An entrepreneur is always busy building a business, finishing tasks, and joining meetings.

It’s nice to come home after a long day to lay down on your sofa and unload your thoughts. Watching a movie or an episode of a TV show can help you relax. We created a list of movies and TV shows targeted at entrepreneurs for you to unwind and get inspired.

The movies about startups

In our movie list, we have four biography movies of inspiring entrepreneurs:

Jobs (2013)

Jobs is the first of two biographical Steve Jobs movies. Joshua Micheal Stern directed it, and Ashton Kutcher starred (as Steve Jobs).

The movie shares glimpses from Steve Jobs’ professional and personal life. It shows Jobs’ time in college and how he decides to drop out and start his company in his family’s garage. His conflicts with board members and colleagues at Apple eventually drove him out of the company, but also helped him on his return.

IMDb: 6.0

Rotten Tomatoes: 28%

Where to watch: Netflix

The Social Network (2010)

The Social Network focuses on Zuckerberg and Facebook. The movie is based on the book “The Accidental Billionaires.”  With David Fincher as director, it stars Jesse Eisenberg, Andrew Garfield and Justin Timberlake.

The movie starts when Zuckerberg was at Harvard and began to build Facebook. It’s particularly good with the lawsuit scenes with Eduardo Saverin, the co-founder of Facebook. There’s also the trial with the Winklevoss brothers, who claim that Zuckerberg stole their ConnectU idea.

IMDb: 7.8

Rotten Tomatoes: 96%

Where to watch: Netflix

Pirates of Silicon Valley (1999)

Pirates of Silicon Valley shows the famous competition between Steve Jobs and Bill Gates. Martyn Burke directed the movie, and Anthony Micheal Hall, Noah Wyle and Joey Slotnick starred.

The movie focuses on the time frame between the 1970s to 1990s. It depicts the development of computers, the rivalry between Gates and Jobs, and Jobs leaving Apple and coming back in the late 1990s. It’s from the book “Fire in the Valley: The Making of the Personal Computer.”

IMDb: 7.2

Rotten Tomatoes: 89%

Where to watch: Amazon Prime Video (to buy)

The Founder (2016)

The founder focuses on the story of Ray Kroc, the owner of McDonald’s and the McDonald brothers, the founders of McDonald’s. John Lee Hancock was the director, and Micheal Keaton, Nick Offerman and John Carroll Lynch starred.

Ray Kroc was a struggling salesman who tried to sell milkshake mixers. One day, Kroc and Mcdonald brothers’ ways cross. Kroc finds the McDonald brothers’ idea fascinating and tries to convince them to franchise. The movie depicts how Kroc slowly becomes a greedy and ambitious man, and how the McDonald brothers lose their business.

IMBd: 7.2

Rotten Tomatoes: 80%

Where to watch: 

• Amazon Prime Video, 
• you also buy/rent on YouTube,
• Google Play Movies & TV, 
• Apple TV.

TV Series

Maybe you’re a person who prefers 40 minutes long TV shows over 2 hours of movies. We add to our list three real events miniseries and two fictional TV series:

Silicon Valley (2014 – 2019)

Silicon Valley is a comedy series depicting the lives of five software engineers. The main character, Richard Hendricks, struggles to establish his first tech company. Hendricks and other programmers are living in an incubator house together. The series funnily represents many struggles technical entrepreneurs face in Silicon Valley.

Thomas Middleditch, Martin Star, Kumail Nanjiani and T. J. Miller starred in the HBO series. 

IMDb: 8.5

Rotten Tomatoes: 94%

Where to watch: 

• With the buy/rent option on Google Play Movies & TV, 
• Apple TV, 
• Amazon Prime Video,
• YouTube.

Halt and Catch Fire (2014 – 2017)

Halt and Catch Fire narrates the development of personal computers and the World Wide Web through three main characters. The series covers the period between the early 1980s and 1990s. The characters find some flaws in the IBM computers and decide to develop a better personal computer.

Leo Pace, Scoot McNairy, Kerry Bishé and Mackenzie Davis played in the show.

IMDb: 8.4

Rotten Tomatoes: 90%

Where to watch: 

• Apple TV,
• Amazon Prime Video with buy/rent options.

The Dropout (2022) 

The Dropout is a miniseries that tells the story of Theranos and its founder Elizabeth Holmes. Theranos is a health technology company, and the 19 years-old college drop-out Holmes aims to revolutionise the healthcare tech industry. However, things went south for her. The miniseries is based on the podcast “The Dropout”.

Amanda Seyfried, Naveen Andrews and William H. Macy starred in the miniseries.

IMDb: 7.5

Rotten Tomatoes: 89%

Where to watch: Disney+

The Billion Dollar Code (2021)

The Billion Dollar Code is a German miniseries set in the early 1990s. It tells the story of two Berliners, a hacker and an artist, who designed a revolutionary visual map. Years later, these two entrepreneurs come together to sue Google Earth for stealing their code. The miniseries is based on a real story.

Mark Waschke and Mišel Matičević shared the roles in the miniseries.

IMDb: 8.0

Rotten Tomatoes: 97%

Where to watch: Netflix

WeCrashed (2022)

The miniseries, WeCrashed, is based on the podcast “WeCrashed: The Rise and Fall of WeWork.”  The series gets its inspiration from real events. WeWork was founded in 2008 in New York and became a billion-dollar-worth startup in less than a decade. However, things changed drastically. Jared Leto and Anne Hathaway tell the story of WeWork.

IMDb: 7.3

Rotten Tomatoes: 65%

Where to watch: Apple TV

Conclusion

We have picked some movies and TV series to help you unwind, enjoy and get inspired. If you like our list, check our posts Social Entrepreneurs Books Including Fiction and 10 Entrepreneurship Podcasts for 2022.