Best movies like The Darkside

After committing a crime for which he is likely to be jailed, a Yolngu teenager convinces two of his childhood friends to join him on a journey from North East Arnhem Land to Darwin to seek help from a tribal leader.

Harry and Beth wanted a different kind of holiday so they chartered a boat to drop them off on a remote coral island on the Great Barrier Reef. The island was idyllic, surrounded by a wide reef, covered in palms and full of birds and other wildlife. It was small and totally deserted or so they thought. But when things go missing from their camp site and they discover someone else's footprints in the sand this quickly becomes disturbing as they realize the island has a ghost! Inspired by actual events.

Documentary by John Pilger looks at the awful truth behind white Australia's dysfunctional relationship with Indigenous Australians

The Australian Aborigines (in this film anyway) believe that this is the place where the green ants go to dream, and that if their dreams are disturbed, it will bring down disaster on us all. The Aborigines' belief is not shared by a giant mining company, which wants to tear open the soil and search for uranium.

The first of four installments in the groundbreaking Heartbeat of the World anthology film series. Comprised of several short films by some of the world's most exciting directors, Words with Gods follows the theme of religion - specifically as it relates to an individual's relationship with his/her god or gods...or the lack thereof. In Words with Gods, each director recounts a narrative centered around human fragility, as well as environmental and cultural crises involving specific religions with which each has a personal relationship; including early Aboriginal Spirituality, Umbanda, Buddhism, the Abrahamic faiths, Hinduism, and Atheism. An animated sequence by Mexican animator Maribel Martinez is woven through each of the film segments, with each segment narratively connected as a feature-length film.

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.

An aboriginal girl is brought up by a white family that adopts her. As a young woman, she is mysteriously drawn to go "Walkabout" as people of her tribe have for hundreds of years.

Nine women convicts escape from a prison hell-hole and dare to create a savage world free of man.

The residents of a housing development find themselves in trouble after they discover that their development was built on top of a sacred aboriginal graveyard.

Two drag queens and a transgender woman contract to perform a drag show at a resort in Alice Springs, a town in the remote Australian desert. As they head west from Sydney aboard their lavender bus, Priscilla, the three friends come to the forefront of a comedy of errors, encountering a number of strange characters, as well as incidents of homophobia, whilst widening comfort zones and finding new horizons.

Friends Gary Black (Nathan Phillips) and Dumby Red (Luke Carroll) are on the same football team in their coastal Australian town. But to local racists, they're a world apart: Gary is white and Dumby is an Aborigine. This becomes an issue when one of the team's Aboriginal players becomes involved in a crime. In response, Dumby is demoted even though he's the star player, and Gary is given his place. Will Gary have the courage to speak out before tragedy results?

Three stories of the supernatural are recounted in this anthology. Rick, an Aboriginal boy living near a swamp on Bribie Island, is haunted by an American solider who drowned in quicksand. Ruby and her family live in a house near long-abandoned train tracks, which still carry ghostly apparitions. A landlord has trouble evicting the tenants of an old warehouse: a couple that's been dead for years

Australia, 1958. When a nine year old white girl is found murdered, police are quick to arrest illiterate Aborigine, Max Stuart. Under interrogation Max admits to the killing. With a legal system compromised by intimidation tactics, the skills of his two gifted but naïve defense lawyers are put to the test.

After being infected in the wake of a violent pandemic and with only 48 hours to live, a father struggles to find a new home for his baby daughter.

The Yowie Yahoo starts kidnapping musicians at a concert attended by Scooby and the gang in Vampire Rock, Australia.

Man’s best friend becomes his worst nightmare when a horde of bloodthirsty wild dogs descends upon a family’s farmhouse in a fang-bearing fight for survival.

The place is Melbourne, Australia 1978. The punk phenomenon is sweeping the country and Dogs In Space, a punk group, are part of it. In a squat, in a dodgy suburb, live a ragtag collection of outcasts and don't-wanna-bes who survive on a diet of old TV space films, drugs and good music. And the satellite SKYLAB could crash through their roof at any moment...

