Top 250 Movies Like Higher Ground

Two troubled adolescents chronicle the events that ultimately lead up to a terrifying assault on their school.

Graham Young is a teenage misfit living in suburban London in the 1960s. He hates his stepmother but loves chemistry, and the two impulses unite in a wicked plot to slowly poison her. After she dies, he's found guilty and sent to a psychiatric hospital, where an idealistic doctor thinks he can be cured.

In small-town Texas, high school football is a religion, 17-year-old schoolboys carry the hopes of an entire community onto the gridiron every Friday night. When star quarterback Lance Harbor suffers an injury, the Coyotes are forced to regroup under the questionable leadership of John Moxon, a second-string quarterback with a slightly irreverent approach to the game.

A nerdy teen, Ryan Woodman is smitten with the popular and gorgeous Ashley Grant, who apparently has no interest in him. Meanwhile, dim star athlete Chris Campbell has his eye on Ryan's brainy and beautiful friend, Maggie Carter. The two agree to help each other in their romantic quests, but, as they come closer to their goals, both Ryan and Chris suspect that they might be pursuing the wrong girls.

An adult Martin Roy reminisces about his life in the 1966/67 school year. At fifteen years old and in his last year of junior high school, he breathed, ate and slept hockey. He collected hockey cards, played street hockey with his friends, tried skating and ice hockey for the first time in his life, but was most fascinated with his local national league team, the Montréal Canadiens, and its star player, Henri Richard. He dreamed of growing up and working for the Canadiens franchise. But a more immediate goal was to get tickets to one of their games, using M. Richard and his banker father, Hervé, as possible conduits to that goal.

Anthony Keller, star of his NYC high school basketball team, is riding his way to Cornell on a sports scholarship. But he can only maintain his popular jock facade for so long, as his troubled father Lee has a gambling addiction that threatens to derail his dreams both on and off the court.

Mildred is one of the young girls at a prestigious witch academy. She can't seem to do anything right and is picked on by classmates and teachers. The headmistress of the school, Miss Cackle, has an evil twin sister who plans to destroy the school. Can Mildred foil the plan before the Grand Wizard comes to the Academy for a Halloween celebration you'll never forget?!!

Shy sixteen-year-old Stacy Collins can't believe that the most popular guy in school, an attractive athlete named Bobby Tennison, is interested in her. At first she is flattered by his constant attention, but then he becomes possessive and jealous-telling her who she can speak to and what she can wear. Threats escalate into violence when Bobby thinks Stacy has stepped out of line. Soon she is walking on egg shells and living in fear. Having seen the tell-tale bruises, Stacy's best friend convinces her to break things off with Bobby-but in a moment of weakness, Stacy goes to meet him. It will be the last time she is seen alive.

Even though he's the only black student at the elite Palmetto Grove Academy, star basketball player and future NBA hopeful Odin James has the adoration of all, including the team's coach and the Dean's beautiful daughter Desi. Odin's troubled friend Hugo, the coach's son, is deeply resentful of his father's preference of Odin on and off the court. When Hugo plots a diabolical scheme to sow the seed of mistrust between O and Desi, it sets in motion a disturbing chain of events which erupts into a firestorm of breathtaking intensity.

Devon Browning is viewed as an outcast and is a victim of physical and emotional abuse from his classmates. After a tragic death in his family, his life begins to fall off course. He eventually seeks revenge by bringing a gun to school and opening fire on his classmates. The film offers an unwavering look at violence in schools today by showing the causes, effects, and consequences of a school shooting.

Maggie Baker has a weight problem, and her high school classmates won't let her forget it. They shamelessly ridicule her, and even go so far as to nominate her for Homecoming Queen as a joke. Maggie, however, decides to take the nomination seriously, collects the required signatures and starts campaigning. A number of students get behind her, threatening the chances of the popular clique -- who resolve to sabotage Maggie's campaign by any means necessary.

