True crimehas become one of the most pop storytelling genres of the modern epoch . An entire family of podcasts has sprouted up around the musical genre , and the same go for docudrama and scripted TV and big - CRT screen thriller . Like horror inspired meta films likeScreamin the ’ 90s , the writing style ’s popularity has even influenced the creation of semi - parodic show likeOnly execution in the Building , which accompany a terzetto of characters who are so preoccupied with on-key offence that they transform into inexpert investigator themselves .
Recent additions to the writing style include Netflix and Anna Kendrick’sWoman of the Hourand Hulu’sUnder the Bridge . While it has explode in popularity over the past 10 years , though , true criminal offense has been around for C and has been a pop form of storytelling for several decades now . With that in thinker , here are 10 of the best true law-breaking movies .
We also have guides to thebest movies on Netflix , thebest movies on Hulu , thebest moving-picture show on Amazon Prime Video , thebest movies on Max , and thebest movies on Disney+ .
10. Hustlers (2019)
anchor by a career - delimit carrying out from Jennifer Lopez , Hustlersis a glitzy , trashy reliable crime thriller that was rightfully applauded by both critics and general moviegoer alike when it was released in 2019 .
Based on a 2015 article about a crew of New York City strippers who conned their affluent Wall Street clients by drugging them and then maxing out their credit cards , Hustlershas all necessary reality and gritrock of a true crime thriller , but the way , self-assurance , and sparkly escapism of a bragging - time Hollywood product . The conversations surrounding the Lorene Scafaria - directed film have go down a second in the long time since its release , butHustlersdeserves to be remembered as what it is : one of the good dead on target crime picture of our modern geological era .
Hustlersis cyclosis now onHulu .
9. In Cold Blood (1967)
It ’d be impossible to make a list like this without includingIn Cold Blood . Not only is its source material , the Truman Capote - indite 1966 novel of the same name , one of the most originative pieces of genuine offence literature ever write , but Richard Brooks ’ plastic film adaptation hold a similarly monolithic spot in film chronicle .
The movie ’s luster of authenticity and its stark , realist black - and - white photography helped arrange a visual and tonal template for the true offense musical style that is still followed by many to this day . In the 60 years since its release , the movie , which explore the real - life 1959 murders of a Kansas family , has n’t lost an ounce of its chilling big businessman , either .
In Cold Bloodis available to rent now on most digital platform .
8. Catch Me If You Can (2002)
When most people think of true offence , they usually think of unresolved slaying , shivery sociopath , and dogged , determined police detectives . But like every genre , there are many different sunglasses of on-key crime . That is , perhaps , no better illustrated than byCatch Me If you’re able to‘s cellular inclusion on this list . The film is base on a purportedly autobiographical novel of the same name by Frank Abagnale , and it depicts his aver yr drop traveling the world committing chip fraud and posing as — among other things — a fender , physician , and prosecutor .
Leonardo DiCapriogives one of his most purely magnetic public presentation as Abagnale , andTom Hanksis hilarious and heartwarming opposite him as the FBI agentive role tracking him in thisSteven Spielberg - guide crime comedy that is every moment as intriguing as it is light on its pes . It ’s an entertaining , windy option to the genuine offense genre ’s often dark and bleaker entries .
Catch Me If You Canis pelt now onPluto TVandParamount+ .
7. Bonnie and Clyde (1967)
Bonnie and Clydeis a boundary - force thriller about two of America ’s most infamous outlaws befittingly asterisk Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway , two of the most redoubtable and magnetic motion-picture show stars of the 1960s and ’ 70s . Directed by Arthur Penn , the film plays a bit tight - and - loose with the real facts of Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow ’s two - year crime spree in the early 1930s , but its simplified version of effect admit it to tap into not only its subjects ’ appealingly rebellious sprightliness but also the dusty revulsion of their violent death .
The film unavoidably does n’t seem as transgressive now as it did in 1967 . However , its shockingly violent edge and — even more importantly — unrelenting involvement in the vileness of its tarradiddle makesBonnie and Clydea surprisingly enduring , bristled piece of American straight crime filmmaking .
Bonnie and Clydeis available to rip now on most digital political platform .
6. Fruitvale Station (2013)
Black PantherdirectorRyan Coogler‘s feature directorial debut is a stirring , heartbreaking employment of humanist cinema . establish on the veridical - life sentence 2009 constabulary shooting of a vernal black-market homo cite Oscar Grant , Fruitvale Stationdepicts the final mean solar day of Grant ’s ( played by Michael B. Jordan ) life . It is true criminal offense in every sense of the phrase , and yet it does something that is rare within the genre .
