Best movies like Long Night's Journey Into Day

Having spent 10 years in prison for nationalist activities, Shack Twala is finally ordered released by the South African Supreme Court but he finds himself almost immediately on the run after a run-in with the police. Assisted by his lawyer Rina Van Niekirk and visiting British engineer Jim Keogh, he heads for Capetown where he hopes to recover a stash of diamonds, meant to finance revolutionary activities, that he had entrusted to a dentist before his incarceration. Along the way, they are followed by Major Horn of the South African State security bureau and it becomes apparent that he has no intention of arresting them until they reach their final destination

Two alien brothers crash their ship in the U.S. They get separated, and one searches the country for the other one.

Sarah Barcant, a lawyer in New York City who grew up in South Africa, returns to her childhood dwelling place to intercede for Alex Mpondo, a Black South African politician who was tortured during apartheid.

Fearless, feisty and resolute, the "Rough Aunties" are a remarkable group of women unwavering in their stand to protect and care for the abused, neglected and forgotten children of Durban, South Africa. This newest documentary by internationally acclaimed director Kim Longinotto (SISTERS IN LAW, DIVORCE IRANIAN STYLE) follows the outspoken, multiracial cadre of Thuli, Mildred, Sdudla, Eureka and Jackie, as they wage a daily battle against systemic apathy, corruption and greed to help the most vulnerable and disenfranchised of their communities.

The struggle to eradicate apartheid in South Africa has been chronicled over time, but no one has addressed the vital role music plays in this challenge. This documentary by Lee Hirsch recounts a fascinating and little-known part of South Africa's political history through archival footage, interviews and, of course, several mesmerizing musical performances.

The true story of anti-apartheid activists in South Africa, and particularly the life of Patrick Chamusso, a timid foreman at Secunda CTL, the largest synthetic fuel plant in the world. Patrick is wrongly accused, imprisoned and tortured for an attempt to bomb the plant, with the injustice transforming the apolitical worker into a radicalised insurgent, who then carries out his own successful sabotage mission.

Come Back, Africa chronicles the life of Zachariah, a black South African living under the rule of the harsh apartheid government in 1959.

South Africa, 1978. Tim Jenkin and Stephen Lee, two white political activists from the African National Congress imprisoned by the apartheid regime, put a plan in motion to escape from the infamous Pretoria Prison.

The life and career of Andre Stander, a South African police officer turned bank robber.

A dramatic story, based on actual events, about the friendship between two men struggling against apartheid in South Africa in the 1970s. Donald Woods is a white liberal journalist in South Africa who begins to follow the activities of Stephen Biko, a courageous and outspoken black anti-apartheid activist.

In the back country of South Africa, black minister Stephen Kumalo journeys to the city to search for his missing son, only to find his people living in squalor and his son a criminal. Reverend Misimangu is a young South African clergyman who helps find his missing son-turned-thief and sister-turned-prostitute in the slums of Johannesburg.

A South-African preacher goes to search for his wayward son who has committed a crime in the big city.

The plot centers on students involved in the Soweto Riots, in opposition to the implementation of Afrikaans as the language of instruction in schools. The stage version presents a school uprising similar to the Soweto uprising on June 16, 1976. A narrator introduces several characters among them the school girl activist Sarafina. Things get out of control when a policeman shoots several pupils in a classroom. Nevertheless, the musical ends with a cheerful farewell show of pupils leaving school, which takes most of act two. In the movie version Sarafina feels shame at her mother's (played by Miriam Makeba in the film) acceptance of her role as domestic servant in a white household in apartheid South Africa, and inspires her peers to rise up in protest, especially after her inspirational teacher, Mary Masombuka (played by Whoopi Goldberg in the film version) is imprisoned.

During the 1976 Soweto uprising, a white school teacher's life and values are threatened when he asks questions about the death of a young black boy who died in police custody.

Bruce Brown's The Endless Summer is one of the first and most influential surf movies of all time. The film documents American surfers Mike Hynson and Robert August as they travel the world during California’s winter (which, back in 1965 was off-season for surfing) in search of the perfect wave and ultimately, an endless summer.

