Best movies like Within the Whirlwind

At the dawn of WWII, several men escape from a Russian gulag—to take a perilous and uncertain journey to freedom as they cross deserts, mountains and several nations.

The year is 1732. John Wesley, an irritatingly self-righteous instructor at Oxford is offered the chance to go to the new colony of Georgia, where he hopes to preach to the Indians. John struggles with his failure and fears and is finally experiences the peace he longed for: "I felt my heart strangely warmed." Wesley begins to preach about his experience of saving faith, but is turned out of most churches in London. Despite opposition, mob violence that seeks to break up their meetings, Wesley and his "Methodies" establish social ministries to the poor that transformed the face of England. Today, almost 75 million people worldwide trace their spiritual heritage back to John Wesley.

A hard-living salesman becomes a quadriplegic after an accident.

A victim from World War II's "Death Railway" sets out to find those responsible for his torture. A true story.

A retelling of the biblical book of Hosea set against the backdrop of the California Gold Rush of 1850.

This intricate historical drama tells the story of actor Ferdinand Marian (Tobias Moretti), who is ordered by Nazi propagandist Joseph Goebbels to star in the 1940 anti-Semitic film Jew Suss. Despite his cooperation, Ferdinand's actions have unexpected costs. Ferdinand's Jewish wife, Anna (Martina Gedeck), is sent to a concentration camp, and as World War II intensifies, he rebels against the Nazis, leading to the destruction of his career.

The German soldier Clemens Forel - determined to be reunited with his beloved family - makes a dramatic escape through bitter cold winters, desolate landscapes, and life threatening ventures from a Siberian labor camp after World War II. 8000 miles and three endless years of uncertainty later, he is finally about to reach his destination... An edge of your seat drama that celebrates the power of the human spirit and the force of will, while inspired and impowered by love.

The coming-of-age tale of 16-year-old Lina Vilkas who is deported to Siberia amid Stalin's reign of terror in the Baltic region during WWII. An aspiring artist, she secretly documents her harrowing journey with her drawings.

The passionate Merchant-Ivory drama tells the story of Francoise Gilot, the only lover of Pablo Picasso who was strong enough to withstand his ferocious cruelty and move on with her life.

When John Halder's latest novel is enlisted by powerful political figures in the Nazi party to push their agenda, his career and social standing instantly advance. But after learning of the Reich's horrific plans for the future and the devastating effects they will have on people close to him, John must decide whether or not to take a stand and risk losing everything.

A pair of childhood friends reunite during their summer break from college and deal with a traumatizing experience from their past.

A 5-year-old girl embarks on a harrowing quest for survival amid the sudden rise and terrifying reign of the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia.

Germany 1939. Hans and Lene marry the day before the war breaks out, and Hans is sent to the Eastern front. During a bombing raid their daughter Anna is born. The house is destroyed and Lene and Anna moves in with relatives in Berlin. Hans survives the war but he is not the same person as in 1939, and he and Lene find it difficult to live together again.

A middle-aged man recalls his childhood growing up in and around London during World War II.

Nazi POWs suspected of heinous acts are locked up in a Soviet women's prison run by vengeful female guards. To weed out the guilty, the innocent must pay. Can supposed enemies turn into great loves? Based on a true post-World War II story, this drama stars Thomas Kretschmann, John Malkovich and Vera Farmiga in a bitter game of cat and mouse and a battle between hate and humanity, mercy and revenge.

The story follows the life of a regular German women Leni Gruyten during the 1930s and 1940s. Through her interactions with friends, family and other people she knows, the regular folks' perception of the Nazi era is shown.

The film follows adjunct professor Joss, who travels to England to visit the farm where her late mother grew up and bonds with single father Daniel, whose family now runs it.

Wed just as war breaks out, Jeanne hardly gets to know her military husband, Louis, before the debacle of 1940. While waiting for his return from a POW camp, Jeanne journeys through countless affairs with Louis' comrades- in-arms. Hoping to forget these wartime betrayls, Louis takes his wife and the infant twins he didn't father to Berlin, where she falls for Matthais, a sensitive German industrialist. When the Indochinese war sends Louis to Vietnam, Matthais follows Jeanne back to France. A subsequent move to Damascus where Louis is posted as military attache, fails to break their bond.

A Russian Literature professor at the University of Havana is ordered to work as a translator for child victims of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster when they are sent to Cuba for medical treatment. Based on a true story.

This heroic story follows the life of Karol Wojtyla, a Polish Roman catholic who ascends the throne of St. Peter as Pope John Paul II. As a young boy, Karol is a bright and talented student. Archbishop Sapieha recognizes the very special, moving qualities Karol possesses and encourages him to consider the priesthood. Although determined to study Polish literature, Karol turns to the church; he is ordained and studies in Italy, France, and Belgium. Torn by fear and repression in post-Stalin Eastern Europe, Karol becomes a poisonous thorn in the communists' side. His deer reverence and commitment return him to Poland as Pope John Paul II.

