Best dark & gritty German movies on MUBI in India
By the KyaDekhu team · Updated · Availability for India from JustWatch, ratings from IMDb
21 movies on MUBI in India match this list, with an average IMDb rating of 7.1. Ranked by vote-weighted IMDb rating and popularity.
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1. Faust (1926)
Movie · German · 1h 46m · Fantasy, Drama · IMDb 8.1 (18.8K votes)
Slow-burnVisually stunningDark & grittyCold & detached
Murnau’s epic adaptation of Goethe’s tragedy stands with Fritz Lang’s Metropolis among the supreme achievements of German silent cinema. Gösta Ekman plays the alchemist who, his faith shaken in a time of plague, is offered the gift of healing and eternal youth… in exchange for his soul.
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2. Victoria (2015)
Movie · German · 2h 18m · Crime, Thriller · IMDb 7.5 (68.2K votes)
Fast-pacedVisually stunningEdge-of-seatMature
A young Spanish woman who has newly moved to Berlin finds her flirtation with a local guy turn potentially deadly as their night out with his friends reveals a dangerous secret.
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3. Europa (1991)
Movie · German · 1h 53m · Crime, Drama · IMDb 7.5 (25.0K votes)
TwistySlow-burnVisually stunningDark & gritty
In 1945 Germany, following the end of World War II, Leopold Kessler, an American of German descent, is hired by his uncle as a sleeping car conductor on the Zentropa train line. Leopold's wish is to be neutral to the ongoing purges of loyalists by Allied forces and do what he can to help a hurting country, but ultimate
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4. Revanche (2008)
Movie · German · 2h 1m · Crime, Drama · IMDb 7.5 (17.5K votes)
MatureDark & grittyEdge-of-seatSlow-burn
Alex, an ex-con working as muscle in a Vienna brothel, dreams of escaping with his girlfriend Tamara, who also works there. Their attempt to break free sets off a chain of events that links their fate with a rural police officer and his troubled marriage. As their lives intersect, a quiet struggle unfolds between guilt
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5. Phoenix (2014)
Movie · German · 1h 38m · Drama · IMDb 7.3 (22.6K votes)
TwistySlow-burnDark & grittyCold & detached
In the aftermath of WWII, German-Jewish cabaret singer Nelly has to undergo facial reconstructive surgery following her survival from Auschwitz. Without recognising Nelly, her former husband Johnny asks her to help him claim his wife’s inheritance. To see if he's betrayed her, she agrees, becoming her own doppelgänger.
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6. Great Freedom (2021)
Movie · German · 1h 56m · Drama, Romance · IMDb 7.5 (9.0K votes)
Slow-burnMatureDark & gritty
In post-war Germany, liberation by the Allies does not mean freedom for everyone. Hans Hoffmann is repeatedly imprisoned under Paragraph 175, which criminalizes homosexuality. Nevertheless, over the decades, he continues his quest for freedom and love, even if he finds it in the most unusual places.
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7. In the Fade (2017)
Movie · German · 1h 46m · Drama, Crime · IMDb 7.1 (38.2K votes)
MatureDark & grittyCold & detachedEdge-of-seat
Katja's life collapses after the deaths of her husband and son in a bomb attack. After a time of mourning and injustice, Katja seeks revenge.
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8. Barbara (2012)
Movie · German · 1h 45m · Drama · IMDb 7.2 (17.4K votes)
Slow-burnCold & detachedDark & grittySerious
Exiled to a rural clinic in 1980s East Germany for seeking an exit visa, a disillusioned doctor maintains a guarded distance from her colleagues, unsure if the kindly head physician is a genuine ally or a Stasi informant.
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9. A Regular Woman (2019)
Movie · German · 1h 30m · Drama · IMDb 7.6 (3.1K votes)
MatureDark & grittyCold & detachedSerious
Hatun Aynur Sürücü, a German woman of Kurdish origin, was shot dead by her brothers at a bus stop in 2005. The story of a woman who fought for her freedom and independence despite her family's objections, and whose life ended in a horrific murder.
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10. Whores' Glory (2011)
Movie · German · 1h 50m · Documentary · IMDb 7.2 (5.6K votes)
MatureCold & detachedSlow-burnDark & gritty
In Bangkok, Thailand, women punch a clock and wait for clients in a brightly lit glass box; in the red-light district of Faridpur, Bangladesh, a madam haggles over the price of a teenage girl; and in the border town of Reynosa, Mexico, crack-addicted women pray to a deity named Lady Death.