A drifter and his pet puma stand up against a motorcycle gang in a small American town.

A chronicle of Nelson Mandela's life journey from his childhood in a rural village through to his inauguration as the first democratically elected president of South Africa.

Vusi Madlazi returns to the South African village he left as a young boy 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.

A young man in 1981 South Africa must complete his brutal and racist two years of compulsory military service while desperately maintaining the secrecy of his homosexuality.

A White enclave in Johannesburg, South Africa, in the 1960s. Molly Roth, 13 years old, is the daughter of leftist parents, and she must piece together what's happening around her when her father disappears one night, barely evading arrest, and, not long after, her mother is detained by the authorities. Some of Molly's White friends turn against her, and her family's friendships with Blacks take on new meaning. Relationships are fragile in the world of apartheid. How will she manage?

An American reporter and an Afrikaans poet meet and fall in love while covering South Africa's Truth and Reconciliation Commission hearings.

A South African political prisoner is tortured to obtain information on apartheid conspirators. Ten years later, the head officer in charge of the questioning is similarly held as prisoner and questioned about his past offenses.

Two South Africans set out to discover what happened to their unlikely musical hero, the mysterious 1970s rock 'n' roller, Rodriguez. The film won Best Documentary at the 85th Academy Awards.

A drama centered on two women who engage in a dangerous relationship during South Africa's apartheid era.

The beginning of the end of the apartheid era in South Africa is seen through the perspectives of three female friends: Sophie, who is of English descent; Aninka, who is an Afrikaner; and Thoko, who is black.

After the end of Apartheid, Archbishop Desmond Tutu meets with a brutal murderer seeking redemption.

In this story of a black policeman during South African apartheid, Danny Glover plays the cop, who believes he's trying to help his people, even while serving as a pawn of the racist government. When his son gets involved in the anti-apartheid movement, he finds himself torn between his family and what he believes is his duty.

Based on the true story of a black girl who was born to two white Afrikaner parents in South Africa during the apartheid era.

Combining a new age black maid, blood-drinking zombie racists and a plot to poison the town with blood cakes, what ensues is a dark comedy that pits the forces of fascism against the redeeming power of true love and home cooking…

A low-ranking Secret Service agent is conned into supplying information to Eastern Bloc countries. Although he is not a suspect due to his unimportant position, when his office partner is hauled in as a suspect he realises he has got himself into very deep water.

Soldier of fortune, Monroe Bieler, is sent to dole out some American-style justice when the wife and child of an African president are kidnapped by terrorists.

Filmmakers investigate 2001 anthrax attacks and uncover a nightmare world.

The secret history of the negotiations that led to Mandela's release from prison, the ANC becoming the government of South Africa, and the end of apartheid.

Footage of the investigation documentary telling about the extermination of African elephants lasted almost three years. The film crew traveled throughout 30 countries to make a route of ivory smuggling and to find out the true culprit of these crimes against elephants.

In the early to mid '90s, when the South African system of apartheid was in its death throes, four photographers - Greg Marinovich, Kevin Carter, Ken Oosterbroek and João Silva - bonded by their friendship and a sense of purpose, worked together to chronicle the violence and upheaval leading up to the 1994 election of Nelson Mandela as president. Their work is risky and dangerous, potentially fatally so, as they thrust themselves into the middle of chaotic clashes between forces backed by the government (including Inkatha Zulu warriors) and those in support of Mandela's African National Congress.

Ndola, Northern Rhodesia (currently Zambia), September 18th, 1961. Swedish Dag Hammarskjöld, UN Secretary-General, mysteriously dies in a plane crash. Decades later, Danish journalist and filmmaker Mads Brügger and Swedish researcher Göran Björkdahl investigate the case looking for a definitive closure.