Several old college friends converge at a mansion, ostensibly for a pleasant reunion. Larry Dann, the most easygoing of the bunch, comes to the conclusion that all is not well in the old dark house. For one thing, he's run across several people whom he's never met. For another, they all seem to be of a different time and place.

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.

In a remote corner of the wild country, a bloody war rages. Travis is a bounty hunter with one last hope of redemption. Gutjuk is a young Indigenous man trying to save the last of his family. Together they embark on a manhunt, which unravels a secret that ultimately pits them against each other.

Indigenous Detective Jay Swan arrives in the frontier town of Goldstone on a missing persons inquiry. What seems like a simple investigation unearths an intricate web of crime, corruption, human trafficking, and coordinated exploitation of indigenous people’s land. Jay must bury his differences with young local cop Josh, so together they can bring justice to Goldstone.

A search for love, meaning and bathroom solitude. Danny goes through a series of shared housing experiences in a succession of cities on the east coast of Australia. Together these vignettes form a narrative that is surprisingly reflective.

Mabo tells the story of one of Australia's national heroes - Eddie Koiki Mabo, the Torres Strait Islander who left school at age 15, yet spearheaded the High Court challenge that overthrew the fiction of terra nullius.

Eddie returns to his home town on the south coast of New South Wales. Having left for the city without explanation a few years previously, he tries to pick up the pieces of his life and fit back in to the lives of those he left, including his ex-girlfriend Tully and brother Pete.

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.

During a power outage, two strangers tell scary stories. The more Fred and Fanny commit to their tales, the more the stories come to life in the dark of a Catskills cabin. The horrors of reality manifest when Fred confronts his ultimate fear: Fanny is the better storyteller.

A story within a story within a story. In Australia's Northern Territory, an Aboriginal narrator tells a story about his ancestors on a goose hunt. A youngster on the hunt is being tempted to adultery with his elder brother's wife, so an elder tells him a story from the mythical past about how evil can slip in and cause havoc unless prevented by virtue according to customary tribal law.

It's 1968, and four young, talented Australian Aboriginal girls learn about love, friendship and war when they entertain the US troops in Vietnam as singing group The Sapphires.

Based on the true story of a young girl who went missing in the Australian outback in 1932.

In 1929, an Australian Aboriginal stockman kills a white station owner in self-defense and goes on the lam, pursued by a posse.

In 1825, Clare, a 21-year-old Irish convict, chases a British soldier through the rugged Tasmanian wilderness, bent on revenge for a terrible act of violence he committed against her family. She enlists the services of an Aboriginal tracker who is also marked by trauma from his own violence-filled past.

Young Katherine and her older friend Hester live at the isolated farm run by Hester and her father Francis. Katherine works as a maid and wants to leave that place because there's too much work. Hester, however, gets attracted to Katherine and hold her there, promising to give her less work in the future. When old Francis dies, Hester decides to sell the farm for cash. They move to small cottage on the edge of the farm and plan to go to Europe for the money they got. But tragic accident and theft of their money change their plans.

Travis, a jaded detective, arrives in the remote outback town of Limbo to investigate the cold case murder of local Indigenous girl Charlotte Hayes 20 years ago. As truths about the murder begin to unfold, the detective gains a new insight into the unsolved case.

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.

Imagine what it would be like if black settlers arrived to settle a continent inhabited by white natives? In 1788, the first white settlers arrived in Botany Bay to begin the process of white colonisation of Australia. But in Babakiueria, the roles are reversed in a delightful and light-hearted look at colonisation of a different kind. This satirical examination of black-white relations in Australia first screened on ABC TV in 1986 to widespread acclaim with both critics and audiences alike. This is the story of the fictitious land of Babakiueria, where white people are the minority and must obey black laws. Aboriginal actors Michelle Torres and Bob Maza (Heartland) and supported by a number of familiar faces from the time, including Cecily Polson (E-Street) and Tony Barry, who starred in major ABC-TV hits such as I Can Jump Puddles and his Penguin award-winning Scales of Justice. Babakiueria was awarded the United Nations Media Peace Prize in 1987.

