Best movies like Without Borders

Jimmy Hanley learns that his former dancing partner has been killed, leaving a baby boy Sandy, so he takes the baby to live with him and his roommate Boris Bebenko. Theatre manager Allen Rand threatens to fire Jimmy for neglecting his work, but Jimmy's girlfriend Diana squares things by going to dinner with Rand over Jimmy's objections. Sandy catches measles and the quarantine causes Jimmy and Boris to miss a big audition.

A mother searches for five years to find her kidnapped son in this fact-based drama. Unexpectedly the boy is found, but the reunion is not as she hoped. She now has to deal with five years of abuse that the boy suffered at the hands of his kidnappers.

In Havana, Raul dreams of escaping to Miami. Accused of assault, he appeals to Elio to help him reach the forbidden world 90 miles across the ocean. One night, full of hope, they face the biggest challenge of their lives.

This film relates the story of a tightly connected Afro-American community informally called Colored Town where the inhabitants live and depend on each other in a world where racist oppression is everywhere, as told by a boy called Cliff who spent his childhood there. Despite this, we see the life of the community in all its joys and sorrows, of those that live there while others decide to leave for a better life north. For those remaining, things come to a serious situation when one prominent businessman is being muscled out by a white competitor using racist intimidation. In response, the community must make the decision of whether to submit meekly like they always have, or finally fight for their rights.

Jon Bon Jovi plays Jamey Meadows, a man newly released from prison who has found himself homeless on the crazy streets of New York City. Slowly, he must try to build his life up from the gutter. Resisting constant offers from his brother, played by William Forsythe (Dick Tracy, The Rock, Deuce Bigalow: Male Gigalo) to rejoin the insidious world of crime, Meadows takes a menial job as a door to door census worker. Among his many encounters throughout this job, he meets a young Chinese immigrant who is just as unhappy in her life as he is in his. These two slowly hit it off and a relationship gradually begins to develop between them. Can Jamey Meadows learn to live in this new life, or will the temptations of his old ways drag him back to where he started?

Through a series of flashbacks, four Chinese women born in America and their respective mothers born in feudal China explore their pasts.

British documentarian Nick Broomfield creates a follow-up piece to his 1992 documentary of the serial killer Aileen Wuornos, a highway prostitute who was convicted of killing six men in Florida between 1989 and 1990. Interviewing an increasingly mentally unstable Wuornos, Broomfield captures the distorted mind of a murderer whom the state of Florida deems of sound mind -- and therefore fit to execute. Throughout the film, Broomfield includes footage of his testimony at Wuornos' trial.

Eager to provide a better future for her son, Fadi, divorcée Muna Farah leaves her Palestinian homeland and takes up residence in rural Illinois -- just in time to encounter the domestic repercussions of America's disastrous war in Iraq. Now, the duo must reinvent their lives with some help from Muna's sister, Raghda, and brother-in-law, Nabeel.

Heaven's mother Leigh had to escape from Farthinggale Manor and the secrets she harbored. Falling into the arms of Luke, his devotion promised her hope as only Luke knew her deepest of secrets. Bravely she bore the suspicions of the hill folk, as she tried to grasp the happiness that long eluded her. With a baby girl, Heaven, on the way, she hoped for a chance at happy ever after.

A dangerously disturbed Vietnam veteran struggles with life 15 years after his return home, and slowly falls into insanity from his gritty urban lifestyle.

Dating Do's and Don'ts is a 1949 instructional film designed for American high schools, to teach teens basic dating skills.

In the 1820s, a taciturn loner and skilled cook travels west to Oregon Territory, where he meets a Chinese immigrant also seeking his fortune. Soon the two team up on a dangerous scheme to steal milk from the wealthy landowner’s prized Jersey cow – the first, and only, in the territory.

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.

Zain, a 12-year-old boy scrambling to survive on the streets of Beirut, sues his parents for having brought him into such an unjust world, where being a refugee with no documents means that your rights can easily be denied.

Former FBI agent, now single mother Lisa Brennan, takes a holiday to escape an unhappy love affair and painful family memories. But in a heartbeat, she is not only faced with a daughter kidnapped by human traffickers, but also faces murder charges and must keep one step ahead of the foreign police.

Masha, a young Russian emigrant traveling to the U.S., is saved from an officer's advances by civil engineer David Harding. Upon landing in America, J. J. Walton, a self-made political boss and contractor, pursues Masha and hires her as his maid. She leaves after the first night, but becomes his mistress after Walton promises her an education and marriage.

In seaside Italy, a Holocaust survivor with a daycare business takes in a 12-year-old street kid who recently robbed her.

