Best movies like The Man Nobody Knew: In Search of My Father, CIA Spymaster William Colby

A unique, carefully handpicked, selection of the best movies like The Man Nobody Knew: In Search of My Father, CIA Spymaster William Colby Starring William Colby, Zbigniew Brzezinski, Seymour Hersh, Donald Rumsfeld, and more. If you liked The Man Nobody Knew: In Search of My Father, CIA Spymaster William Colby then you may also like: Air America, Body of Lies, Operation Fortune: Ruse de Guerre, The November Man, Extraction 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 personal exploration into the life of America's controversial former CIA Director told through the eyes of his wife and filmmaker son, Carl. Through extraordinary events in twentieth century history, this consummate soldier/spy stood at the center of the Agency's most clandestine activities and operations. The film reveals the 'cover life' of this CIA operative, who followed orders and took on the dirtiest assignments until the Nixon Administration ordered him to 'stonewall' Congress about the CIA's past abuses, but he refused. This film reveals why, for the first time, he could not obey.

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Air America

Air America was the CIA's private airline operating in Laos during the Vietnam War, running anything and everything from soldiers to foodstuffs for local villagers. After losing his pilot's license, Billy Covington is recruited into it, and ends up in the middle of a bunch of lunatic pilots, gun-running by his friend Gene Ryack, and opium smuggling by his own superiors.

Body of Lies

The CIA’s hunt is on for the mastermind of a wave of terrorist attacks. Roger Ferris is the agency’s man on the ground, moving from place to place, scrambling to stay ahead of ever-shifting events. An eye in the sky – a satellite link – watches Ferris. At the other end of that real-time link is the CIA’s Ed Hoffman, strategizing events from thousands of miles away. And as Ferris nears the target, he discovers trust can be just as dangerous as it is necessary for survival.

Operation Fortune: Ruse de Guerre

Special agent Orson Fortune and his team of operatives recruit one of Hollywood's biggest movie stars to help them on an undercover mission when the sale of a deadly new weapons technology threatens to disrupt the world order.

The November Man

An ex-CIA operative is brought back in on a very personal mission and finds himself pitted against his former pupil in a deadly game involving high level CIA officials and the Russian president-elect.

Extraction

When a former CIA operative is kidnapped by a group of terrorists, his son learns there is no plan for his father to be saved—so he launches his own rescue operation.

A Dark Truth

In the jungles of Ecuador, blood taints the waters. A multinational conglomerate's unholy alliance with a bloodthirsty military regime has resulted in a massacre. Only the rebel Francisco Franco and his determined wife Mia can prove the truth. To settle a personal debt, former CIA agent Jack Begosian takes on the freelance assignment to rescue Francisco and risks everything in a brutal battle to expose the cover-up.

Frenemy of the State

An adventure story centered on an heiress who works undercover for the CIA.

Persepolis

In 1970s Iran, Marjane 'Marji' Statrapi watches events through her young eyes and her idealistic family of a long dream being fulfilled of the hated Shah's defeat in the Iranian Revolution of 1979. However as Marji grows up, she witnesses first hand how the new Iran, now ruled by Islamic fundamentalists, has become a repressive tyranny on its own.

Kandahar

After his mission is exposed, an undercover CIA operative stuck deep in hostile territory in Afghanistan must fight his way out, alongside his Afghan translator, to an extraction point in Kandahar, all whilst avoiding elite enemy forces and foreign spies tasked with hunting them down.

Topaz

Copenhagen, Denmark, 1962. When a high-ranking Soviet official decides to change sides, a French intelligence agent is caught up in a cold, silent and bloody spy war in which his own family will play a decisive role.

Fair Game

Wife and mother Valerie Plame has a double life as a CIA operative, hiding her vocation from family and friends. Her husband, Joseph Wilson, writes a controversial article in The New York Times, refuting stories about the sale of enriched uranium to Iraq, Then Valerie's secret work and identity is leaked to the press. With her cover blown and other people endangered, Valerie's career and personal life begin to unravel.

The Long Kiss Goodnight

Samantha Caine, suburban homemaker, is the ideal mom to her 8 year old daughter Caitlin. She lives in Honesdale, PA, is a school teacher and makes the best Rice Krispie treats in town. But when she receives a bump on her head, she begins to remember small parts of her previous life as a lethal, top-secret agent.