Svenja and her 16-year-old daughter Kira have traveled the world a lot. Svenja is a hotel manager and is currently bringing an aging hotel in Australia back into shape. But her biggest challenge is her daughter, who has switched to complete refusal and doesn't let Svenja tell her anything anymore. Kira doesn't avoid confrontations at school either, which in turn leads to conflicts with Svenja. After another argument, Kira decides to go to Jack. Jack is Aboriginal and Kira's only friend. Together, the two young people go in search of their “special place”, their own particular locality. Svenja is beside herself with worry when she notices Kira's disappearance and gives chase with Jack's father Kalti, a deeply relaxed hotel boat guide whom Svenja had released two days earlier. An adventurous journey begins in the barren deserted Outback - for Svenja and Kira a strange world, fascinating, but also life-threatening!

Based on the story of Australia's colonization, this atmospheric drama stars Alan Ladd as Hugh Tallant, an American medical student falsely convicted of robbery and sent on a torturous voyage with other prisoners to the penal colony at Botany Bay. Because of his attempt to escape, evil Captain Gilbert decides to return him to England on charges of mutiny.

When Sammy Dean and her older brother Andy are suddenly orphaned, they fear that they will be separated and placed in foster homes. So they set off along on foot, hoping to reach a ship that will take them to England and their only surviving relatives. The two young runaways must make their dangerous journey through some of the world’s harshest terrain-the wilds of the Australian outback.

An American family receives an inheritance a century English castle with its gardens and furniture includes a real ghost, that of Simon de Canterville. The ghost, which aims to continue to enjoy peace of mind several hundred years, using their best techniques to get rid of the spooky family upset.

A family buy land set around a water hole in a remote location, that is occupied by native Australians. The two groups clash.

The Maralinga people survive aggressive colonisation, including dispossession to enable atomic testing, and through their tenacious spirit and cultural strength fight to retain their country.

A young Aboriginal boy is torn between his unexpected love of acting and the disintegration of his family.

An Australian Indigenous horror anthology with five terrifically twisted tales by five Indigenous filmmakers.

The story of an Aboriginal family's attempts to forge a new life for themselves within the segregated society. At the urging of headstrong teenager Trilby, the Comeaways relocate from their family camp, to a house in the main town.

A young man reconciles ancient tradition with the modern, urban world in this debut feature from Stephen Page, artistic director of Australia’s renowned Bangarra Dance Theatre.

Barney and Dimi are young men in love and are on a trip to visit Dan, Barney's dying father. Dan is planning his suicide and wants Barney there.

Beckoning the Butcher explores the night Chris Shaw and his four friends summoned a spirit into their holiday house - then disappeared forever.

"Badass Bunyip" is a a schlocky, gory, Australian Christmas movie. When Shazza and Dazza accidentally choose an sacred Aboriginal site to have their Christmas lunch, all hell breaks loose.

Adapted from the stage production of the same name, 'Basically Black' is a sketch comedy TV pilot that aired in 1973, and due to the provocative racial content, ABC never produced another episode. It stands as a historical milestone, the first television program and stage play completely created and written by Aboriginal Australians.

In this tense tale of psychological terror, Vivian Miller (Young) is a young twenties woman who’s serving out her jail sentence at a work release program in the Midwest. Her 90 days of probation takes her to The Cawdor Theater, a dilapidated summer stock theater run by Lawrence O’Neil (Elwes). Lawrence, a failed Broadway director, is now reduced to staging amateur productions with young parolees and raging over the mistakes from his past. Vivian’s arrival in Cawdor starts a terrifying series of events that brings Lawrence’s secret past to the present. After Vivian views an old taped stage production of Macbeth, a force of evil is unleashed which soon turns its sights on her. With the help of Roddy (Welch), a local outcast, Vivian sets about trying to discover who the supernatural killer on the tape is before she becomes the next victim.