Best movies like El Norte

When a wandering mercenary named Hogan rescues a nun called Sister Sara from the unwanted attentions of a band of rogues on the Mexican plains, he has no idea what he has let himself in for. Their chance encounter results in the blowing up of a train and a French garrison, as well as igniting a spark between them that survives a shocking discovery.

A college professor travels to New York City to attend a conference and finds a young couple living in his apartment.

Rocklin Colorado, 1925. A hard cold winter. Young Arturo Bandini loves his father Svevo, his mother Maria and his brothers. Even though his bricklayer father wastes the little money he has in the Imperial Poolhall and his time with the rich American widow, Hildegarde. Even though his beautiful and pious mother lets his father get away with that, even if his little brother wets the bed. Arturo loves them all. He also loves to play baseball, even though he has to wait until spring. And he also loves the movies ... and Rosa. But she doesn't love him ...

An unattractive 7th grader struggles to cope with suburban life as the middle child with inattentive parents and bullies at school.

Senegalese immigrant Aisha lands a job as a nanny for a wealthy Manhattan couple. As she prepares for the arrival of the son she left behind in Senegal, a violent presence begins to invade both her dreams and her reality, threatening to destroy the American Dream she is painstakingly piecing together.

An immigrant in search of the American dream is forced to take a room in a boarding house and soon finds herself in a nightmare from which she can't escape.

Annoyed by the responsibility of being an older brother to Dil, Tommy sets out with Chuckie, Phil, and Lil to return his baby brother to the hospital. However, they inadvertently get lost in the woods during their trip.

Jake Barnes and his two kids, Sean and Jessie, have moved to Alaska after his wife died. He is a former airline pilot now delivering toilet paper across the mountains. During an emergency delivery in a storm his plane goes down somewhere in the mountains. Annoyed that the authorities aren't doing enough, Jessie and Sean set out on an adventure to find their father with the help of a polar bear which they have saved from a ferocious poacher. Conflict ensues.

A young Anatolian Greek, entrusted with his family's fortune, loses it en route to Istanbul and dreams of going to America.

When workers at the Hormel meatpacking plant in Austin, Minnesota are asked to take a substantial pay cut in a highly profitable year, the local labor union decides to go on strike and fight for a wage they believe is fair. But as the work stoppage drags on and the strikers face losing everything, friends become enemies, families are divided and the very future of this typical mid American town is threatened.

An Innuit hunter races his sled home with a fresh-caught halibut. This fish pervades the entire film, in real and imaginary form. Meanwhile, Axel tags fish in New York as a naturalist's gofer. He's happy there, but a messenger arrives to bring him to Arizona for his uncle's wedding. It's a ruse to get Axel into the family business. In Arizona, Axel meets two odd women: vivacious, needy, and plagued by neuroses and familial discord. He gets romantically involved with one, while the other, rich but depressed, plays accordion tunes to a gaggle of pet turtles

A corrupted border agent decides to clean up his act when an impoverished woman's baby is put up for sale on the black market.

The story concerns two agents, one Mexican (PJF) and one American, who are tasked to stop the smuggling of Mexican migrant workers across the border to California. The two agents go undercover, one as a poor migrant.

Jeb Maynard is a patrolman guarding the U.S.-Mexican border, whose partner and buddy Scooter has just been murdered. Maynard knows that a smuggler of illegal aliens is responsible for Scooter's death, but the feds insist that drug dealers committed the crime.

Maya is a quick-witted young woman who comes over the Mexican border without papers and makes her way to the LA home of her older sister Rosa. Rosa gets Maya a job as a janitor: a non-union janitorial service has the contract, the foul-mouthed supervisor can fire workers on a whim, and the service-workers' union has assigned organizer Sam Shapiro to bring its "justice for janitors" campaign to the building. Sam finds Maya a willing listener, she's also attracted to him. Rosa resists, she has an ailing husband to consider. The workers try for public support; management intimidates workers to divide and conquer. Rosa and Maya as well as workers and management may be set to collide.

Immigrants from around the world enter Los Angeles every day, with hopeful visions of a better life, but little notion of what that life may cost. Their desperate scenarios test the humanity of immigration enforcement officers. In Crossing Over, writer-director Wayne Kramer explores the allure of the American dream, and the reality that immigrants find – and create -- in 21st century L.A.