Scorpio

Cross is an old hand at the CIA who often teams up with Frenchman Jean “Scorpio” Laurier, a gifted freelance operative. After their last mission together, the CIA orders Scorpio to eliminate Cross, leaving him no choice but to obey.

Kill the Messenger

A reporter becomes the target of a vicious smear campaign that drives him to the point of suicide after he exposes the CIA's role in arming Contra rebels in Nicaragua and importing cocaine into California. Based on the true story of journalist Gary Webb.

Hidden Agenda

In Ireland, American lawyer Ingrid Jessner and her activist partner, Paul Sullivan, struggle to uncover atrocities committed by the British government against the Northern Irish during the "Troubles." But when Sullivan is assassinated in the streets, Jessner teams up with Peter Kerrigan, a British investigator acting against the will of his own government, and struggles to uncover a conspiracy that may even implicate one of Kerrigan's colleagues.

Freeway: Crack in the System

FREEWAY: CRACK IN THE SYSTEM tells the story of broken dreams, drug dealers, dirty cops, and government complicity—more compelling than fiction, it’s the real story behind America’s longest war. This documentary by award-winning filmmaker Marc Levin (SLAM, Mr. Untouchable, Brick City) exposes how the infiltration of crack cocaine destroyed inner-city neighborhoods across the country. At the center of it all is the rise, fall and redemption of Freeway Rick Ross, a street hustler who became the King of Crack, and journalist Gary Webb, who broke the story of the CIA’s complicity in the drug war. Featuring exclusive interviews with Freeway Rick Ross, not to be confused with the rapper who took his name Pulitzer Prize winning journalist Gary Webb, his source Coral Baca, and wife Susan Webb former Los Angeles Deputy Sheriff Roberto Juarez drug trafficker Julio Zavala and many more.

Sanctuary

Luke Kovak is part of a covert group within the CIA that works on illegal black ops involving blackmail and assassinations. When his boss orders the murder of one of the team, Luke realizes how expendable they all are and gets out (taking proof of their activities with him). He now lives as a priest until the group start to get close to tracking him down.

Viper

After Laura's husband James is murdered, she decides to find out who did it and why. She finds herself in a fight against an anti-terrorist organization in her desire for revenge.

The Panama Deception

This winner of the 1993 Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature details the case that the 1989 invasion of Panama by the US was motivated not by the need to protect American soldiers, restore democracy or even capture Noriega. It was to force Panama to submit the will of the United States after Noriega had exhausted his usefulness.

The Trials of Henry Kissinger

This riveting documentary depicts former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger as a warmonger responsible for military cover-ups in Vietnam, Cambodia and East Timor, as well as the assassination of a Chilean leader in 1970. Based on a book by journalist Christopher Hitchens, the film includes interviews with historians, political analysts and such journalists as New York Times writer William Safire, a former Nixon speechwriter.

The Sleep Room

At the height of the cold war, the C.I.A. secretly funded Dr. Ewen Cameron, director of the Allan Memorial Institute, and his experimental research into brainwashing techniques. Twenty-five years later, the last nine survivors of those gruesome experiments fight to expose the truth...of The Sleep Room.

Coverup: Behind the Iran Contra Affair

Coverup: Behind the Iran Contra Affair is the third feature-length documentary produced by the Empowerment Project. The shadow government of assassins, arms dealers, drug smugglers, former CIA operatives and top US military personnel who were running foreign policy unaccountable to the public, revealing the Reagan/Bush administration's plan to use FEMA to institute martial law and ultimately suspend the Constitution. Strikingly relevant to current events.

A Second Son

The leaked 2012 video diary of schoolgirl Emily Turner, documenting her life as she faces the consequences of an underage pregnancy. But a private domestic drama soon turns into an extraordinary record of international importance with a series of mysterious events that force Emily and her family to recognize the significance of what has befallen her, heralding the end of days as we know them today.