It focuses more on the victim at the center of its story than his Orcinus orca and , in doing so , highlights just how much was lost when he was shoot down . By centering itself around the man of its protagonist and spotlighting the fallout of his murder , Fruitvale Stationalso negociate to touch on a repeat dead on target crime theme — namely , how America ’s organization repeatedly give out to protect and take care of the most vulnerable among us .
Fruitvale Stationis cyclosis now onMax .
5. Killers of the Flower Moon (2023)
Few movie maker have spent as much time exploring the moral price of offence thanMartin Martin Scorsese . In 2023 , he did so again inKillers of the Flower Moon , which explore the serial killing of multiple penis of the Osage Nation in twenties Oklahoma that was carried out by their prehensile white neighbour . The three - hr epos unflinchingly lay bare the racist , institutional immorality that earmark its central slaying — as well as countless other inconceivable crimes throughout America ’s account — to not only pass but go practically unpunished .
Even by his standards , Scorsese ’s film remove such a deep lamentable register that you are depart feel the full , inescapable exercising weight of the crime depict in it . In one of his most inspire directorial flourishes , Scorsese then endsKillers of the Flower Moonwith an epilogue that acknowledges both the inherently debatable nature of true criminal offense and the office he has play in the entertainment - ification of literal - life tragedy , all while still finding a way to habituate the the motion-picture show ’s genre as a fomite to make one last , meat - wrenching period .
Killers of the Flower Moonis streaming now onApple TV+ .
4. Spotlight (2015)
Both a true crime thriller and a journalism drama , 2015’sSpotlightis one of the more careful and methodical films on this inclination . Directed in a bright understated fashion by Tom McCarthy , the Best Picture victor detail a Boston Globe team ’s efforts to expose the Catholic Church ’s taxonomical covering up of example of sexual abuse perpetrated by legion priests .
The stories that the Boston Globe publish as a solution of this real - life investigation rightly earned the paper the Pulitzer Prize for Public Service in 2003 , and McCarthy ’s film does an exceptional line of highlighting both the grandness of its dependable crime story and the disaster of the crimes that its professional subject bring out to the world . It also just so chance to boast one of the good ensemble cast of characters of the 2010s .
Spotlightis cyclosis now onStarz .
3. Goodfellas (1990)
This list easily could have featured even more Martin Scorsese moving picture than it already does . In an effort to highlight other films , though , we ’ve choose to limit his presence in this collection to the previously mentionedKillers of the Flower Moonand his 1990 masterpieceGoodfellas .
exalt by the real - living advance and fall of mobster Henry Hill , Goodfellascaptures the allure , chaos , depravity , and emptiness of a life of crime with such exacting item and style that watching it is at last one of the most stimulating experience you ’ll ever have as a moviegoer . Like all of Scorsese ’s good films , it ’s a drama made with a startlingly clear eye — one that understand the temptingness and Leontyne Price of sin so plainly that it has no problem striking the perfect proportionality between entertainment and striking profundity .
Goodfellasis useable to lease now on most digital platform .
2. Memories of Murder (2003)
Sixteen years before he made his Oscar - winning external hitParasite , South Korean filmmakerBong Joon - homade arguably his greatest film , 2003’sMemories of Murder . slackly based on South Korea ’s first confirmed case of serial killing , the film follows an odd - couple pair of police detectives who become obsessed with see the man responsible for a recent string of rapes and murders .
Over the line of their investigation , both detectives unravel in different way — one miss his act - first - question - later bluster ; the other his steely calm air . By the clip it has reached its haunting ending , Memories of Murderhas movingly instance the lasting marks that immorality can leave , as well as how the pursuit of the verity is one that a person can never sprain out from once it has gotten their draw into them .
Memories of Murderis cyclosis now onTubi .
1. Zodiac (2007)
This is it . If there is one honest criminal offense plastic film to recommend above all others , it isZodiac . David Fincher‘s 2007 chef-d’oeuvre is a titanic workplace of American filmmaking — an epic thriller that pulls double - obligation as both an obsessive piece of re - institution and minute item and a psychologically fertile pieceaboutobsession .
It is a painstakingly well - craft film about the substantial - spirit Zodiac murders , as well as the probe — both prescribed and not — into the never - bewitch killer responsible for them . Along the way , Fincher not only bring the horrifying evilness of the Zodiac Killer ’s crimes into the open but also reveals the full , grand WWW of carmine herrings , viable suspects , and idle - close clues that spring up in the backwash of the murders themselves .
Zodiac , in other words , explores a key true statement about true offence itself , which is that the demurrer of Department of Justice and the hungriness for it are adequate reasons why the genre remains so pop and so appealing to so many . Those vista , of form , andthe impulse to realise evil , which is , perhaps , the one desireZodiacwisely does n’t essay to fulfil .
Zodiacis streaming now onMGM+ .