An undocumented immigrant finds a human heart in one of the toilets of the west London hotel where he works with other undocumented immigrants.

Ray Eddy, an upstate New York trailer mom, is lured into the world of illegal immigrant smuggling. Broke after her husband takes off with the down payment for their new doublewide, Ray reluctantly teams up with Lila, a smuggler, and the two begin making runs across the frozen St. Lawrence River carrying illegal Chinese and Pakistani immigrants in the trunk of Ray's Dodge Spirit.

Filmmaker Christopher Quinn observes the ordeal of three Sudanese refugees -- Jon Bul Dau, Daniel Abul Pach and Panther Bior -- as they try to come to terms with the horrors they experienced in their homeland, while adjusting to their new lives in the United States.

Forced to give up his dreams of art school, Zach works dead-end jobs to support his sister and her son. Questioning his life, he paints, surfs and hangs out with his best friend, Gabe. When Gabe's older brother returns home for the summer, Zach suddenly finds himself drawn into a relationship he didn't expect.

Traces over three generations an immigrant family's trials, tribulations, tragedies, and triumphs. Maria and Jose, the first generation, come to Los Angeles, meet, marry, face deportation all in the 1930s. They establish their family in East L.A., and their children Chucho, Paco, Memo, Irene, Toni, and Jimmy deal with youth culture and the L.A. police in the '50s. As the second generation become adults in the '60s, the focus shifts to Jimmy, his marriage to Isabel (a Salvadorian refugee), their son, and Jimmy's journey to becoming a responsible parent.

An epic love story spanning decades is sparked by a chance encounter between two men in provincial Mexico. Based on a true story, ambition and societal pressure propel an aspiring chef to leave his soulmate and make the treacherous journey to New York, where life will never be the same.

A family of Irish immigrants adjusts to life on the mean streets of Hell's Kitchen while also grieving the death of a child.

An unemployed construction worker heading out west stops at a remote farm in the desert to get water when his car overheats. The farm is being worked by a group of East European Catholic nuns, headed by the strict mother superior, who believes the man has been sent by God to build a much needed church in the desert.

Paulie, a talking parrot, recounts his travels looking for his original owner to a Russian janitor who helps him to the end of his journey.

Two intertwined families, one American, one Mexican, and their fight to save three year old illegal Angelina from deportation.

An American couple drift toward emptiness in postwar North Africa.

This tale takes place in a bar. The Spanish Alonso and his blind mother run this place. Bay, who is Alonso's friend live here too. This story tells something about Alonso and Bay and the "American Dream".

Two desperate families find their quest for a better life in the United States challenged by prejudice and injustice in director Andrew James' harsh critique of the American Dream. For two families who successfully manage to make their way across the border and into the United States, the harrowing trip through an unforgiving landscape was only the beginning of their treacherous journey. How does one survive in a place where right has become wrong, and the perpetrator is now the victim? Some turn to crime, inadvertently falling into a vicious cycle with the power to destroy families and consume lives before they've even had a chance to prove themselves.

A Mexican immigrant new to Los Angeles enters into a love triangle with two very different women.

Ayiva recently left his home in Burkina Faso in search of a way to provide for his sister and his daughter. He takes advantage of his position in an illegal smuggling operation to get himself and his best friend Abas off of the continent. Ayiva adapts to life in Italy, but when tensions with the local community rise, things become increasingly dangerous. Determined to make his new situation work he attempts to weather the storm, but it has its costs.

A young woman visiting in Mexico is kidnapped by a gang of bandits, who drag her through the rugged wilderness to their hideout. She manages to leave word for her friend Bill, who knows the country well. But when Bill cannot find a horse, his only available form of transportation is his roadster. Nevertheless, he is determined to come to her rescue, even though it means trying to drive the car across miles of rocky, broken terrain.

