Movies Like Zulu (2013)

Zulu is a 2013 crime, drama, thriller film from Jérôme Salle with a MovieMagicScore of 6.7/10. Here are 20 similar films, ranked by real viewer ratings — starting with Cry Freedom and The Three Investigators in The Secret of Skeleton Island.

Crime Drama Thriller

Cry Freedom

1987

A dramatic story, based on actual events, about the friendship between two men struggling against apartheid in South Africa in the 1970s. Donald Woods is a white liberal journalist in South Africa who begins to follow the activities of Stephen Biko, a courageous and outspoken black anti-apartheid activist.

7.0

MagicScore

The Three Investigators in The Secret of Skeleton Island

2007

The hobby detectives “The Three Investigators” want to take a little break. So they take advantage of an offer from Peter's father, who has accepted a job in South Africa and wants to take the detectives there. But Jupiter, Peter and Bob wouldn't be the three investigators marks feared by the criminal world if they just lounged around in the sun on their vacation. So it's no wonder that the clever boys soon have their next case to solve...

6.0

MagicScore

Cold Case Hammarskjöld

2019

Ndola, Northern Rhodesia (currently Zambia), September 18, 1961. Swedish economist and diplomat Dag Hammarskjöld, Secretary General of the UN, dies mysteriously in a plane crash. Decades later, Danish journalist and filmmaker Mads Brügger and Swedish researcher Göran Björkdahl investigate the case in search of definitive closure.

6.7

MagicScore

Sarafina!

1992

The plot centers on students involved in the Soweto Riots, in opposition to the implementation of Afrikaans as the language of instruction in schools. The stage version presents a school uprising similar to the Soweto uprising on June 16, 1976. A narrator introduces several characters among them the school girl activist Sarafina. Things get out of control when a policeman shoots several pupils in a classroom. Nevertheless, the musical ends with a cheerful farewell show of pupils leaving school, which takes most of act two. In the movie version Sarafina feels shame at her mother's (played by Miriam Makeba in the film) acceptance of her role as domestic servant in a white household in apartheid South Africa, and inspires her peers to rise up in protest, especially after her inspirational teacher, Mary Masombuka (played by Whoopi Goldberg in the film version) is imprisoned.

6.1

MagicScore

A Far Off Place

1993

Thrown together under incredible circumstances, two strangers must discover courage and strength when they begin a journey across the treacherous African desert! Equipped only with their wits and the expertise of a native bushman who befriends them, they are determined to triumph over impossible odds and reach their destination. But along the way, the trio face a primitive desert wilderness.

6.1

MagicScore

Beauty

2011

François van Heerden, a mid-40s Afrikaans family man, has become devoid of any care or concern for his own measure of happiness, and so convinced of his ill-fated existence, that he is wholly unprepared when a chance encounter unravels his clean, controlled life.

5.8

MagicScore

Free Willy: Escape from Pirate's Cove

2010

After young Kirra leaves her Australian home to summer with her grandfather in South Africa, she soon discovers a baby orca stranded in the lagoon near her grandfather’s rundown seaside amusement park. She names the lonely whale Willy--and embarks on a great quest to lead the little guy back to his anxious pod.

6.2

MagicScore

The Demon

1979

Random people are terrorized by a malevolent man who brings their worst fears to life.

4.2

MagicScore

Catch a Fire

2006

The true story of anti-apartheid activists in South Africa, and particularly the life of Patrick Chamusso, a timid foreman at Secunda CTL, the largest synthetic fuel plant in the world. Patrick is wrongly accused, imprisoned and tortured for an attempt to bomb the plant, with the injustice transforming the apolitical worker into a radicalised insurgent, who then carries out his own successful sabotage mission.

6.2

MagicScore

#10

Endgame

2009

The time is the late '80s, a crucial period in the history of South Africa. President P.W. Botha is hanging on to power by a thread as the African National Congress (ANC) takes up arms against apartheid and the country tumbles toward insurrection. A British mining concern is convinced that their interests would be better served in a stable South Africa and they quietly dispatch Michael Young, their head of public affairs, to open an unofficial dialogue between the bitter rivals. Assembling a reluctant yet brilliant team to pave the way to reconciliation by confronting obstacles that initially seem insurmountable, Young places his trust in ANC leader Thabo Mbeki and Afrikaner philosophy professor Willie Esterhuyse. It is their empathy that will ultimately serve as the catalyst for change by proving more powerful than the terrorist bombs that threaten to disrupt the peaceful dialogue.