Tentacle 8

A mysterious computer virus wipes out highly classified personnel files at the NSA, prompting a top secret investigation. RAYMOND BERRY, an NSA operative is thrown into a detention center, where he is suspected of crimes against the United States. He fights to stay alive, hoping to reunite with TABITHA, a CIA agent he has recently fallen in love with. Ray discovers that Tabitha is not who she says she is, complicating his plans to escape his former life and start over in anonymity.

Seal Team Six: The Raid on Osama Bin Laden

When the rumored whereabouts of Osama bin Laden are revealed, the CIA readies a team of seasoned U.S. Navy SEALs for the mission of a lifetime. Despite inconclusive evidence that bin Laden is inside the compound, and ignoring the possible ramifications of an unannounced attack on Pakistani soil, the Pentagon orders the attack. The SEAL Team bands together to complete their mission of justice in a riveting final showdown.

To Sleep with Anger

An enigmatic drifter from the South comes to visit an old acquaintance who now lives in South-Central LA.

The Sell Out

This action drama centers on a former CIA operative who grudgingly rejoins the spy game due to the machinations of his one-time student - a screw up who goes to work for the Soviets. As his job drags him deeper into a dangerous and under-handed world, the student wants out of the agency and oout of the U.S.S.R. But the man's choices have made him a target and now both the United States and Russia want him dead, sending their mos able hit men to do it.

.357 Magnum

American Jonathan "Johnny" Hightower works as a contract secret agent and his favorite tool is his .357.

The Unexpected Mrs. Pollifax

When her doctor recommends that a widow pursue her unfulfilled life ambitions, he doesn't realize that she has always wanted to be a spy. Sending a letter to her congressman gets her an interview with the CIA and accidentally gets her an assignment to Morocco for a supposed easy task of picking up an encrypted code book. When the agency realizes their mistake, they send a super-agent to watch over her. Both are taken prisoner and the real agent is injured, leaving Mrs. Pollifax to use her considerable wits to help them escape and to save the day.

Snowden

CIA employee Edward Snowden leaks thousands of classified documents to the press.

The Gracefield Incident

On August 16, 2013, the Supreme Court mandated the CIA to declassify files that had been kept secret for the past 75 years. Visual records of documented paranormal events were released to the public. The following incident took place in Gracefield, Quebec.

Frame Of Mind

What happens when the truth is not enough? A New Jersey police detective comes across new evidence in the Kennedy assassination

Gladio

In three programmes shown over consecutive weeks in BBC2's Timewatch strand, Allan Francovich interviewed key Gladio players such as Propaganda Due head, Licio Gelli, Italian neofascist and terrorist Vincenzo Vinciguerra, Venetian judge Felice Casson, Italian Gladio commander General Gerardo Serravale, Belgian Senator Roger Lallemand, Belgian gendarme Martial Lekue and former CIA director William Colby. Also included was "hoaxer" Oswald LeWinter.

Mastergate

A "play on words" about a fictional political scandal concerning covert arms deals and double-dealing government operatives, satirizing the Watergate hearings of 1972-1973.

The Ties That Bind

The Ties That Bind is an experimental documentary about the filmmaker's mother, who was born and lived in southern Germany from 1920-1950. Through a mixture of personal anecdote and social history, she describes the rise of Nazism, the war years, and the Allied occupation, during which she met her future husband, an American soldier. The Ties That Bind breaks with the usual format of war documentaries, thus allowing a different portrait of the individual to emerge, while it reflects on the current political situation in America and the filmmaker's activities in relation to those issues.

Kill Ratio

An attack on the new President of a fledgling Eastern European democracy pits an American covert operative against the country’s ruthless military leader determined to seize control of the government.

Spies, Inc.

Spies from different nationalities stationed in a small Asian island work out a plot to create an international incident taking profit from it. Defrauding CIA through fake reports and running a front company using operating funds, they control the island and use the skills acquired in the service of their countries to pursue their personal dreams of wealth and happiness.

Sammy-Gate

A dark political satire about how Sammy Davis, Jr. caused Watergate. Equal parts "Dr. Strangelove," "Zelig," and "Network," "Sammy-Gate" takes you on a psychedelic trip into the 1970s polyester heart of darkness. On a USO tour of Vietnam, Sammy Davis Jr. stumbles upon a CIA-sponsored plot to smuggle heroin into the United States. Through comic ineptitude mixed with noble intentions, Davis triggers a chain of bizarre missteps by the FBI, the Mafia, and the Nixon administration that result in the Watergate scandal.