Pedro returns home to a small mountain village in Guerrero, Mexico after years of working in the US. He finds his daughters older, and more distant than he imagined. His wife still has the same smile. Having saved some earnings from two trips to the US, he hopes to now finally make a better life with his family, and even to pursue his dreams on the side by starting a band: Copa Kings. He cherishes the everyday moments with his family. The villagers think this year's crop will be bountiful. There is also good work in a growing city an hour away. But the locals are wise to a life of insecurity, and their thoughts are often of family members or opportunities far away, north of the border. While working in the fields, Pedro meets and begins to mentor a teenager who dreams of the US. That place somehow always feels very present, practically knocking at the door. "Aquí y Allá" is a story about hope, and the memories and loss of what we leave behind.

After watching the news on 9/11 with his family, Fernando travels from Mexico to New York City to find his father, an undocumented worker at the World Trade Center's famous Windows on the World restaurant.

Marlon Cruz, a young Colombian man who motivated by his girlfriend Reina, leaves his comfortable life in Medellin and flees with her through Guatemala and Mexico, across the borders, illegally into the United States.

Nothing is more important to Mexican-American Marta Delacruz than her quinceanera -- the traditional 15th birthday celebration that symbolically ushers a young girl into adulthood. Marta is understandably angry and resentful when her father cancels the gala event, but her outlook changes completely when she accidentally uncovers her father's secret: He never became a U.S. citizen.

Rose, a 17-year-old Filipino-American teenager from Texas, dreams of becoming a country music icon. She has to fend for herself when her mother is arrested by ICE, and must choose between following her dreams without her mother or leaving her passions behind.

When twenty-four-year-old Jae is released from prison for killing her mother, she returns to her childhood home in small-town Ridgecrest. The desire to go anywhere but there prompts her to agree to join her brother on a road trip out to Death Valley - which results in getting them hopelessly lost in the most stunning, but unforgiving topographical terrain on the planet.

Tells the parallel stories of nine-year-old Carlitos and his mother, Rosario. In the hopes of providing a better life for her son, Rosario works illegally in the U.S. while her mother cares for Carlitos back in Mexico.

After getting out of prison, a Latino criminal tries to go straight.

Dolores is an illegal immigrant from El Salvador who works as a housemaid in New York City. Under the constant fear of likely deportation, she wonders whether she should return to her country. Her decision to leave is strengthened when her life is suddenly complicated by a series of unfortunate events.

Dwight and his sister Jessie reach a crossroads over what to do about their little brother Thomas, a sickly child with a mysterious affliction.

After their family emigrates from Colombia during the summer of ‘99, a metalhead science prodigy and his deviant younger brother do their best to adapt to new lives in America.

Forced to flee his home in Honduras, Óscar seeks asylum in the United States, only to find himself trapped in the immigration system.

The crew of a bankrupt Scottish trawler turn to smuggling illegal immigrants over the stormy waters of the North Sea.

Abruptly abandoned by her husband in a country completely foreign to her, Colombian native Mariana (Paola Mendoza) struggles to take care of herself and her two young children on the unforgiving streets of New York City. Sebastian Villada, Laura Montana and Anthony Chisholm also star in this gritty independent drama jointly written and directed by Mendoza and her collaborator Gloria La Morte.

Yearning to leave behind his life of misfortune in the Middle East, Ibrahim Jarrah wins the U.S. Green Card Lottery for a chance to become an American citizen. Ibrahim lands in New York City the day before 9/11…and the events of the September terrorist attacks forever shape the struggles he faces on his journey to capture the American dream.

An undocumented immigrant, Roberto, seeks a way to become lawful, but all efforts are put on hold when he becomes a new father at the onset of the US government's 'Zero Tolerance' child separation policy at the US / Mexico border.

Armed with dreams that extend beyond their block, Luis and Ronald, two best friends from Los Angeles, videotape their last 36 hours before shipping off to Afghanistan. One hundred days before Obama's inauguration, these young men have joined the Marines together to face the obstacles and circumstances that seem to overwhelm their passage into manhood. Luis wants to be a filmmaker and Ronald wants to travel the world and raise a family. Through the lens of Luis's video camera, they capture their friends, family members and places they call home - to remember who they are and where they come from. In their darkest hour, they turn on the video camera for the last time and document the final moments of their journey home. They soon realize that their dreams and promises of a new life mean nothing in a place called War.

A Mexican-American teenage farmworker dreams of graduating high school, when ICE raids in her community threaten to separate her family and force her to become her family’s breadwinner.