Laura Ullman, a single mother, kills her abusive ex-boyfriend and turns the gun on her son when he threatens to call the police. Paul leaves home to start a better life and falls for Ashley, a young woman looking for direction in her life, unaware of his past troubles.

In her public persona, Eleanor “Tussy” Marx was a translator, actress, a children’s rights activist and a persuasive labour organizer, a tireless powerhouse determined to carry on her father’s work. She held her own with twentieth century gods, including both her father and his colleague Engels. In her privately life, however, she was vulnerable and her attraction to the self-indulgent and self-important Edward Aveling led her into misery and ultimately proved fatal.

Death in Love is a psychosexual-thriller about a love affair between a Jewish woman and a doctor overseeing human experimentation at a Nazi German concentration camp, and the impact this has on her sons' lives in the 1990s.

Drama set in the 1950s, based on a true story, about a young girl, Sung Neng Yee, who is brought as part of a wealthy Chinese family. She is eager to become part of Mao Tze Tung's "new society", but soon becomes disenchanted by the economic misery the changes bring to her family. Before long, the authorities become aware of Neng Yee's feelings and she is taken to a labour camp, overseen by the sadistic Colonel Cheng.

The relationship between a director and an actress takes a turn when the lines between art and life are crossed.

A woman is wrongly accused of murdering her husband in Edwardian London. Just before the outbreak of World War I, Edith Graydon married her boyfriend Percy Thomson. He survives the war but theirs is not a happy marriage. She doesn't really love him and he feels it every day. He's also possessive and their daily life is a constant battle. She meets and falls in love with Frederick Bywaters, her sister's one-time boyfriend. They have a long affair and her desperate attempts to get either a formal separation of divorce from her husband falls on deaf ears. They are at their wits end and Bywaters decides to do something about it. On a dark evening when Edith is walking with her husband, Bywaters stabs him to death. Edith is charged with murder along with Bywaters and both are found guilty. She claims her innocence right up until the day they are both executed by hanging in 1923. Based on a true story.

Irena Sendler is a Catholic social worker who has sympathized with the Jews since her childhood, when her physician father died of typhus contracted while treating poor Jewish patients. When she initially proposes saving Jewish children from the Warsaw Ghetto, her idea is met with skepticism by fellow workers, her parish priest, and even her own mother Janina.

Michalina Wislocka, the most famous and recognized sexologist of communist Poland, fights for the right to publish her book, which will change the sex life of Polish people forever.

Cordelia ia a troubled, damaged soul who is only just recovering after some unnamed trauma; she is an actor rehearsing a play and comes to stay in a creepy London mansion flat occupied by her twin sister Caroline and Caroline’s boyfriend Matt. When they leave her alone there Cordelia strikes up a friendship with Frank the charming, but strange and unreliable young man they can hear practising his cello in the upstairs flat – a relationship which quickly becomes very disturbing.

This is the true story of Freddy and Walter – two young Slovak Jews, who were deported to Auschwitz in 1942. On 10 April 1944, after meticulous planning, they manage to escape. While the inmates they had left behind courageously stand their ground against the Nazi officers, the two men are driven on by the hope that their evidence could save lives.

A luxury hotel in a conflict zone. Development aid worker Dorothea begins an affair with a young drifter, Alec, but what starts as sweet distraction brings her dangerously close to losing control.

"The Anarchist's Wife" is the story of Manuela who is left behind when her husband Justo fights for his ideals against Franco's Nationalists during the Spanish Civil War. He is deported to a concentration camp, and upon his release, continues the fight against nationalism in the French resistance. Years, pass without a word from him, but his wife never gives up hope of seeing him again.

Coming of Age Drama in rural Poland in the summer of 1943.

The political drama is set in the Stalin's Soviet Union after the Second World War. A British archaeologist Andrei Miller is working in Iran. He is mistakenly kidnapped and arrested by the KGB. He is falsely accused of spying and wrongfully sentenced to a Gulag prison-camp in Siberia.

An epic tale of Poles, Ukrainians, Jews who are deported to Russia. Their fate is shown from the perspective of a young boy Staszek, who goes to Siberia with his family and neighbors from a small village in the eastern Polish borderlands. Together with his companions he starts hard struggle for survival, where the most fearsome opponent turns out to be terrible, merciless nature... Circumstances force the boy to reevaluate his life and grow up faster. Soon he will have to learn the essential struggle for survival and make decisions that will where rate will be life of his relatives. He will also have to choose between love for the Jewish Zinnia and the Russian Luybka.