1982):
Similar in 82%
Singing the Blues in Red (1986)
Plot Summary:
Persona Non Grata in his homeland, protest singer Klaus Drittemann must leave East Berlin, his wife and child and emigrate to West Berlin, where the representatives of an American record company are eagerly waiting for him. They plan to exploit his defection from communism both ideologically and financially. But Klaus, as ill-at-ease in the West as he was in the East, is reluctant to be used as an expendable commodity. Leaving his contract unsigned (or signed in his manner), he leaves for Cambridge to meet his father, a concert player, who -just like him - left East Berlin thirty years ago as Klaus was a little boy. He is accompanied by a young French journalist, Emma, who knows where his father has been living since he disappeared for more than a decade. The young lady is cooperative but might hide things from him.
IMDB Rating: 6.2
IMDB Votes: 562
Genere: Drama, Music
Country: UK, West Germany, France
Duration: 111 min
Plot tags: serious, realistic, independent film
Similar in 77%
Der Blaue (1994)
Plot Summary:
In this German political drama, an ex-Stasi agent encounters an old friend whom he may have betrayed after his friend tried to escape East Germany. The former East German agent is Otto Skrodt who after many years is about to be promoted in the highest government ranks. He is anxious to maintain a squeaky clean image. His daughter is Isabelle. The young and friendly Kalle returns after spending many years in jail for his escape attempts. He doesn't know exactly who blew the whistle, but his friend Skrodt is definitely under suspicion. Kalle returns to ostensibly renew the friendship and to see Isabelle whom he loves. The duplicitous friendship between the two men becomes the main focus of the story which features interesting plot twists at the end.
IMDB Rating: 6.2
IMDB Votes: 34
Genere: Drama
Country: Germany
Duration: 96 min
Plot tags:
Similar in 82%
Das Wunder von Berlin (2008)
Plot Summary:
East Germany, 1988: working as a state security service agent, Jürgen Kaiser is loyal to the party line, but worried about his son Marco, a punk. As he is arrested after a concert, Marco is forced to join the army, where he surprisingly identifies with socialism and believes he has to defend his country against the capitalist enemy. While Jürgen is astonished, his wife Hanna and Marco's girlfriend Anja, supporting the civil rights movement, don't like his new attitude.
IMDB Rating: 6.7
IMDB Votes: 492
Genere: Drama, War
Country: Germany
Duration: 100 min
Plot tags: spoof, parody
Similar in 78%
The Architects (1990)
Plot Summary:
The architect Daniel Brenner is in his late thirties when he receives his first challenging and lucrative commission: to design a cultural center for a satellite town in East-Berlin. He accepts the offer under the condition that he gets to choose who he works with. This way, he reunites with former colleagues and friends - most of them architects or students of architecture who have since chosen a different profession due to personal restraint or economic confinement. Together, they develop a concept which they hope will be more appealing to the public than the conventional and dull constructions common to the German Democratic Republic. However, their ambitious plans are once and again foiled by their conservative supervisors. As frustration grows, Daniel has trouble keeping his career in balance with his family-life: his wife Wanda wants to leave for West-Germany.
IMDB Rating: 7.0
IMDB Votes: 290
Genere: Drama
Country: East Germany
Duration: 102 min
Plot tags:
Similar in 76%
Prager Botschaft (2007)
Plot Summary:
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IMDB Rating: 6.4
IMDB Votes: 80
Genere: Drama
Country: Germany
Duration: 96 min
Plot tags: political drama
Similar in 77%
Cold Summer (2006)
Plot Summary:
The Wall - Berlin '61.
IMDB Rating: 6.4
IMDB Votes: 172
Genere: Drama
Country: Germany
Duration: 90 min
Plot tags:
Similar in 78%
Never Mind the Wall (2001)
Plot Summary:
Germany 1982: The country is divided into two parts. Nele, coming from West-Germany, travels to East-Germany where she meets Captain, singer of a band. They fall in love with each other, but the regime "takes care" of their relationship, meaning: They can not see each other again. Germany 1990: The country is reunited. Nele starts searching their lost love.
IMDB Rating: 6.6
IMDB Votes: 519
Genere: Drama, Romance
Country: Germany
Duration: 94 min
Plot tags: eighties
Similar in 81%
Westler (1985)
Plot Summary:
Felix from West-Berlin falls in love with Thomas in East-Berlin. At first they keep their relationship going by regular visits from Felix, but the curfew forces him to return every evening. When the East-German authorities become suspicious, Thomas decides to try and flee to the West.
IMDB Rating: 6.6
IMDB Votes: 429
Genere: Drama
Country: West Germany
Duration: 94 min
Plot tags:
Similar in 76%
An Englishman Abroad (1983)
Plot Summary:
Actress Coral Browne travels to Moscow, and meets a mysterious Englishman. Turns out he's the notorious spy, Guy Burgess. Based on a true story, with Ms. Browne playing herself.