1983: The Brink of Apocalypse

This programme recalls the events that led up to one of the most dangerous moments in the entire history of the Cold War: a NATO command post exercise, code named Able Archer 83, which caused the USSR to believe that NATO was planning a genuine nuclear attack.

638 Ways to Kill Castro

Dollan Cannell's documentary on the hundreds of alleged plots to assassinate Fidel Castro, and a look at the evolution of Cuban politics. If the title of this extraordinary film sounds ludicrous, don't be fooled. This film looks at the incredible story of the 638 alleged plots by the CIA and Cuban exiles to kill the Cuban leader Fidel Castro.

The True Story of Charlie Wilson

A playboy congressman, an outcast CIA operative, and a socialite steer over $300 million of the United States Government’s money — in an era when Reagan couldn’t raise $19 million for the Contras — to fund a covert war intended to turn Afghanistan into “Russia’s Vietnam.” Is this a joke? Is this some improbable work of fiction? Who are these wildly eccentric figures? How did they pull it off? In this special presentation from THE HISTORY CHANNEL® discover the intricate details of this incredible, fascinating and completely true series of events. Learn how Texas Congressman Charlie Wilson allied with CIA agent Gust Avrakotos and Houston philanthropist Joanne Herring to secretly bankroll the Afghan Mujahideen’s resistance to the Soviet Union. Retrace the behind-the-scenes machinations that led to the CIA’s largest and most successful campaign ever. And understand the wide-ranging and long-lasting implications of this little-known episode.

The American Tapestry

Showtime's "In the 20th Century" is a millennium-related strand of feature-length documentaries in which famous directors take on major subjects of their choosing. In the last of the six films, "The American Tapestry," filmmaker Gregory Nava takes viewers on an uplifting and challenging journey through the memoirs of five immigrant families, each one on a quest for its own American Dream. Beautifully interweaving accounts from several generations, Nava composes an astonishing tapestry of personal triumphs and tragedies, as each story of courage unfolds. The American Dream is an elusive thing, and the lives of the people in Nava's film are both triumphant and tragic, teeming with optimism and sometimes despair. They expose the finest and worst in America as well as what we feel most magnificent and dreadful. They are part of the many contrasting threads that make up the American tapestry — a complex portrait of a nation at the turn of the millennium.

Unnatural Causes

Frank Coleman is a Vietnam veteran dying from cancer brought on by exposure to the defoliant chemical Agent Orange which he turns to Maude DeVictor, a Veterans Administration benefits counselor who teams up with Coleman to fight a lopsided batted against the bureaucratic system for its cover up of the possible dangers of Agent Orange.

Assignment Berlin

Tracy Garret's a cop and after an incident that left one person dead, she's invited by her father to spend sometime with him in Berlin. While they were out having dinner, her father's shot. She is then informed by the German inspector assigned to her father's case that her father's a CIA operative. She then decides to investigate the case...

Prince Jack

A dramatic look at the inner workings of the Kennedy administration.

Melany Rose

After the tragic death of one of her patients, Dr. Sullivan takes an assignment working for the enigmatic Dr. Freeman at his secret military facility known only as 'The Garden,' housing test subjects made up of maximum-security inmates. Inspired by MKUltra, the illegal CIA mind-control experiment.

Barbie: Spy Squad

Barbie and her best friends Teresa and Renee transform from hard-working gymnasts to undercover secret agents. When their amazing gymnastics skills catch the eye of a top-secret spy agency, the girls are soon following clues to a gem-stealing cat burglar, using high-tech gadgets, glam disguises and cute robo-pets to save the day.

Hollywood on Trial

A detailed look at the events leading up to the blacklisting of Hollywood writers and artists. In October 1947 nineteen Hollywood personalities were subpoenaed by the House Committee on Un-American Activities to testify about their knowledge or possible involvement in the American Communist Party. The first ten to be called refused to cooperate, claiming their first amendment rights, were cited for contempt of Congress and sent to prison. They became known as the "Hollywood Ten" and this is their story.

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