5.8

MagicScore

#11

Invictus

2009

Newly elected President Nelson Mandela knows his nation remains racially and economically divided in the wake of apartheid. Believing he can bring his people together through the universal language of sport, Mandela rallies South Africa's rugby union team as they make their historic run to the 1995 Rugby World Cup Championship match.

7.2

MagicScore

#12

Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom

2013

A chronicle of Nelson Mandela's life journey from his childhood in a rural village through to his inauguration as the first democratically elected president of South Africa.

6.9

MagicScore

#13

Goodbye Bafana

2007

The true story of a white South African racist whose life was profoundly altered by the black prisoner he guarded for twenty years. The prisoner's name was Nelson Mandela.

6.8

MagicScore

#14

Cry, the Beloved Country

1995

A South-African preacher goes to search for his wayward son who has committed a crime in the big city.

6.7

MagicScore

#15

Moffie

2020

A young man in 1981 South Africa must complete his brutal and racist two years of compulsory military service while desperately maintaining the secrecy of his homosexuality.

6.6

MagicScore

#16

The Bang Bang Club

2011

In the early to mid '90s, when the South African system of apartheid was in its death throes, four photographers - Greg Marinovich, Kevin Carter, Ken Oosterbroek and João Silva - bonded by their friendship and a sense of purpose, worked together to chronicle the violence and upheaval leading up to the 1994 election of Nelson Mandela as president. Their work is risky and dangerous, potentially fatally so, as they thrust themselves into the middle of chaotic clashes between forces backed by the government (including Inkatha Zulu warriors) and those in support of Mandela's African National Congress.

6.6

MagicScore

#17

Kanarie

2018

Kanarie (Afrikaans for 'Canary') is a coming-of-age musical war drama. Drafted into the South African army during apartheid, a young soldier joins the military's traveling choir, and romance on the battlefield causes him to deal with his long-repressed sexual identity through hardship, camaraderie, first love, and the liberating freedom of music, the true self can be discovered.

6.4

MagicScore

#18

A World Apart

1988

A White enclave in Johannesburg, South Africa, in the 1960s. Molly Roth, 13 years old, is the daughter of leftist parents, and she must piece together what's happening around her when her father disappears one night, barely evading arrest, and, not long after, her mother is detained by the authorities. Some of Molly's White friends turn against her, and her family's friendships with Blacks take on new meaning. Relationships are fragile in the world of apartheid. How will she manage?

6.3

MagicScore

#19

Shepherds and Butchers

2017

A lawyer takes on a case of a prison guard in South Africa who is traumatized by the executions he's witnessed.

6.3

MagicScore

#20

The Power of One

1992

PK, an English orphan terrorized for his family's political beliefs in Africa, turns to his only friend, a kindly world-wise prisoner, Geel Piet. Geel teaches him how to box with the motto “fight with your fists and lead with your heart”. As he grows to manhood, PK uses these words to take on the system and the injustices he sees around him - and finds that one person really can make a difference.

7.5

MagicScore

Frequently asked

What are the best movies like Zulu?

The top films similar to Zulu by MovieMagicScore are Cry Freedom (7.0), The Three Investigators in The Secret of Skeleton Island (6.0), Cold Case Hammarskjöld (6.7). Each shares crime/drama/thriller themes and is ranked by real viewer ratings, not critics or studios.

Is Zulu worth watching?

Zulu holds a MovieMagicScore of 6.7/10 from 498 viewer ratings.

What kind of movie is Zulu?

Zulu (2013) is a crime, drama, thriller film directed by Jérôme Salle, starring Orlando Bloom, Forest Whitaker, Conrad Kemp.

Where can I find more recommendations like Zulu?

Browse the full ranked list above, or explore more crime recommendations on MovieMagicScore, where every list is ordered by genuine viewer ratings.

Keep exploring

Movies like Cry Freedom Movies like The Three Investigators in The Secret of Skeleton Island Movies like Cold Case Hammarskjöld Movies like Sarafina!Movies like A Far Off Place Movies like Beauty

About movies like Zulu

This ranked list pairs Zulu (2013), a crime and drama and thriller film from Jérôme Salle, with similar titles by genre, theme and cast overlap (fans of Orlando Bloom take note). Unlike critic-driven sites, every position here is ordered by MovieMagicScore — a rating built only from real viewers, with no studio marketing or paid placement. Scores update as more people rate, so the list stays current.

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