Robin McAllister (Devon Sawa) and his family win the lottery and they end up moving from Kansas City to Seattle where Robin attends Locksley Academy, a wealthy private school. While there Robin comes up with a plan to help one of his friends who was hurt and needs money for an operation by robbing from John Prince Sr., the head of a very wealthy corporation. Robin becomes friends with a couple of misfits at school named Will Scarlett (Billy O'Sullivan) and Little John (Tyler Labine) and also falls for a girl named Marian (Sarah Chalke) who helps train the horses that Robin's family has. While helping out his friends Robin becomes an enemy of John Prince Jr. (Joshua Jackson), the big shot rich kid at school and his friends Warner and Gibson who are also the sons of rich parents. Then Robin goes to join the archery team but is not allowed to because of John Prince Jr. so he starts his own team and his 2 friends join and learn from Robin.

In pursuit of fantasy, five teenagers hop the fence of a now defunct amusement park. While apparently a mindless diversion, for two of them the park is the setting for a more fatal bid at escape.

No one seemed to care about Jamie Marks until after his death. Hoping to find the love and friendship he never had in life, Jamie’s ghost visits former classmate Adam McCormick, drawing him into the bleak world between the living and the dead.

After discovering they are all dating the same same guy, three popular students from different cliques band together for revenge, so they enlist the help of a new gal in town and conspire to break the jerk's heart, while destroying his reputation.

Angus is a large, pathetic 14-year-old whose thoughts are most often filled with the image of only one girl, Melissa Lefevre. Angus is shy and thinks that he has no chance of ever 'getting' her. Being especially uncool, he is incredibly surprised (along with the rest of the school) that he is chosen to dance with her at the Winter Ball. The only one not surprised is the cool kid who set him up to fail, but Angus' best friend is going to help him win the heart of Melissa by developing a new look for him

A troubled and bullied high school student fights against judgement from his community after threatening to bomb the football team.

A high school basketball player’s life turns upside down after free-falling into the harrowing world of drug addiction.

When troubled 12-year-old Jacob Felsen is sent away to boarding school, he enters every kid’s worst nightmare: a creepy old mansion, deserted except for six other teenage misfits and two menacing and mysterious teachers. As events become increasingly horrific, Jacob must conquer his fears to find the strength to survive.

Five high school students from different walks of life endure a Saturday detention under a power-hungry principal. The disparate group includes rebel John, princess Claire, outcast Allison, brainy Brian and Andrew, the jock. Each has a chance to tell his or her story, making the others see them a little differently -- and when the day ends, they question whether school will ever be the same.

This year, over 5 million American kids will be bullied at school, online, on the bus, at home, through their cell phones and on the streets of their towns, making it the most common form of violence young people in this country experience. The Bully Project is the first feature documentary film to show how we've all been affected by bullying, whether we've been victims, perpetrators or stood silent witness. The world we inhabit as adults begins on the playground. The Bully Project opens on the first day of school. For the more than 5 million kids who'll be bullied this year in the United States, it's a day filled with more anxiety and foreboding than excitement. As the sun rises and school busses across the country overflow with backpacks, brass instruments and the rambunctious sounds of raging hormones, this is a ride into the unknown.

Carrie White is a lonely and painfully shy teenage girl with telekinetic powers who is slowly pushed to the edge of insanity by frequent bullying from both classmates at her school, and her own religious, but abusive, mother.

Awkward teenager Charlie Bartlett has trouble fitting in at a new high school. Charlie needs some friends fast, and decides that the best way to find them is to appoint himself the resident psychiatrist. He becomes one of the most popular guys in school by doling out advice and, occasionally, medication, to the student body.

Inspired by a true story, Girl Fight recounts the harrowing story of a 16-year-old, stellar high school student whose life spirals downward when her former friends conspire to upload onto the Internet a shocking video of them beating her up.

moody daughters, Rachel and Dina have a close relationship. Dina tells her everything... or so Rachel thinks. When Dina suddenly commits suicide, Rachel is devastated and confused. Her search for answers as to what happened in her daughter's final days leads her to some painful discoveries about the secrets that Dina was trying to keep and the bullying that was tearing her apart.

A mother/daughter relationship is thrown off balance when the mother discovers that her "good girl" daughter is part of a group who are engaging in sexual activities with multiple partners that results in an outbreak of sexually transmitted diseases.

A surreal portrait of a Catholic Private School and its hierarchy. A new student must submit to the bizarre rituals of his peers and the expectations of the school's administration by selling chocolates.

Three high school students make an incredible discovery, leading to their developing uncanny powers beyond their understanding. As they learn to control their abilities and use them to their advantage, their lives start to spin out of control, and their darker sides begin to take over.

