ListSimilar.

1. Inside Pinochet's Prisons

The horrifying story of what went on inside General Pinochet's secret prisons.

2. Solitary

There are 100,000 US citizens in solitary confinement across the country, a staggering number prompting comment from both President Obama and the Pope. Situated in rural Virginia, 300 miles from any urban center, Red Onion State Prison is one of over 40 supermax prisons across the US built to hold prisoners in eight-by-ten-foot cells for 23 hours a day. Filmed over the course of one year, this eye-opening film braids stark prison imagery, stories from correction officers, and intimate reflections from the men who are locked up in isolation. The inmates share the paths that led them to prison and their daily struggles to maintain their sanity.

It has an average vote of 7 on TMDB.

3. 13th

An in-depth look at the prison system in the United States and how it reveals the nation's history of racial inequality.

It has an average vote of 7.9 on TMDB.

4. Gilles Clément, le jardin en mouvement (Gilles Clément, le jardin en mouvement)

The film retraces the atypical journey of Gilles Clément, gardener and landscape architect, but also a writer. Marked by ecology, he questioned the art of gardens at the end of the XXth century, with the garden in movement, the planetary garden or the third landscape.

5. God and Devil on Top of the Wall (Deus e o Diabo em Cima da Muralha)

Imagine a prison with some ten thousand prisoners, many of them dangerous and, to control them, only a few unarmed employees. Small in number, these employees work in shifts. They are almost prisoners themselves, in a routine of tension, but also of humor and emotion. This prison was all too real. While it was in existence, the Carandiru was the largest prison in Latin America, administered by a reduced number of employees. The documentary shows, from the point of view of these few employees, holding the keys, how the prison operated: the delicate balance in the relationship with the prisoners, affinity among employees, moments of tension and, even, of happiness. These are stories told by former employees, among them, Dr. Dráuzio Varella, author of the book Estação Carandiru. These are the secrets of a place that no longer exists.

It has an average vote of 7 on TMDB.

6. Criminal Injustice: Death and Politics at Attica

Forty years after the bloodiest one-day encounter between Americans since the Civil War, the dead remain buried along with the truth. Until now. Based on interviews with eyewitnesses who just now are telling their stories, as well as access to newly discovered documents, the film sheds new light on exactly what happened at Attica between September 9-13, 1971. Criminal Injustice raises compelling new questions about the 39 deaths at Attica, White House involvement, and the corrupting influence of Nelson Rockefeller’s political aspirations before, during, and long after the deadly retaking of the prison. Former hostage Michael Smith said that “the cover up started as soon as the shooting stopped.” This film reveals that the truth actually may have been concealed long before that.

7. Portrait of God

Portrait of God is a documentary road movie about the manhunt for the most wanted person in the world. The film is constructed as a classic detective story. A middle-aged detective shadows the suspect through the highs and lows of South African society until he ends up in a gigantic prison in Cape Town bursting with murderers, thieves, and rapists.

It has an average vote of 6 on TMDB.

8. Defending Our Lives

Documentary about the magnitude and severity of domestic violence. This film features four women imprisoned for killing their batterers and their terrifying personal testimonies. It won an Oscar at the 66th Academy Awards in 1994 for Documentary Short Subject.

It has an average vote of 5.8 on TMDB.

9. Pull of Gravity

North Philadelphia, PA – Kev, El and Andy are three men united by one struggle: they are trying to defy gravity. As part of the 700,000 prisoners released into society every year, they find themselves faced with a chilling outlook: 67% of ex-offenders re-offend within three years. What explains this invisible force that keeps former inmates in a seemingly unending cycle of incarceration? Filmed on the street over the course of two years, Pull of Gravity is an intimate portrait of these three men that confronts head-on the gritty details of lives cut short by poverty and drugs, where dealing is seen as the only route to economic prosperity, where using offers an escape from powerlessness, and where prison is too often the next stop. The film’s unfiltered lense captures its subjects as they lay bare their stories, fears, and tentative dreams.

It has an average vote of 10 on TMDB.

10. The Big One

The Big One is an investigative documentary from director Michael Moore who goes around the country asking why big American corporations produce their product abroad where labor is cheaper while so many Americans are unemployed, losing their jobs, and would happily be hired by such companies as Nike.

It has an average vote of 6.673 on TMDB.

11. Standard Operating Procedure

Errol Morris examines the incidents of abuse and torture of suspected terrorists at the hands of U.S. forces at the Abu Ghraib prison.

It has an average vote of 6.842 on TMDB.

12. They Call Us Monsters

Behind the walls of the Compound, LA’s most violent juvenile offenders await their trials. To their advocates, they’re kids. To the system, they’re adults. To their victims, they’re monsters. Who are they to you?

It has an average vote of 6.7 on TMDB.

13. Preschool to Prison

Preschool to Prison is a compelling examination of how the United States public school system is built and operated like prisons. Zero-tolerance policies are used to justify suspension and arrests that set up a pathway to send children of color and children with special needs from school to prison. Children are being suspended, restrained, dragged, physically manhandled, and subsequently arrested for minor offenses such as throwing candy on a school bus. These personal accounts from people affected by the school-to-prison pipeline give riveting tales about the generational impact on society.

14. Nemesis (Nemesis)

The film explores the destruction of a unique train station in Zurich and the construction of the new prison and police centre in its place. From the perspective of the filmmaker’s window, and with testimony from prisoners awaiting deportation, the film probes how we deal with the extinction of history and its replacement with total security.

It has an average vote of 7.5 on TMDB.

15. Jacinta

An intimate portrait of mothers and daughters and the effects of trauma, Jacinta follows a young woman in and out of prison as she attempts to break free from an inherited cycle of addiction, incarceration, and crime.

It has an average vote of 8 on TMDB.

16. Isamu Noguchi: Stones and Paper

Isamu Noguchi was a sculptor, designer, architect, and craftsman. Throughout his life he struggled to see, alter, and recreate his natural surroundings. His gardens and fountains were transformations meant to bring out the beauty their locations had always possessed.

17. Women Behind Bars with Trevor McDonald

Trevor McDonald goes to Rockville Correctional Facility in Indiana to speak with some of the women that live there.

18. Cages (Celas)

The final months of pregnancy and the first ones after the birth of a baby are unique experiences in a woman's life. And when this daily life is lived inside a prison?

19. What happened to the children? (Vad Hände Med Barnen?)

In this documentary we meet five children in Sweden and see what happened in their lives. Robin was nine years old, but he already knew what a prison looked like and the bad a punishment can do. Frida was not yet born when we filmed her mother Angela in 1983. Her sister Malin lived for several years in a foster family. Bosse was 14 years old and in 9th grade when we met him in 1978. He was the only guy in the class who had glasses. Marie received many postcards and letters from her father, but very rarely met him while she was growing up.

It has an average vote of 8 on TMDB.

20. The words of Ventotene (Le parole di Ventotene)

The film focuses on Ernesto Rossi , who was imprisoned by the fascist regime between 1930 and 1943 for his political ideas. Exiled on the island of Ventotene, he co-authored the Ventotene manifesto.