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11. Short Sharp Shock (1998)
Movie · German · 1h 40m · Crime, Drama · IMDb 7.1 (6.2K votes)
MatureDark & grittyEdge-of-seat
Gabriel, Bobby and Costa are old friends from Altona, a multicultural hood in Hamburg. Just out of prison, Gabriel wants to turn his back on crime, but the others continue to operate as petty criminals. Friendships are tested as the trio navigate a dark world of mafia bosses and deals gone wrong.
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12. Transit (2018)
Movie · German · 1h 42m · Drama, Romance · IMDb 6.9 (13.1K votes)
Dark & gritty
In an attempt to flee Nazi-occupied France, Georg assumes the identity of a dead author but soon finds himself stuck in Marseilles, where he falls in love with Maria, a young woman searching for her missing husband.
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13. Outer Space (1999)
Movie · German · 11m · Horror · IMDb 7.1 (3.3K votes)
Dark & grittyTwistyCold & detachedEdge-of-seat
A young woman move towards a house that holds a potentially dangerous spirit that has been tormenting her. The woman tries to fight against the film itself as it starts to cause the world to collapse.
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14. Jerichow (2008)
Movie · German · 1h 32m · Drama · IMDb 7.0 (3.9K votes)
MatureSlow-burnDark & gritty
In a small Northern German town, a dishonourably discharged Afghanistan veteran is offered a job as a deliveryman by an alcoholic Turkish entrepreneur, through which the former meets the latter's gorgeous wife.
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15. I Was Nineteen (1968)
Movie · German · 1h 55m · Drama, History · IMDb 7.5 (1.3K votes)
Dark & grittySlow-burnCold & detachedMature
A young soldier enters Germany with Soviet troops at the end of WWII, feeling like a stranger in his homeland. As he meets Germans, he grapples with his ambivalence, realizing he is both a victor and one of the vanquished. His inquisitive nature leads him to confront the atrocities and lies he encounters along the way.
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16. The Golden Glove (2019)
Movie · German · 1h 50m · Crime, Thriller · IMDb 6.7 (22.9K votes)
MatureDark & grittyCold & detachedSlow-burn
A serial killer strikes fear in the hearts of residents of Hamburg during the early 1970s.
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17. Stars (1959)
Movie · German · 1h 32m · Drama, War · IMDb 7.4 (765 votes)
Slow-burnDark & gritty
Stationed in a secluded Bulgarian village in 1943, Walter – a German Wehrmacht sergeant and artist – lives in almost idyllic distance from the war. Then a transit camp is set up for Jews arriving from Greece. When Ruth, one of the internees, asks Walter to help a pregnant woman, the two form an unlikely bond.
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18. Ticket of No Return (1979)
Movie · German · 1h 47m · Drama · IMDb 6.6 (792 votes)
Slow-burnCold & detachedLow-stakesDark & gritty
A sartorially resplendent woman of few words arrives in Berlin with plans to live out the rest of her days as a drunkard.
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19. Moon (2024)
Movie · German · 1h 32m · Drama, Thriller · IMDb 6.5 (1.2K votes)
Cold & detachedDark & grittyEdge-of-seatMature
Sarah, a former professional kickboxer from Vienna, accepts an offer to work as a personal trainer for a rich family in the Middle East. She finds herself in a foreign world, in a palace behind walls and cut off from the internet, where the sisters are under surveillance around the clock. They have no interest in learn
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20. In My Room (2018)
Movie · German · 2h · Drama · IMDb 6.2 (1.5K votes)
Slow-burnCold & detachedDark & grittySerious
Armin, in his fourties, is a freelancer with lots of time and little money. He’s not really happy, but can’t picture living a different life. One morning the world looks the same as always, but mankind has disappeared.
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21. Dorian Gray in the Mirror of the Yellow Press (1984)
Movie · German · 2h 30m · Drama · IMDb 6.3 (225 votes)
Slow-burnTwistyCold & detachedVisually stunning
The final installment in Ulrike Ottinger’s Berlin Trilogy (following TICKET OF NO RETURN and FREAK ORLANDO) casts Delphine Seyrig as the nefarious Fritz Lang supervillain Dr. Mabuse, here the head of a powerful media empire that seeks to create headlines by manufacturing (and then publicly destroying) its own celebrity
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