Based on a true story, in which Richmond High School head basketball coach Ken Carter made headlines in 1999 for benching his undefeated team due to poor academic results.

At an elite, old-fashioned boarding school in New England, a passionate English teacher inspires his students to rebel against convention and seize the potential of every day, courting the disdain of the stern headmaster.

Jealousy flares after the headmistress of an elite boarding school for girls becomes obsessed with a new student.

Slaking a thirst for dangerous games, Kathryn challenges her stepbrother, Sebastian, to deflower their headmaster's daughter before the summer ends. If he succeeds, the prize is the chance to bed Kathryn. But if he loses, Kathryn will claim his most prized possession.

The story of an unruly class of bright, funny history students at a Yorkshire grammar school in pursuit of an undergraduate place at Oxford or Cambridge. Bounced between their maverick English master, a young and shrewd teacher hired to up their test scores, a grossly out-numbered history teacher, and a headmaster obsessed with results, the boys attempt to pass.

Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, 1991. High school freshman Charlie is a wallflower, always watching life from the sidelines, until two senior students, Sam and her stepbrother Patrick, become his mentors, helping him discover the joys of friendship, music and love.

After federal agents arrest a drug czar and put him on trial, the cartel leader's vicious son storms a prep school and takes its students hostage. They rebel against the armed intruders and try to take back their academy by any means necessary.

After starting at an upmarket boarding school, a teenage girl forms close friendships with her two older roommates. However, when she discovers that her new friends are lovers she finds herself caught in a complicated situation.

Four teenagers at a British private school secretly uncover and explore the depths of a sealed underground hole created decades ago as a possible bomb shelter.

William Hundert is a passionate and principled Classics professor who finds his tightly-controlled world shaken and inexorably altered when a new student, Sedgewick Bell, walks into his classroom. What begins as a fierce battle of wills gives way to a close student-teacher relationship, but results in a life lesson for Hundert that will still haunt him a quarter of a century later.

A brother and sister get caught up in the drug scene in their local high school, with tragic results.

In 1978, a Kiss concert was an epoch-making event. For the three teen fans in Detroit Rock City getting tickets to the sold-out show becomes the focal point of their existence. They'll do anything for tickets -- compete in a strip club's amateur-night contest, take on religious protesters, even rob a convenience store!

Several ordinary high school students go through their daily routine as two others prepare for something more malevolent.

The employees of an independent music store learn about each other as they try anything to stop the store being absorbed by a large chain.

Olivia and Matthew Grey, 18-year-old twins born into a world of privilege and high expectations. There are almost no boundaries between them - even their dreams are connected.

A group of young girls are brought up in a college within dark forests and gloomy lakes. Young Hidalla and her friends Irene, Vera, Blanka, Melusine and Rain are brought up in an isolated world: the girls don't know anything about live outside the college's high walls. At the age of 16, some of them start asking questions about their origins, their parents and the true purposes of the Headmistresses strict rules. When two of them disappear mysteriously, the initial fairytale atmosphere grows more and more eerie...

A group of friends come of age in the asphalt desert of the San Fernando Valley, as set to a blazing soundtrack and endless drinking, drugs and sex.

A bright high-school senior has her impending status as valedictorian jeopardized when her bitter history teacher, Mrs. Tingle, gives her a poor grade on a project. When an attempt to get ahead in Mrs. Tingle's class goes awry, mayhem ensues and friendships, loyalties and trust are tested by the teacher's intricate mind-games.

High school hotshot Zach Siler is the envy of his peers. But his popularity declines sharply when his cheerleader girlfriend, Taylor, leaves him for sleazy reality-television star Brock Hudson. Desperate to revive his fading reputation, Siler agrees to a seemingly impossible challenge. He has six weeks to gain the trust of nerdy outcast Laney Boggs -- and help her to become the school's next prom queen.

Tracy is a normal 13-year-old trying to make it in school. After befriending the most popular girl at school, Evie, Tracy's world is turned upside down when Evie introduces her to a world of sex, drugs and cash. But it isn't long before Tracy's new world and attitude finally takes a toll on her, her family, and old friends.

When a shy teenager's new-found powers help him score at basketball - and with the popular girls - he has some pretty hairy decisions to make.