A sudden windfall has unexpected consequences on a working class girl during the Great Depression.

Seven women from different backgrounds, nationality, age, class, and marital status find themselves in New Guinea, February 1942 - when the Japanese army takes over unexpectedly, and sends them into a war camp in the jungle.

Valentin is Acapulco's resident playboy, until a former fling leaves a baby on his doorstep and him heading with her out of Mexico.

A high-priced call girl, shocked by her mother's death, decides to get out of the business and have a baby.

Broken hearts in Ireland. Sean is a great tenor, in semi-retirement, living in a village close to Mary, the woman he’s always loved. Mary’s aunt convinced her to marry a man for his money; he has recently deserted her, leaving her penniless. She and her two children, Eileen and Tad, move in with the selfish and austere aunt. Eileen is falling in love with Fergus, a young man who’s off to Dublin to seek his fortune. Sean is drawn out of retirement and goes on tour in America. At his first concert, he’s nervous and out of sorts until the last song, when peace descends on him like a gift. What has happened, and can family life be set right?

Three detectives become embroiled in a tense struggle after a tragic accident that leaves a child in critical condition. One is guilty of a crime, one will try to cover it up, and the other attempts to expose it. How far will these men go to disguise and unravel the truth?

Fiona is abandoned at six months of age, raised in foster and adoptive homes, abused, and, still a teen, hustles on the streets of New York. We watch her use heroine, fall in love with other women, be pursued by men, engage in murderous violence, hide out in a crack house, and decide to leave the city. We see her mother, also a streetwalker and drug user, occasionally talk about her lost daughter. Fiona has a necklace she was clutching when a foundling. Will mother and daughter meet? Is there a silver lining?

A former prostitute kidnaps a baby boy at birth to satisfy her drug-dealing husband, who has told her that he is going to divorce her and put her out on the streets if she cannot produce him a son. Obviously the real mother becomes emotionally wrought and determined to get her baby back. Barbara Mandrell gets thrown into all of this mess as the mother's mother, who just happens to be beset with heart problems.

An American actress travels to Mexico to make a movie and brings her daughter with her. Upon arriving in Mexico, she is spotted by a drug dealer who also heads a kidnapping ring. He plants one of his drug-addicted "customers" with the actress as her nanny in order to be kidnap the child for ransom, but things don't work out as planned.

Max and Leo are 8 and 5 years old and have just immigrated to the US with their mother. Their days pass inside a tiny apartment, while they wait for their mother to come back, as they hold on to the hope of traveling to Disney.

An uncool high-schooler forms his own group to beat the local hotshots in a battle of the bands.

An overlooked middle child finds himself in the unexpected spotlight when he realizes his family's terrible Christmas day keeps repeating. As the only one experiencing the day over and over, he decides to use his unique gift to give the holidays a makeover and his family a Christmas they will never forget.

Each morning Donya leaves her tight-knit community of Afghan immigrants in Fremont, California. She crosses the Bay to work at a family-run fortune cookie factory in San Francisco. Donya drifts through her routine, struggling to connect with the culture and people of her new, unfamiliar surroundings while processing complicated feelings about her past as a translator for the U.S. government in Afghanistan. Unable to sleep, she finagles her way into a regular slot with a therapist who grasps for prospective role models. When an unexpected promotion at work thrusts Donya into the position to write her own story, she communicates her loneliness and longing through a concise medium: the fortunes inside each cookie. Donya’s koans travel, making a humble social impact and expanding her world far beyond Fremont and her turbulent past, including an encounter with a quiet auto mechanic who could stand to see his own world expanded.

A chain-wallah from Delhi travels across India in search of his missing son, in the hopes that whoever took him, returns him unharmed.

Cory (Dan Byrd) is a foster child nobody wants. Carlotta (Academy Award-nominee Julie Harris) is an elderly woman the world has forgotten. Together, they find friendship and family when they join a traveling circus. Also features Mickey Rooney and Joe DiMaggio, in his last screen appearance.

An unmarried, middle-aged woman accidentally gets pregnant by an internationally renowned pianist and decides to keep and raise the baby on her own.

Sensitive wallflower Cara exists in her humdrum life until the appearance of charismatic Jay unlocks powerful desires within her. When Jay's beautiful French lover arrives, Cara's journey to self-discovery takes a dark and unexpected turn, with tragic consequences.

When a Latinx filmmaker is offered a dream job abroad, she discovers a supernatural way to navigate the U.S. immigration system and get the coveted travel permit she needs. But what seems like a magic solution soon shows unexpected consequences.