IMDB Rating: 7.5
IMDB Votes: 608
Genere: Drama
Country: UK
Duration: 61 min
Plot tags:
Similar in 85%
Beloved Berlin Wall (2009)
Plot Summary:
Berlin, 1989. Sascha is a young East German border guard and Franzi is a lively young West German woman who's just moved into a flat next to Sascha's watchtower at the Berlin Wall. It takes only a slight mishap and a selfless act of chivalry and the two fall in love. But soon the Stasi believes they are witnessing the start of a revolt. This is the time of mass protests and East Germans taking refuge in the West German embassy in Prague after all. Franzi and Sascha have to find their ways to stand up for their love and strive for the impossible; to bring down the wall.
IMDB Rating: 6.6
IMDB Votes: 477
Genere: Comedy, Drama, Romance
Country: Germany
Duration: 103 min
Plot tags: sentimental, touching, humorous, realistic, captivating, semi serious
Similar in 83%
One Night in Berlin (2011)
Plot Summary:
Berlin. Night. An old, homeless drunk stumbles down the street. Ignored by everyone - almost everyone. A woman suddenly appears in front of him - mid-thirties, thin, a drug addict. She stands face-to-face for the first time in years with the man she despises. Father and daughter, Volker and Anna. Anna is desperate and on the run from the police. She needs money urgently and demands the key to grandpa's safety deposit box, a key which she knows her father still has. But Volker claims to have hidden it on the other side of the city. They set out on foot through the Berlin night, heading west. On the way, with Anna in pain, Volker discovers she is bleeding from her stomach - but not all the blood is hers. And then he finds the bloodied knife she is carrying... As time runs out and the police close in, father and daughter hurry through the night. Under cover of darkness the secrets of their East German past explode in a final confrontation - and the consequences of times past come to.
IMDB Rating: 7.2
IMDB Votes: 21
Genere: Drama
Country: UK, Germany
Duration: 76 min
Plot tags: road movie
Similar in 85%
West (2013)
Plot Summary:
East Germany. Summer, late 70's. Three years after her boyfriend Wassilij's apparent death, Nelly Senff decides to escape from behind the Berlin wall with her son Alexej, leaving her traumatic memories and past behind. Pretending to marry a West German, she crosses the border to start a new life in the West. But soon her past starts to haunt her as the Allied Secret Service begin to question Wassilij's mysterious disappearance. Is he still alive? Was he a spy? Plagued by her past and fraught with paranoia, Nelly is forced to choose between discovering the truth about her former lover and her hopes for a better tomorrow.
IMDB Rating: 6.4
IMDB Votes: 1000
Genere: Drama
Country: Germany
Duration: 102 min
Plot tags: serious, realistic, touching, captivating, gloomy
Similar in 80%
The Wall - The Final Days (2008)
Plot Summary:
The Berlin wall separated families and friends for 28 years. Some accepted it, and some worked hard to make it fall.
IMDB Rating: 6.5
IMDB Votes: 234
Genere: Drama
Country: Germany
Duration: 186 min
Plot tags:
Similar in 81%
The Same Sky (2017)
Plot Summary:
Lars is a "Romeo agent" from East Germany in the 1970s. His task is to go West, first to seduce and then to spy on Western women who worked in government or defense institutions.
IMDB Rating: 7.4
IMDB Votes: 3000
Genere: Drama, Thriller
Country: Germany
Duration: 120 min
Plot tags: tense, serious, captivating, suspenseful, political
Similar in 86%
Der Turm (2012)
Plot Summary:
Adapted from an award-winning best-selling book by Uwe Tellkamp, 'The Tower' depicts a higher class family’s struggles during crumbling communist rule in 1980’s East Germany. It illustrates the weaknesses and pending downfall of the German communist state through an intimate portrayal of one family's struggles, dreams and decisions. Run-ins with East Germany’s Secret Police reveal the cracks in both the police state and family loyalties.
IMDB Rating: 7.0
IMDB Votes: 601
Genere: Drama
Country: Germany
Duration: 180 min
Plot tags: tense, captivating, suspense, disturbing
Similar in 89%
The Weissensee Saga (2010)
Plot Summary:
Weissensee is a German television series. The series is set in East Berlin in 1980 and 1987 and follows two families.
IMDB Rating: 8.2
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Drama
Country: Germany
Duration: 50 min
Plot tags: serious, realistic, poignant, compassionate, romantic, atmospheric, touching, soap opera
Similar in 85%
Open the Wall (2014)
Plot Summary:
A lighthearted look at the opening of the border crossing of Bornholmer Straße in Berlin from the point of view of the confused border guards.
IMDB Rating: 7.0
IMDB Votes: 858
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: Germany
Duration: 88 min
Plot tags: tense, humorous, captivating, light
Similar in 80%
Escape from East Berlin (1962)
Plot Summary:
Director Robert Siodmak's 1962 film, inspired by true events, is about an East Berlin resident who attempts to escape to West Berlin with his family and girlfriend through a secret underground tunnel.