A boy growing up in Dublin during the 1980s escapes his strained family life by starting a band to impress the mysterious girl he likes.

A socially inept fourteen year old experiences heartbreak for the first time when his two best friends -- Cappie, an older-brother figure, and Maggie, the new girl with whom he is in love -- fall for each other.

A drama teacher's taboo relationship with an unstable student strikes a nerve in her jealous classmate, sparking a vengeful chain of events within their suburban high school that draws parallels to "The Crucible".

Golden Delicious is a coming-of-age story about an Asian-Canadian teenager who is torn between his girlfriend’s dreams of their future and his father’s ambition, all the while struggling with finding himself and following his own desires.

When Sam learns his mother cannot afford to send him to another school after he is kicked out, he and his friends start their own escort service for mature women to pay for his tuition.

Musical film about the trials and tribulations of an idealistic drama teacher as she tries to put on the end of year show.

A Southern teen at a ritzy boarding school gets into mischief while acting the sophisticated grownup to impress a suave gentleman and match wits with a pair of jewel thieves.

In this adolescent-oriented drama, a young woman is forced to attend a posh finishing school in the Mediterranean. She vents her anger by rebelling against the cruel and sicko headmaster. When she discovers that he has been secretly photographing them naked and profiting from the pictures, she rallies the other girls and gets revenge.

A high school shooting has repercussions on the town and students.

A young man of the rock and roll generation is in his senior year of high school. When one day he successfully gets on a popular teen dance television show he becomes a star. The plot follows him as he lives his new life in his new world. What he finds are adoring fans, jealous rivals, bitter friends left behind, and the girl of his dreams...his dance partner.

When principal Joe Clark takes over decaying Eastside High School, he's faced with students wearing gang colors and graffiti-covered walls. Determined to do anything he must to turn the school around, he expels suspected drug dealers, padlocks doors and demands effort and results from students, staff and parents. Autocratic to a fault, this real-life educator put it all on the line.

A clique of school girls devise a secret plan that they code-name "Lick the Star".

A young woman at a girl's school in Switzerland makes up stories about and writes herself letters from an imaginary explorer-adventurer father; and is eventually put in a position where she has to produce him. Interesting things happen as she talks a visiting Englishman into helping her out.

When a high school senior is dumped by her boyfriend, her grades fall drastically...to avoid failing, she begins seducing her male teachers. Thus begins her downward spiral into drug addiction and prostitution, and ultimately assassinations for a kingpin mob boss.

Follows the fate of Lyle, a violent adolescent who, in lieu of prison, is placed in a juvenile mental institution where he encounters a group of equally troubled teens. This motley crew - abused, sexually confused, violent, and yet hanging on by their grit and anger - becomes Lyle's last lifeline as he fights to find meaning in a world that seems to defy understanding.

Follows the story of Ernest Green, one of the Little Rock Nine who were the first blacks to integrate into an all white school.

Tired of being used and abused by the opposite sex, three girlfriends decide to turn the tables on the guys who cross them by teaching them a sex-ed lesson they'll never forget! But their little scheme backfires when their secret gets out, and when one of the school's jocks goes too far, he sets into motion a chain of events that could change all their lives forever.

When Jack and Diane find themselves in an unexpected adult situation, the A-Squad comes to their rescue. In order to help their friend Diane, the A-Squad goes where no cheerleader has gone before: taking on a little after-school project known as bank robbery. But the A-Squad does things their way -- with sugar and spice -- forever changing their friendship, their future and the nation's notion of teen spirit.

When private tutor Thomas Arnold (Sir Cedric Hardwicke) becomes headmaster at Rugby, a boy's preparatory school in England, he puts into place a policy of strict punishment for unruliness and bulying. Arnold finds an ally in Tom Brown (Jimmy Lydon), a new student who is subjected to hazing and abuse by a group of older boys and is pressured by his friends to keep quiet about it. Fed up, he leads his fellow classmates in an underground rebellion against their tormentors. But certain unspoken rules still apply at the school and Brown loses his hero status when he is accussed of breaking the Rugby code of silence.

Kaitlyn is a high school student whose obsession with gambling leads to her accumulating a mountain of debt. Her habit also causes a high degree of family tension.

