Boys Town
Devout but iron-willed Father Flanagan leads a community called Boys Town, a different sort of juvenile detention facility where, instead of being treated as underage criminals, the boys are shepherded into making themselves better people. But hard-nosed petty thief and pool shark Whitey Marsh, the impulsive and violent younger brother of an imprisoned murderer, might be too much for the good father's tough-love system.
Movies Like Boys Town
Similar in style, tone, and themes — find your next watch.
Doubt
2008★ 7.2
In 1964 Bronx, two Catholic school nuns question the new priest's ambiguous relationship with a troubled African-American student.
The Confession
2011★ 6.6
A unique story of redemption and an exploration of good and evil featuring a hit man and a priest.
Fatima
2020★ 7.2
In 1917, outside the parish of Fátima, Portugal, a 10-year-old girl and her two younger cousins witness multiple visitations of the Virgin Mary, who tells them that only prayer and suffering will bring an end to World War I. As secularist government officials and Church leaders try to force the children to recant their story, word of the sighting spreads across the country, inspiring religious pilgrims to flock to the site in hopes of witnessing a miracle..
Small Things Like These
2024★ 6.7
In 1985, while working as a coal merchant to support his family, Bill Furlong discovers disturbing secrets kept by the local convent and uncovers truths of his own; forcing him to confront his past and the complicit silence of a small Irish town controlled by the Catholic Church.
The Keys of the Kingdom
1944★ 7.1
A young priest, Father Chisholm is sent to China to establish a Catholic parish among the non-Christian Chinese. While his boyhood friend, also a priest, flourishes in his calling as a priest in a more Christian area of the world, Father Chisholm struggles. He encounters hostility, isolation, disease, poverty and a variety of set backs which humble him, but make him more determined than ever to succeed.
Evelyn
2002★ 6.4
Desmond Doyle is devastated when his wife abandons their family on the day after Christmas. His unemployment, and the fact that there is no woman in the house to care for the children—Evelyn, Dermot and Maurice—make it clear to the authorities this is an untenable situation. The Catholic Church and the Irish courts decide to put the Doyle children into Church-run orphanages.
The Man Without a Face
1993★ 6.5
Justin McLeod is a former teacher who lives as a recluse on the edge of town after his face is disfigured from an automobile accident ten years earlier, in which a boy was incinerated--and for which he was convicted of involuntary manslaughter. Also suspected of being a paedophile, he is befriended by Chuck, causing the town's suspicions and hostility to be ignited.
House of Strangers
1949★ 7.0
Ruthless Italian-American banker Gino Monetti is engaged in a number of criminal activities. Three of his four grown sons refuse to help their father stay out of prison after he's arrested for his questionable business practices. Three of them take over the business but kick their father out. Max, a lawyer, is the only son that remains loyal.
New Jersey Drive
1995★ 6.3
Jason and Midget are two young, black teenagers living in Newark, New Jersey, the unofficial car theft capital of the world. Their favourite pastime is that of everybody in their neighbourhood: stealing cars and joyriding. The trouble starts when they steal a police car and the cops launch a violent offensive that involves beating and even shooting suspects.
The Fugitive
1947★ 6.0
Anti-Catholic and anti-cleric policies in the Mexican state of Tabasco lead the revolutionary government to persecute the state's last remaining priest.
Traitor
2008★ 6.6
When straight arrow FBI agent Roy Clayton heads up the investigation into a dangerous international conspiracy, all clues seem to lead back to former U.S. Special Operations officer Samir Horn.
Newsies
1992★ 6.7
A week in the life of the exploited, child newspaper sellers in turn-of-the-century New York. When their publisher, Joseph Pulitzer, tries to squeeze a little more profit out of their labours, they organize a strike, only to be confronted with the Pulitzer's hard-ball tactics.
Homeless to Harvard: The Liz Murray Story
2003★ 7.3
Based on a true story. Liz Murray is a young girl who is taken care of by her loving, but drug-addicted parents. Liz becomes homeless at 15 and after a tragedy comes upon her, she begins her work to finish high school.
Won't Back Down
2012★ 6.1
Jamie Fitzpatrick and Nona Alberts are two women from opposites sides of the social and economic track, but they have one thing in common: a mission to fix their community's broken school and ensure a bright future for their children. The two women refuse to let any obstacles stand in their way as they battle a bureaucracy that's hopelessly mired in traditional thinking, and they seek to re-energize a faculty that has lost its passion for teaching.
Five Minutes of Heaven
2009★ 6.1
The story of former Ulster Volunteer Force member Alistair Little. Twenty-five years after Little killed Joe Griffin's brother, the media arrange an auspicious meeting between the two.
The Children Act
2018★ 6.6
In the midst of a marital crisis, a High Court judge must decide if she should order a life-saving blood transfusion for a teen with cancer despite his family's refusal to accept medical treatment for religious reasons.
Standing Up
2013★ 6.7
Based on one of the most beloved Young Adult novels of all time: Two kids are stripped naked and left together on an island in a lake - victims of a vicious summer camp prank; But rather than have to return to camp and face the humiliation, they decide to take off, on the run together. What follows is a three day odyssey of discovery and self-discovery.
The Parts You Lose
2019★ 6.7
An unlikely friendship unfolds between a young deaf boy, Wesley, and a fugitive criminal who takes refuge in an abandoned barn on the family’s rural North Dakota farm.
Wonderstruck
2017★ 6.1
The story of a young boy in the Midwest is told simultaneously with a tale about a young girl in New York from fifty years ago as they both seek the same mysterious connection.
No One Would Tell
1996★ 7.0
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.