IMDB Rating: 6.6
IMDB Votes: 632
Genere: Drama, History, Thriller
Country: West Germany, USA
Duration: 94 min
Plot tags: political
Similar in 79%
Judgement in Berlin (1988)
Plot Summary:
American judge in Germany must decide if the hijacking of an East German plane into West Berlin was justified.
IMDB Rating: 5.8
IMDB Votes: 871
Genere: Drama
Country: West Germany, USA
Duration: 96 min
Plot tags: realistic, serious, suspense, sincere, touching, political, independent film
Similar in 86%
The Promise (1994)
Plot Summary:
East-Berlin, 1961, shortly after the erection of the Wall. Konrad, Sophie and three of their friends plan a daring escape to Western Germany. The attempt is successful, except for Konrad, who remains behind. From then on, and for the next 28 years, Konrad and Sophie will attempt to meet again, in spite of the Iron Curtain. Konrad, who has become a reputed Astrophysicist, tries to take advantage of scientific congresses outside Eastern Germany to arrange encounters with Sophie. But in a country where the political police, the Stasi, monitors the moves of all suspicious people (such as Konrad's sister Barbara and her husband Harald), preserving one's privacy, ideals and self-respect becomes an exhausting fight, even as the Eastern block begins its long process of disintegration.
IMDB Rating: 6.8
IMDB Votes: 849
Genere: Drama, Romance
Country: Germany, France, Switzerland
Duration: 115 min
Plot tags: realistic, sentimental, sincere, touching, serious, emotional, inspirational, romantic, sexy, enigmatic
Similar in 77%
Berlin Is in Germany (2001)
Plot Summary:
When Martin, a former GDR citizen, is released from jail, he lately becomes confronted with the consequences of the German re-unification.
IMDB Rating: 7.1
IMDB Votes: 1000
Genere: Drama
Country: Germany
Duration: 99 min
Plot tags: touching, humorous, emotional, realistic, serious
Similar in 76%
Shores of Hope (2012)
Plot Summary:
In this vivid historical drama set in 1980s East Germany, two dockworkers and best friends who dream of escaping the repressive regime are forced to choose their loyalties when the state police promise them safe passage out of the country — if they inform on their co-workers and union leader.
IMDB Rating: 6.6
IMDB Votes: 551
Genere: Drama
Country: Germany
Duration: 116 min
Plot tags: serious, realistic, suspenseful, captivating, tense
Similar in 79%
Berlin Tunnel 21 (1981)
Plot Summary:
In Berlin in 1961, an American soldier and a German engineer join forces to build a tunnel under the Berlin Wall in order to smuggle out refugees, including the soldier's East German girlfriend.
IMDB Rating: 6.8
IMDB Votes: 342
Genere: Drama, Thriller
Country: USA
Duration: 141 min
Plot tags: exciting, tense, rough, serious, realistic, suspenseful
Similar in 80%
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 78%
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%
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 88%
Barbara (2012)
Plot Summary:
It is the summer of 1980 in East Germany and, alone, Barbara is confined to living and working as a doctor in a small provincial town - her punishment for attempting to emigrate to the West. She has only one focus; to escape and for this, she has to wait patiently. Until Andre, her supervisor in the hospital, takes her off course. Are his motives of love or duty to the authorities? The day-to-day pretense, and content supervision slowly take their toll as the tension builds.
IMDB Rating: 7.2
IMDB Votes: 16000
Genere: Drama
Country: Germany
Duration: 105 min
Plot tags: tense, melancholic, compassionate, atmospheric, psychological, sincere, realistic, philosophical, political, existential
Similar in 86%
Balloon (2018)
Plot Summary:
Two families attempt a daredevil plan to escape DDR with a homemade hot air balloon, but it crashes just before the border. The Stasi finds traces of this attempt to escape and immediately starts investigations, while the two families are forced to build a new escape balloon. With each passing day the Stasi is closer on their heels – a nerve-wracking race against time begins.
IMDB Rating: 7.5
IMDB Votes: 13000
Genere: Drama, History, Thriller
Country: Germany, France, USA
Duration: 125 min
Plot tags: captivating, suspenseful, tense, suspense
Similar in 87%
Fuehrer Ex (2002)
Plot Summary:
Ingo Hasselbach, whose parents were Communist Party members in East Germany during his childhood, has lived at both ends of the political seesaw. The question of how people reach a change of heart is a profound one; Hasselbach describes the external forces that led to his founding Germany's first neo-Nazi political party and the internal ones that led him away from it five years later.
IMDB Rating: 6.6
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Drama
Country: Germany, France
Duration: 105 min
Plot tags: serious, suspenseful, disturbing, tense, rough, bleak, realistic
Similar in 86%
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