An inside glimpse of how it feels to be a teen in today's disconnected world. PURGATORY HOUSE chronicles the after-life journey of Silver Strand: a lonely teen who abandons her life of turmoil and drug addiction, only to find herself caught somewhere between heaven and hell. There, she must choose whether she will accept her drab existence or discover within herself the power to change.

Evan Hansen, a high schooler with social anxiety, unintentionally gets caught up in a lie after the family of a classmate who committed suicide mistakes one of Hansen’s letters for their son’s suicide note.

Bookish and unpopular Mandy finds her luck finally changing when Drew, the school hottie, invites her to the year's biggest party. But with being grounded and Drew's ex-girlfriend bent on thwarting her, Mandy may be destined to remain a geek. Can a little ingenuity and some help from her friends save the day?

A biography of Ian Dury, who was stricken with polio at a young age and defied expectations by becoming one of the founders of the punk-rock scene in Britain in the 1970s.

Simon is an intelligent and privileged young man whose family expects him to become a Princeton graduate. Crying out for attention from his reserved and cool hearted family, Simon commits numerous petty crimes and is soon sent away to boarding school where he befriends a "Deadhead," adopts the "hippie" lifestyle and dabbles in many drugs in his search for acceptance.

A group of teenagers wish to rebel against the administrators and teachers (the system) in their suburban Chicago high school called New Port South

Larry, a 16-year-old Tlicho Indian, lives in the small northern town of Fort Simmer. He has a crush on his classmate, Juliet Hope. Larry's past holds a variety of terrors—his father is abusive and he once had an accident that nearly killed him. When Johnny Beck , a young Métis from Hay River, moves to town, things heat up, for better or worse.

At the beginning of World War I, a young Swiss girl is sent off to boarding school.

Sophomore year has been a nightmare for Jessica Burns. Relentlessly harassed by her former friend Avery Keller, Jessica doesn't know what she did to deserve the abuse from one of South Brookdale High's most popular and beautiful students. But when a shocking event changes both of their lives, a documentary film crew, a hidden digital camera, and the attention of a reeling community begin to reveal the powerful truth about A Girl Like Her.

Stuck together for the last month of school, a group of boarding school students are faced with either dealing with the reality of the damage done, or drifting off into isolated fantasies and denials.

Bullied high school student Tommy is suddenly befriended by his chief tormentor, Matt, the school's most popular student and star athlete. Tommy is suspicious, but is forced to accept the awkward friendship in order to enter a cooking contest with a big prize. And besides, it's so much easier to impress his crush, Sarah, when he's not getting beat up by Matt and his team. As the cooking contest heats up, Sarah sniffs out a conspiracy, but nobody wants to hear about it. Can Tommy trust his budding friendship with Matt or is it all a huge joke on him?

Two High School Couples explore Friendship and dating along dissimiliar lines, leading to Courage and Transformation for one teen and a personal crisis for Another.

The Young Believers is the story of four Christian teens that are navigating through their senior year in high school. The teens use God’s Word as their weapon of choice against the temptations that confront them. This is a remarkable film which promotes godly living. Four teens, Delilah, Leah, David and Luke, have known each other for years and they make a pact at the beginning of high school that they will not drink alcohol, do drugs or have sex before marriage. They are committed to the Lord but soon face challenges in keeping their promises. A boy named Jude dates Delilah and wants to take their relationship to another level. David is offered alcohol, Leah faces her parent’s divorce and deals with it by not allowing herself to be vulnerable, and Luke is tempted to play other kinds of music rather than music for the Lord.

The true story of two murders that shaped the lives of several college students who went on to become some of the most influential writers of the "Beat Generation."

The Charters family falls into despair over their drug-addicted son Gary. They discuss his problems through the "Toughlove" program in searching for answers.

For three high school friends, growing up takes a dangerous turn when the local bully targets them with his aggression. With no one to turn to but each other, they muster the courage to take a shot at settling the score.

Story of a New England boys' school and of one of the students who is infatuated with an instructor's wife who has Multiple Sclerosis. The woman struggles to show her strict husband how love rather than demands helps the student to blossom, but finally she falls into a coma. While she is able to have some 'looking down' awareness of what is happening, her coma is what brings her husband to an understanding of the needs of others.

