Best movies like Burke & Wills
They dared to challenge the unknown. They were the first. They crossed the Australian continent from Melbourne to the Gulf of Carpentaria.
A unique, carefully handpicked, selection of the best movies like Burke & Wills Starring Jack Thompson, Nigel Havers, Greta Scacchi, Matthew Fargher, and more. If you liked Burke & Wills then you may also like: Five Weeks in a Balloon, Walkabout, The Whale, Queen of the Desert, Quigley Down Under and many more popular movies featured on this list. You can further filter the list even more or get a random selection from the list of similar movies, to make your selection even easier.
A story based on true events about two explorers on a doomed journey trying to cross Australia on foot in the 19 century.
Burke & Wills
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Walkabout
Under the pretense of having a picnic, a geologist takes his teenage daughter and 6-year-old son into the Australian outback and attempts to shoot them. When he fails, he turns the gun on himself, and the two city-bred children must contend with harsh wilderness alone. They are saved by a chance encounter with an Aboriginal boy who shows them how to survive, and in the process underscores the disharmony between nature and modern life.
The Whale
Dramatic retelling of the fateful last voyage of the Nantucket whaleship Essex. When the Essex is attacked and sunk by a sperm whale in November 1820, her crew take to three fragile whalers. Alone in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, the men must decide whether to head for the nearest islands - a thousand miles downwind to the west - or set out on an epic journey of almost three thousand miles to reach the South American mainland. Fear of cannibals forces them to choose South America. Almost three months later, the first whaler is rescued by another whaleship. Only three men are still alive. A week later the captain's whaler is also rescued, with just two men aboard. The third whaler is never found. This is a story of human endurance and what men in extremis will do to survive.
Queen of the Desert
A chronicle of Gertrude Bell's life, a traveler, writer, archaeologist, explorer, cartographer, and political attaché for the British Empire at the dawn of the twentieth century.
Quigley Down Under
American Matt Quigley answers Australian land baron Elliott Marston's ad for a sharpshooter to kill the dingoes on his property. But when Quigley finds out that Marston's real target is the aborigines, Quigley hits the road. Now, even American expatriate Crazy Cora can't keep Quigley safe in his cat-and-mouse game with the homicidal Marston.
Rabbit-Proof Fence
In 1931, three Aboriginal girls escape after being plucked from their homes to be trained as domestic staff, and set off on a trek across the Outback.
Krakatoa, East of Java
A team of maritime salvage workers are about to embark on a recovery dive. However the 1883 Krakatoa Volcano eruption provides more pressing problems.
Australia
Set in northern Australia before World War II, an English aristocrat who inherits a sprawling ranch reluctantly pacts with a stock-man in order to protect her new property from a takeover plot. As the pair drive 2,000 head of cattle over unforgiving landscape, they experience the bombing of Darwin by Japanese forces firsthand.
Back of Beyond
A garage mechanic out in the middle of the outback gets involved with the girl friend of a jewel smuggler who is on the run.
Breaker Morant
During the Boer War, three Australian lieutenants are on trial for shooting Boer prisoners. Though they acted under orders, they are being used as scapegoats by the General Staff, who hopes to distance themselves from the irregular practices of the war. The trial does not progress as smoothly as expected by the General Staff, as the defence puts up a strong fight in the courtroom.
Cactus
A man is kidnapped from his city home in the quiet hours of the night and, the kidnapper, John Kelly, embarks on a journey into the Australian Outback towards the place where his hostage is due for delivery. As time and distance roll by, the strength and endurance of both men will be tested to the very end.
The Chant of Jimmie Blacksmith
The true story of a part aboriginal man who finds the pressure of adapting to white culture intolerable, and as a result snaps in a violent and horrific manner.
Crocodile Dundee II
Australian outback expert protects his New York love from gangsters who've followed her down under.
Mountains of the Moon
The story of Captain Richard Francis Burton's and Lt. John Hanning Speke's expedition to find the source of the Nile river in the name of Queen Victoria's British Empire. The film tells the story of their meeting, their friendship emerging amidst hardship, and then dissolving after their journey.