The time is the late '80s, a crucial period in the history of South Africa. President P.W. Botha is hanging on to power by a thread as the African National Congress (ANC) takes up arms against apartheid and the country tumbles toward insurrection. A British mining concern is convinced that their interests would be better served in a stable South Africa and they quietly dispatch Michael Young, their head of public affairs, to open an unofficial dialogue between the bitter rivals. Assembling a reluctant yet brilliant team to pave the way to reconciliation by confronting obstacles that initially seem insurmountable, Young places his trust in ANC leader Thabo Mbeki and Afrikaner philosophy professor Willie Esterhuyse. It is their empathy that will ultimately serve as the catalyst for change by proving more powerful than the terrorist bombs that threaten to disrupt the peaceful dialogue.

A lawyer takes on a case of a prison guard in South Africa who is traumatized by the executions he's witnessed.

Michael is a young Irish banker, whose life begins to unravel after causing a stranger's death in an accident. Sifiso is a teenager living in a shack in a Cape Town township, dreaming of escape. When their stories unexpectedly collide, their impact on one another's lives is far greater, and more surprising, than either could have imagined.

A man travels through Asia and Africa seeking the treasure of Ali Baba.

Action thriller trails two attractive female cops (Zoli Marki and Kryska Witowska) on the hunt for a lethal drug lord who’s responsible for injuring one of the women’s former partners. Things get even more dangerous when the two women learn they must guard the suspect’s girlfriend, who has decided to testify against him.

Mapantsula tells the story of Panic, a petty gangster who inevitably becomes caught up in the growing anti-apartheid struggle and has to choose between individual gain and a united stand against the system.

A routine drone survey turns deadly when Ryan Johnson, a marine biologist based in South Africa, films a humpback whale being attacked and strategically drowned by a Great white shark. This is a total perspective shift for the creature.

Louis goes to South Africa where American tourists pay to hunt wild animals in privately owned reserves.

A young man reluctantly embarks on a journey to his ancestral land of Lesotho to bury his estranged father, and finds himself drawn to the mystical beauty and hardships of the people and the land he had forgotten.

Based on the official transcripts of the investigation that followed after the very suspicious notorious death in prison of one of the most important leading men of the South African anti-apartheid movement, Steven Biko.

1. Snake Eyes 2. I Will Wait 3. Below My Feet 4. Wilder Mind 5. Awake My Soul 6. Lover Of The Light 7. Tompkins Square Park 8. Believe 9. Ghosts That We Knew 10. The Cave 11. Ditmas 12. Dust Bowl Dance 13. Wona 14. Lampenda 15. There Will Be Time 16. Little Lion Man 17. The Wolf DUST AND THUNDER chronicles the meeting of South Africa with their long-standing favourite British band, Mumford & Sons. Filmed live against the beautiful Pretorian outback, award-winning director Dick Carruthers gets to the very heart of what makes Mumford & Sons such a special act as the band performs new songs and classic hits in front of an exhilarated crowd. Made for the big screen in stunning Ultra HD with 5.1 surround sound, this truly spectacular concert film may go down as Mumford & Sons’ finest.

On an isolated farm in Apartheid South Africa two lovers find themselves at risk of losing everything to a big city lawyer; they will stop at nothing to prevent him from exposing a dark family secret.

Paul Simon returns to South Africa to explore the incredible journey of his historic Graceland album, including the political backlash he received for allegedly breaking the UN cultural boycott of South Africa designed to end the Apartheid regime. On the 25th anniversary of Paul Simon's GRACELAND, acclaimed documentary filmmaker Joe Berlinger offers a glimpse at the controversy surrounding the decision to record the album in South Africa despite a UN boycott of the nation, which was aimed at ending apartheid. In the run-up to an eagerly anticipated reunion concert, Simon, Quincy Jones, Peter Gabriel, David Byrne, Harry Belafonte, Paul McCartney and others reflect on the decision to record with local artists in South Africa, and the cultural impact of the album that delivered such hits as "I Know What I Know" and "You Can Call Me Al."

A documentary that chronicles the life of South African leader Nelson Mandela. Mandela is probably best known for his 27 years of imprisonment, and for bringing an end to apartheid. But this film also sheds light on the little-known early period of Mandela's life.