A boy learns to deal with personal loss by making friends with a wild animal in this drama for the entire family. Jesse is a 16-year-old who is trying to put his life back together after the death of his father, who died while trying to rescue him in the wilderness. Jesse goes to live with his Uncle Roy, who lives in the rugged mountains of Washington State. While exploring, Jesse finds and rescues a wolf who has been seriously wounded; Jesse bonds with the animal, and while Roy understands the dangers of trying to tend to a wild animal, reluctantly allows Jesse to keep him. Jesse, who is fond of snowboarding, teaches the wolf to be his partner in skijoring, a sport in which a dog is used to haul a man on skis. John Rockwell the owner of a ranch, has different plans for the animal; he sees the wolf as a threat to his stock and is determined to see that the animal is put down.

Cynical and intelligent Arnold Mosk, a known drug user, is put into a disciplinary program at his high school meant for the seriously disturbed where he becomes the main target of the psychopathic Doug Van Housen and his gang.

Satan in the Suburbs tells the shocking story of a grisly ritualistic murder in the quiet bedroom community of Northport, Long Island in the summer of 1984. The killing, it soon emerged, was linked to a teen satanic cult. Perhaps more disturbing than the details of the murder itself was the revelation of a conspiracy of silence among the town's teenagers, many of whom had been aware of the, e killing in the two weeks before an anonymous call finally tipped off local police. 17- year-old Ricky Kasso was arrested and confessed to the crime; five days later, he hung himself in his holding cell. Kasso's friend Jimmy Troiano also. confessed, but was acquitted after jurors learned that he was beaten by local police. The murder shocked the local community and reverberated nationally, with some uninformed observers rushing to scapegoat rock music as the cause.

Lonnie and Rick seem to be complete opposites, at first glance. A survivor of suicide, Lonnie is introverted and ill at ease around her parents, Lois and Harvey. Rick, meanwhile, is sunny and charismatic. But appearances can be deceiving, as their families learn when the teens begin a romance. Upset about Lonnie's influence on Rick, his parents forbid the pair to see each other -- with tragic consequences.

Sheriff Elisha Cooper has to work with New York City officer Nelson after his son is taken hostage by a fugitive who is hiding out on California's Mount Shasta.

The girls of St. Trinians are on the hunt for buried treasure after discovering headmistress Miss Fritton is related to a famous pirate.

Someone at the prestigious Danforth Academy is trying to make the students sick. Is it Mia or Riley, the rich girls? Or could it be Emily, the Principal's daughter? Whoever it is, Abby, Paige, Claire and Taylor will have to put aside their differences and join together to solve the mystery!

A curmudgeonly instructor at a New England prep school is forced to remain on campus during Christmas break to babysit the handful of students with nowhere to go. Eventually, he forms an unlikely bond with one of them — a damaged, brainy troublemaker — and with the school’s head cook, who has just lost a son in Vietnam.

Having outgrown her role, a pampered child actor returns to her family and tries to be an ordinary youngster.

Sarah McDavid, an idealistic young teacher, takes a job in a rough high school where she is eventually attacked and raped in her classroom after school hours and decides to buck the school system in an attempt to make schools safer for students and teachers alike, against the advice of the school's principal, Dr. Keys, who tries to gloss over the hazardous conditions and the incident itself to avoid bad publicity and decreased enrollment.

A high-school track star (Nick Stahl) watches without judgment as his two best friends (Summer Phoenix, Aaron Paul) abuse heroin.

Bafta-winning drama. Following difficulties with her parents, teenager Gemma Brogan leaves home. She falls under the spell of a young woman who introduce her to the world of alternative youth culture and drugs. Initially her new life seems glamorous and exciting but she soon discovers its dark side as she slides uncontrollably into heroin addiction.

A special Christmas tree decorated with handwritten wishes helps Evan and his group of orphaned students develop a connection and a sense of family.

The Élan School was a for-profit, residential behavior modification program and therapeutic boarding school located deep within the woods of Maine. Delinquent teenagers who failed to comply with other treatment programs were referred to the school as a last resort. Treatment entailed harsh discipline, surveillance, degradation, and downright abuse. Years later, the patients who were institutionalized in this facility still carry the trauma they endured, with mixed opinions on the impact of their experience.