True Crime Dramas And Thrillers!...
Some of the most intense, suspenseful crime films ever made have been based -sometimes loosely- on true stories. Here's a list of some exceptional examples...
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- DirectorTerrence MalickStarsMartin SheenSissy SpacekWarren OatesAn impressionable teenage girl from a dead-end town, and her older greaser boyfriend, embark on a killing spree in the South Dakota Badlands.
- DirectorIda LupinoStarsEdmond O'BrienFrank LovejoyWilliam TalmanTwo friends pick up a psychopathic escaped convict who tells them that he intends to murder them when the ride is over.
- DirectorJames LandisStarsArch Hall Jr.Helen HoveyRichard AldenThree people driving into Los Angeles for a Dodgers game have car trouble and pull off into an old wrecking yard where they are held at bay by a bloodthirsty psycho and his crazy girlfriend.
- DirectorRichard BrooksStarsRobert BlakeScott WilsonJohn ForsytheTwo ex-cons murder a family in a robbery attempt, before going on the run from the authorities. The police try to piece together the details of the murder in an attempt to track down the killers.
- DirectorRichard FleischerStarsTony CurtisHenry FondaGeorge KennedyA series of strangulation murders of Boston women sparks a protracted complex manhunt. Law professor John Bottomley leads a multi-jurisdictional task force in the investigation, with help from surviving victim Diane Cluny.
- DirectorSidney LumetStarsAl PacinoJohn CazalePenelope AllenThree amateur robbers plan to hold up a Brooklyn bank. A nice, simple robbery: Walk in, take the money, and run. Unfortunately, the supposedly uncomplicated heist suddenly becomes a bizarre nightmare as everything that could go wrong does.
- DirectorDavid FincherStarsJake GyllenhaalRobert Downey Jr.Mark RuffaloBetween 1968 and 1983, a San Francisco cartoonist becomes an amateur detective obsessed with tracking down the Zodiac Killer, an unidentified individual who terrorizes Northern California with a killing spree.
- StarsGeorge DiCenzoSteve RailsbackNancy WolfeThe investigation and trial of the horrific Tate-LaBianca mass murders orchestrated by the psychotic pseudo-hippie cult leader, Charles Manson.
- DirectorsDenis HérouxGéza von RadványiStarsMathieu CarrièreDebra BergerChristine BoissonA disturbed American war veteran arrives in Belfast during the Northern Ireland conflicts, and proceeds to terrorize a household of female nursing students.
- DirectorWilliam FriedkinStarsGene HackmanRoy ScheiderFernando ReyA pair of NYPD detectives in the Narcotics Bureau stumble onto a heroin smuggling ring based in Marseilles, but stopping them and capturing their leaders proves an elusive goal.
- DirectorCharles B. PierceStarsBen JohnsonAndrew PrineDawn WellsThe story of a berserk, hooded killer who terrorized the border town of Texarkana, Arkansas in 1946--leaving no fewer than five murder victims in his wake. He was never caught. Based on one of America's most baffling murder cases.
- DirectorArthur PennStarsWarren BeattyFaye DunawayMichael J. PollardBored waitress Bonnie Parker falls in love with an ex-con named Clyde Barrow and together they start a violent crime spree through the country, stealing cars and robbing banks.
- DirectorRobert WiseStarsSusan HaywardSimon OaklandVirginia VincentA prostitute sentenced to death for murder pleads her innocence.
- DirectorDavid GriecoStarsMalcolm McDowellMarton CsokasRonald PickupA disgraced communist schoolteacher in Kyiv becomes a brutal, unfeeling serial killer. Based on the crimes of Andrei Chikatilo.
- DirectorScott L. FlynnStarsPatrick BauchauJack ConleyJohn AylwardObsessive manhunt to identify and capture a despicable serial killer.
- DirectorAlfred HitchcockStarsHenry FondaVera MilesAnthony QuayleIn 1953, an innocent man named Christopher Emanuel "Manny" Balestrero is arrested after being mistaken for an armed robber.
- DirectorPeter JacksonStarsMelanie LynskeyKate WinsletSarah PeirseTwo teenage girls share a unique bond: their parents, concerned that the friendship is too intense, separate them, and the girls take revenge.
- DirectorMervyn LeRoyStarsPaul MuniGlenda FarrellHelen VinsonA World War I veteran and aspiring engineer tries to re-enter civilian life. After being unwillingly caught up in a robbery, he suffers the intolerable conditions of a Southern chain gang, struggling to clear his name and prove his worth.
- DirectorSamuel FullerStarsVincent PriceEllen DrewVladimir SokoloffMaster swindler James Reavis painstakingly spends years forging documents and land grants that will make his wife and him undisputed owners of the entire territory of Arizona.
- DirectorJohn McNaughtonStarsMichael RookerTracy ArnoldTom TowlesArriving in Chicago, Henry moves in with ex-con acquaintance Otis and starts schooling him in the ways of the serial killer.
- DirectorChuck ParelloStarsSteve RailsbackCarrie SnodgressCarol MansellThe story of Ed Gein, who dug up the corpses of over a dozen women and made things out of their remains before finally shooting two people to death and butchering their bodies like beef sides.
- DirectorUlli LommelStarsKurt RaabJeff RodenMargit CarstensenUsing his status as a police informant to procure his victims, baby-faced, shaven-headed Fritz Haarmann dismembers their bodies after death and sells the flesh to restaurants, dumping the remainder out of sight.