Dingo
Young John Anderson is captivated by jazz musician, Billy Cross when he performs on the remote airstrip of his Western Australian outback hometown after his plane is diverted. Years later, now a family man and making a meagre living tracking dingoes and playing trumpet in a local band, John still dreams of joining Billy on trumpet and makes a pilgrimage to Paris.
Gallipoli
As World War I rages, brave and youthful Australians Archy and Frank—both agile runners—become friends and enlist in the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps together. They later find themselves part of the Dardanelles Campaign on the Gallipoli peninsula, a brutal eight-month conflict which pit the British and their allies against the Ottoman Empire and left over 500,000 men dead.
The New Boy
In 1940s Australia, a 9-year-old aboriginal orphan boy arrives in the dead of night at a remote monastery run by a renegade nun, and his presence disturbs its delicately balanced world.
The Man from Snowy River
Jim Craig has lived his first 18 years in the mountains of Australia on his father's farm. The death of his father forces him to go to the lowlands to earn enough money to get the farm back on its feet.
Mad Dog Morgan
The true story of Irish outlaw Daniel Morgan, who is wanted, dead or alive, in Australia during the 1850s.
Samson and Delilah
Samson and Delilah's world is small- an isolated community in the Central Australian desert. When tragedy strikes they turn their backs on home and embark on a journey of survival. Lost, unwanted and alone the discover that life isn't always fair, but love never judges.
To Brave Alaska
True story of a yuppie couple's Alaskan trip turning into a wilderness survival struggle.
We of the Never Never
Based on the well-loved Australian classic by Mrs. Aeneas Gunn, this is the remarkable true story of Jeannie Gunn, a woman who fought to overcome sexual and racial prejudice amid the harsh beauties of the outback. Leaving her Melbourne existence for a new life on her husband's isolated ranch, Jeannie's feisty, good-natured attitude soon wins over the misogynistic stockmen, but she faces a much tougher challenge in trying to change their racist attitudes towards the indigenous aboriginal population.
One Night the Moon
Based on the true story of a young girl who went missing in the Australian outback in 1932.
The Earthling
Recently diagnosed with a terminal illness, a man returns home to Australia to die in the wildness. His plans become complicated when he meets a young boy and decides to take him under his wing.
Lost Holiday: The Jim & Suzanne Shemwell Story
In Idaho, an estranged couple are trapped in a blizzard while on vacation just before Christmas.
The Tracker
Somewhere in Australia in the early 20th century outback, an Aboriginal man is accused of murdering a white woman. Three white men are on a mission to capture him with the help of an experienced Indigenous man.
Charlie's Country
Blackfella Charlie is getting older, and he's out of sorts. The intervention is making life more difficult on his remote community, what with the proper policing of whitefella laws that don't generally make much sense, and Charlie's kin and ken seeming more interested in going along with things than doing anything about it. So Charlie takes off, to live the old way, but in doing so sets off a chain of events in his life that has him return to his community chastened, and somewhat the wiser.
Wills & Burke
Parody of historical epics that focuses on real-life Australian explorers William John Wills and Robert O'Hara Burkes, who tragically tried to cross the Australian continent from the south, to the north, a distance of 3,250 km.
Forbidden Territory: Stanley's Search for Livingstone
British explorer Henry Stanley travels to Africa in 1871 seeking missionary David Livingstone.
A story based on true events about two explorers on a doomed journey trying to cross Australia on foot in the 19 century.
Burke & Wills
A unique, carefully handpicked, selection of the best movies like Burke & Wills Starring Jack Thompson, Nigel Havers, Greta Scacchi, Matthew Fargher, and more. If you liked Burke & Wills then you may also like: Five Weeks in a Balloon, Walkabout, The Whale, Queen of the Desert, Quigley Down Under and many more popular movies featured on this list. You can further filter the list even more or get a random selection from the list of similar movies, to make your selection even easier.
Five Weeks in a Balloon
Professor Fergusson plans to make aviation history by making his way across Africa by balloon. He plans to claim uncharted territories in West Africa as proof of his inventions worth.